our pretty nest

if any of you are familiar with the bay area housing market this story likely sounds familiar to you. my husband & i were relocating from nyc, looking to call berkeley our home. after 6 months of looking at houses, we were lucky enough to find a 6-month rental home which bought us more time. more time to keep looking at houses, being outbid, and being disappointed. 

our now house came on the market mid-october 2013 and we hemmed and hawed about it. visited numerous times. stalked the open houses. yet, we never felt strong enough about it to write an offer. and in a most interesting turn of events, after the 2 week showing window, the house didn’t go into contract, like the 200+ other homes we saw. we kept visiting, and watching.....after about 10 weeks, the owners took it off the market, hoping to sell in the spring. we had just lost the bid on another house by $11,000 that week, and realized, this was our chance, this was meant to be our home. 

a house no one really wanted, and a couple who couldn’t find a place to call home. yup. just as romantic as it sounds. we’ve done tons of research, multiple thousands of pins, and are finally ready to embark on updating and renovating our home, one room at a time. hope you’ll follow us on our journey. 

here are the before pics to get you caught up.

a beautiful artist sketch - comes free with the listing!

view from our backyard, up

our entry. no foyer. no coat closet. manilla yellow.

living room - staged.

dining room staged. remind me to tell you the time jess & i broke in through the window on the right. i told you we visited this house often!

artsy craftsy

do love the windows on the sides of the oven.

our master bedroom. learned the hard way that the staged bed was made of boxes.

our view. reason for buying this house.

this bathroom. a reason not to buy this house. lands end chic, circa 1984. that window - etching of mount tam on it. seriously.

spare bedroom.

black & white bathroom. (duh).

basement bedroom/office.