After finding the 1900 house in January 2003 and our unsuccessful back up offer, we continued to take drives down Hwy 17 South to our search area, but there wasn't much on the market at the time and if an old house did become available that wasn't in need of a total restoration, they were snapped up either by other old house enthusiasts or out of state investors...the competition was becoming more fierce by the day. And I was getting very discouraged.....
The photos above were taken April 14 2008 - somehow we've lost the photos we took in 2003....the house looks much better now, but its missing some of it wrap-around porches, the "welcoming arms" staircases, the fish kitchen and the summer kitchen...likely termites had feasted for too long to salvage any of that....the porch on the back is new......!
In October 2003, David was reading the paper over breakfast and suddenly he began reading an advertisement out loud to me....."1890's Old Florida Cracker Home on 2 acres" ......he ends his reading with "once Hunter's on the bus, we'll head down to see this place". About an hour after putting Hunter on the bus, we found ourselves turning onto the road where the Cracker house stood. That dirt road meandered its way through trees past several trailers each sitting on about an acre of land until at last we turn a corner and see the house.
David pulled up in front of the house and I hear him say...."no way" and suddenly he's about to turn the car around and leave .......but something about the house calls to me.....! I can "see" the potential in the wrap around double decker porches that were falling off the house...after all David was a carpenter for a few years and he was taught by his father who was a master! And didn't we own a home repair and remodeling business for a while? We could make this house beautiful again.....I just knew it.
We walked around the back and there was a "summer kitchen" still standing along with a "fish kitchen" on the back porch and believe it or not, a swimming pool! The back acreage was almost completely fenced..... We called the agent and she met us at the house for a walk through....
The inside was worse then the outside of this house -through the years, additions were made and exterior windows had been left in interior rooms, the original hallway had been removed to allow for a larger living room (where once were a hall and two rooms, now there was a L.R. and a bedroom)....the original staircase to the second story had once been outside the house and walls had been built around it to enclose it, but the exterior doors were still there....three of them! The kitchen was barely large enough for the two of us to be in at the same time....but wait, that wall could be removed and ...................
We learned from the agent that the home had been in the same family since it was built in 1890; the trailers that lined the dirt road all belonged to relatives who had been parcelled out shares of the land throughout the years. The matriarch of the family had recently passed away and left the house and 2 acres to one of her sons who had no desire to live there. None of the other relatives were in a position to purchase the house and make the renovations neccessary (installing central heat and air, upgrading the electrical system, making the wrap-around porches secure again etc.).
Saying thanks to the agent for meeting us, we head on home to discuss this house and whether or not we could afford to take it on and to consider whether we wanted to live in what amounted to a "family compound" where we could possibly be forever considered interlopers and shunned (at one point as a child, I had lived in just such a family compound and the shunning can be a real issue especially where children are concerned, believe me).
The asking price was $30,000 more than the January house and this one was in much worse shape......we'd have to get a construction loan to purchase this one and would probably not get permission to live in it until certain things had been accomplished......That night we decide to go down for another look before we put in an offer.
The next day we drove down with Nikki along to see the house....she stopped just inside the front door and said "I don't like this place" and then she shivered....I coaxed her through the downstairs and then prodded her upstairs....where she kept saying "I don't like this place.....I won't live here with you if you buy this house"....! I laughed it off telling her that a few coats of paint, the removal of this wall and that wall, a french door here will take away those feelings...it can beautiful again..."just you wait". Once outside, Nikki was crawling out of her skin...even the crow of a rooster made her jump two feet off the ground and although I laughed so hard tears rolled down my face, I have to admit that I wondered just why she was having such a heightened reaction to this old house....!
We once again headed home to discuss the pros and cons of buying this house. Unlike the 1900 house, this one had had very little updating done over the years; previously land rich, the family had little to cover their day to day existence, let alone keep the house in good repair. This one would be a very big challenge and we needed to be very certain it was one we wanted to take on.....
In the end, by the time we decided to go ahead and make an offer, there were three other people looking to do the same.....all three offers were submitted at the same time...ours was the only full price offer, but we had the contingency of needing to sell our home in order to purchase that one. The seller decided to take another offer due to that contingency. And my heart broke a little .....
I was so discouraged by this point in our search, that I told David I didn't want to even look at another place until Dallas had finished that year of school....I began to think of buying land and building our own house based upon an historic design plan....and it was December 1st before David talked me into heading down south to continue our search..........
I didn't know it yet, but God had a plan for us and it didn't include that house....! We were in our 1909 Farmhouse before that house was actually sold.....( we put our house on the market on Dec 1, sold it on Dec 21st and were in our house by February 6th!) and it took more many months for the seller to go to closing....!
The contract the seller accepted in October 2003 was withdrawn in January 2004 due to illness in the family; a second contract closed around May of 2004 but the buyer almost immediately turned around and sold it after only a few weeks of attempted renovations.
When it came back on the market for a third time in July, I was working at the office of the agent who had shown us the house...she had been asked to market it again. One afternoon, she and I went to lunch with the person who had actually placed the third offer presented along with ours the previous October....we had contacted this prospective buyer to see if he was still interested in the old Cracker House. During that lunch, he and I discussed our October offers, and I learned that he just happened to be a ghost hunter (!)and a reporter for the local newspaper.....he had heard that the house was haunted and that was why he had wanted to buy it. He never did buy that old house; I think by July of 2004 he had realized that haunted or not, that house was having a hard time being owned by folks other than family.........
