I got the wife to agree to move to Florida. :D :D :D :D
Now, just gotta figure out the out of state house buying thing. I personally would like to rent for 6 months and check out all the area's but she's not going for it. She wants to buy. So, any suggestions on area's in the general Orlando area? Anyone bought a house out of state before moving there and living there for a while? How'd you do it? Fly down and look at houses for a week? Or, did you do it online. Suggestions welcome.
More or less, I use to live in Miami Beach. But, she doesn't want to move that far south, so the Orlando area is our target, along with surrounding areas within 50 miles of Orlando? Any suggestions? I"m more or less looking for a 3k to 4k sq. ft. house, new construction, or newer build (year 2k and newer.) Any suggestions for areas to stay away from? I don't want to be too far out of the city.
Florida peep's.. .help me out here. Out of state moving experiances??? Things to stay away from? How'd you do it?
:D :D
I'd also like to be in a race track frendly area meaing I don't want to drive 7 hours to get to a track. I know Daytona isn't that far from Orlando, but how about Jennings ???
:D
Look out Florida, here comes Hurricane Dan ;D :P
Guess that means you won't be racing with us this year? ::)
QuoteGuess that means you won't be racing with us this year? ::)
Not at all. I"ll still spend half my time in Chicago, so I'll still be racing the Midwest region. :D
Orlando is great, but the area between Jacksonville and St. Augustine has the best bargains in the real estate market by far. My friend just bought a new 3800 sq. ft, 2 floor, 5 bedroom, 3 bath house with a HUGE garage and 3/4 of an acre in a cul-de-sac for under $300K. The prices go up every day, though. Obviously people are finding out about the market. I love golf (and racing, weird, I know) and this area has the highest course/resident number in the WORLD... the golf hall of fame helps that. There are lots of other great things, like being centrally located to almost every racetrack in the southeast. If you drive down, definitely take a look around (I-95 and SR 210 is a good place to start).
Thanks. I can't believe how cheap the houses actually are. We've been looking at houses that are in the $250's that would cost almost $500's in Detroit. I've been arguing it with the wife for months, and finally today she said fine. It took todays current weather of 6 deg. to get her to move. In all reality, I can work from anywhere, and the company I work for has been looking for an excuse to open a Florida office. Now we got one :D
In all reality, my quest to move to FL started last Thanksgiving when I took the wife to Disney. She loved the area. I've been pressing ever since. I used to live in South Beach, but the wife isn't having that one. She doesn't want the kid to grow up in Miami area.
We've already started looking at houses, and have a long list. The current plan is to fly down, rent a car, and spend a week looking. The only problem is, is that a week isn't long enough to find out if your looking at houses in bad areas. I figured I'd stop by the police stations and ask, but every city always has a bad area somewhere. I just don't want to move into to it. That's my main point of asking you guys. Until you've been on the scene for a while, you really don't know. I'd like to find an area where it's not in a downtown area congested with traffic, yet not so far out in the Suburbs that it takes 30 minutes to get anywhere. We'll see. Keep the advice going. :)
Real Estate Example:
Detroit Area- 3950 sq. ft. 4 bedroom, 3 full bath, 3 car garage. .35 acre lot. $625,000.00
You know what kind of house you could get down in FL for $625K :o 10K sq. ft or something. Detroit is way overpriced. >:(
Nothing against you, corner, but I never understood the need for 3500 square feet for what, 3 people?
Houses keep getting bigger. It seems ridiculous to me. We had 6 people for a while in 1700 SF, and now with 3 it seems too big.
I guess I question how often all of those SF get used.
Does anyone else NOT agree with the trend of huge houses? There are a few that I've seen that aren't fans. Just wondering what racers thought.
Now garages or work areas are a different story. ;D
Again, nothing against anyone that likes houses that big, I'm just trying to understand the need/desire for it.
Well, I plan on having another kid sooner or later. Plus, I have to deal with the mother in law coming over for week long stays ::) ;)
Honestly, I don't know. I just want a house with plenty of room. I also want a huge garage, and enough land to put up my own pole barn to house all the toys. So far, I've yet to find a garage that is what they say it is. To me, when you say it is "3 car," it should fit 3 cars side by side and you should be able to open all the doors all the way and have room to walk between them still. Haven't found a real 3 car garage. Those garage are 5 car. If it can't fit 3 full size cars, it's not 3 car.
3 car garage = 1.5 car garage if you ask me. They say it fits 3 cars, but what kind of cars? Kia?
and don't forget, the bigger the house, the more bikes you can fit in the living room ;) ;D ;D
You will do anything so that you don't have to show up at the track! Remember we still have a bet going!
When I moved up from Fl, I first rented for 6 months to get a good look at locations and market.
At the time there were not that many options online, so you may get a lot more help now with it.
I highly recommend looking at movers. It makes it a ton easier and it's worth it, considering how much it costs to rent a truck.
I can hook you up with some great land in the everglades if you are looking! I'll make you a special deal too... ;D ;D
You may want to wait a bit before moving for all of the houses that got damaged in the 3 hurricanes to get rebuilt... I am sure the market me be pretty aggresive down there at this time! Specially in the Orlando area.