So perhaps that was why Nikki had the reaction she had to that house......
a few months ago, David and I drove by to see what progress had been made on that cracker house by its new owner...only to see that not much had been accomplished at all, at least from the outside. The owner appears to be living in a trailer beside the house....! We spoke to a neighbor, a grandson of the previous owner of the house......and "yes, ma'm, it shor' is haunted"....!
In October 2003, David was reading the paper over breakfast and suddenly he began reading an advertisement out loud to me....."1890's Old Florida Cracker Home on 2 acres" ......he ends his reading with "once Hunter's on the bus, we'll head down to see this place". About an hour after putting Hunter on the bus, we found ourselves turning onto the road where the Cracker house stood. That dirt road meandered its way through trees past several trailers each sitting on about an acre of land until at last we turn a corner and see the house.
David pulled up in front of the house and I hear him say...."no way" and suddenly he's about to turn the car around and leave .......but something about the house calls to me.....! I can "see" the potential in the wrap around double decker porches that were falling off the house...after all David was a carpenter for a few years and he was taught by his father who was a master! And didn't we own a home repair and remodeling business for a while? We could make this house beautiful again.....I just knew it.
We walked around the back and there was a "summer kitchen" still standing along with a "fish kitchen" on the back porch and believe it or not, a swimming pool! The back acreage was almost completely fenced..... We called the agent and she met us at the house for a walk through....
The inside was worse then the outside of this house -through the years, additions were made and exterior windows had been left in interior rooms, the original hallway had been removed to allow for a larger living room (where once were a hall and two rooms, now there was a L.R. and a bedroom)....the original staircase to the second story had once been outside the house and walls had been built around it to enclose it, but the exterior doors were still there....three of them! The kitchen was barely large enough for the two of us to be in at the same time....but wait, that wall could be removed and ...................
Upstairs there were four bedrooms and a long hallway with two doors at either end leading out onto the falling down porches.....all the rooms were completely paneled in bead board (including the ceilings) and stained a dark walnut making it appear very dark....sanding and some light yellow paint would take care of that.............
We learned from the agent that the home had been in the same family since it was built in 1890; the trailers that lined the dirt road all belonged to relatives who had been parcelled out shares of the land throughout the years. The matriarch of the family had recently passed away and left the house and 2 acres to one of her sons who had no desire to live there. None of the other relatives were in a position to purchase the house and make the renovations neccessary (installing central heat and air, upgrading the electrical system, making the wrap-around porches secure again etc.).
Saying thanks to the agent for meeting us, we head on home to discuss this house and whether or not we could afford to take it on and to consider whether we wanted to live in what amounted to a "family compound" where we could possibly be forever considered interlopers and shunned (at one point as a child, I had lived in just such a family compound and the shunning can be a real issue especially where children are concerned, believe me).
The asking price was $30,000 more than the January house and this one was in much worse shape......we'd have to get a construction loan to purchase this one and would probably not get permission to live in it until certain things had been accomplished......That night we decide to go down for another look before we put in an offer.
The next day we drove down with Nikki along to see the house....she stopped just inside the front door and said "I don't like this place" and then she shivered....I coaxed her through the downstairs and then prodded her upstairs....where she kept saying "I don't like this place.....I won't live here with you if you buy this house"....! I laughed it off telling her that a few coats of paint, the removal of this wall and that wall, a french door here will take away those feelings...it can beautiful again..."just you wait". Once outside, Nikki was crawling out of her skin...even the crow of a rooster made her jump two feet off the ground and although I laughed so hard tears rolled down my face, I have to admit that I wondered just why she was having such a heightened reaction to this old house....!
We once again headed home to discuss the pros and cons of buying this house. Unlike the 1900 house, this one had had very little updating done over the years; previously land rich, the family had little to cover their day to day existence, let alone keep the house in good repair. This one would be a very big challenge and we needed to be very certain it was one we wanted to take on.....
In the end, by the time we decided to go ahead and make an offer, there were three other people looking to do the same.....all three offers were submitted at the same time...ours was the only full price offer, but we had the contingency of needing to sell our home in order to purchase that one. The seller decided to take another offer due to that contingency. And my heart broke a little .....
I was so discouraged by this point in our search, that I told David I didn't want to even look at another place until Dallas had finished that year of school....I began to think of buying land and building our own house based upon an historic design plan....and it was December 1st before David talked me into heading down south to continue our search..........
I didn't know it yet, but God had a plan for us and it didn't include that house....! We were in our 1909 Farmhouse before that house was actually sold.....( we put our house on the market on Dec 1, sold it on Dec 21st and were in our house by February 6th!) and it took more many months for the seller to go to closing....!
The contract the seller accepted in October 2003 was withdrawn in January 2004 due to illness in the family; a second contract closed around May of 2004 but the buyer almost immediately turned around and sold it after only a few weeks of attempted renovations.
When it came back on the market for a third time in July, I was working at the office of the agent who had shown us the house...she had been asked to market it again. One afternoon, she and I went to lunch with the person who had actually placed the third offer presented along with ours the previous October....we had contacted this prospective buyer to see if he was still interested in the old Cracker House. During that lunch, he and I discussed our October offers, and I learned that he just happened to be a ghost hunter (!)and a reporter for the local newspaper.....he had heard that the house was haunted and that was why he had wanted to buy it. He never did buy that old house; I think by July of 2004 he had realized that haunted or not, that house was having a hard time being owned by folks other than family.........
So perhaps that was why Nikki had the reaction she had to that house......
a few months ago, David and I drove by to see what progress had been made on that cracker house by its new owner...only to see that not much had been accomplished at all, at least from the outside. The owner appears to be living in a trailer beside the house....! We spoke to a neighbor, a grandson of the previous owner of the house......and "yes, ma'm, it shor' is haunted"....!
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