This is a different topic but FWIW I totally agree with Nate R. With 3 kids 2,800 sq ft was plenty roomy. Formal living rooms are a waste too. If I have to play dress ups for somebody they aren't my friend and I don't want them in my house. Now, with the last of the kids shipping out on the 26th, it's way, way too much.
I guess if the inlaws were moving in I would want more, or better yet, a whole lot less, so they find somewhere else to go. ;D
QuoteI guess if the inlaws were moving in I would want more, or better yet, a whole lot less, so they find somewhere else to go. ;D
LOL....
However we're looking at that possibility in the future and our house is only 1200 square feet. Perhaps we'll put them up in the barn ;D
I agree with Nate. Everyday I drive past these HUGE houses and think.... WHY?
Dawn
QuoteYou will do anything so that you don't have to show up at the track! Remember we still have a bet going!
;D I'll still be in Chicago 9 days a month. Also, I don't make bets I can't win. Just ask Rev. ;) ;D
Well, I need room. I also work from home alot, so that means I need to be able to work without the kid yelling in the backround while I'm on the phone.
Realistically, most people don't need large homes. They also don't need leather interiors in cars, ect. But, people still get it. I don't know, I grow up in a big house, and always lived in one. They weren't anything special. :-/ Just nice to have enough room to do what you want and not have to go buy again later if you need more room. Most houses now are over 2k sq. ft. anyways, especially in subdivisions.
Get a good real estate agent in Orlando. He or she will ask some questions, and show you some houses that meet your needs. Scheduling in advance should allow you to see 15-20 properties per day.
If you need a referral, PM me.
(disclaimer: I'm not involved in real estate sales, but I have some friends who are)
::) This thread. C'mon Dan!
I'm serious H. I wanna move. I've been wanting to, and this frigid weather finally helped me convince the wife. The only thing keeping us around in the past was her father. And now.... well, you know. Anyways, I'm already on the hunt. I'd like to move soon. Preferrably before the warm weather hits MI.
Okay. If you're serious about moving so be it. But, how old are you? [that's a rhetorical question]. You're the CTO of your company, you claim to have had a large custom home built in Washington Twp (very nice suburb of Detroit) and you know no one to hook you up with a real estate lead?
Your wife turns to you for he car being purchased, getting repaired and assisting with matters on her family's side yet a very expensive and important decision like where your children will go to school, your neighborhood and home, she's insisting that decision is to be made in one week? And you're just going along with that?
Just saying this tread doesn't hold much logical credibility for me.
In any case, I wish you well in your future Dan-O.
Just gimme my beers (including the one from the bet you lost to me earlier this year) before you head south ;D
Actually, your right on most of it. I wasn't really asking for a realestate lead though, although appreciated. I was asking others how they did it when moving out of state. Closing on the house, ect. That's all. I'm not sure exactly what area's are good and bad. That's why I'm asking here. So we don't end up in the wrong area. I know it takes time, but renting isn't an option for us anymore. Long story. I'm sure that we can find a house down there without going thru too much headache when it comes to actually find it. The purchase itself is probably a pain though. Never bought out of state land before. There does come the point where everything is obvious, plus their is always research on the internet.
As far as the time line, it's wide open. Whenever we find something we'll move. I'd like to move ASAP, but that isn't going to happen for a while. My goal is to head somewhere warm year round. More or less H, I want to find the "Washington Twp." in the Orlando, FL area. That type of location. Just don't know where it is.
And Washington isn't the greatest. It's just semi-quiet, but not too far away from everything else. That's what I want.
and I always pay my bets ;)
Don't think I'd move to Orlando area on purpose, but I do know of a set of Dunlops that have not moved to Wisconsin yet ::)
Are you moving from the cold or the heat?
Damn, I forgot. :-[
Moving to heat from the cold
QuoteReal Estate Example:
Detroit Area- 3950 sq. ft. 4 bedroom, 3 full bath, 3 car garage. .35 acre lot. $625,000.00
You know what kind of house you could get down in FL for $625K :o 10K sq. ft or something. Detroit is way overpriced. >:(
You would have to be looking in pretty rural areas to get 10,000 sf of house for less thatn $625k. In south Tampa/Hyde park/Palma ceia area $625k gets you less than 3,000sf but some of hte best school districts and classic 1920's homes, or new homes built to look like 1920 homes due to Architecural review commity..
Jennings is about 3hrs from orlando.. Same with tampa.
hey richboy.. you live in Grosse Pointe now? You know Werner Spitz? He used to be the Wayne County chief medical examiner.
Richboy ??? Hardly.
No, I live in Washington Twp. I work in Grosse Pointe. Our offices were in Troy, and they moved us to Grosse Pointe so we could be closer to the General Malfunction HQ.
Werner Spitz ??? Don't know him. Why would I? I've never been to the Medical Examiners Office.
You lost me on this one Rev...
Can I help ya with something? Need to contact or ... ?
Big issue for me in out of state move was what to do with my current house. We had only been in it a year so we had very little wiggle room on price since we had such little equity to cover selling costs.
We ended up renting it out for a couple of years and then sold at a price where we at least covered our sales costs.
Don't know what your situation is.... do you not have to worry about selling the house?
QuoteDon't know what your situation is.... do you not have to worry about selling the house?
Yeah I still have to sell a house, but that doesn't concern me too much. More than likely, my brother is going to move in and watch over the house until it sells. I'm in the process of listing it now, but Realtors are hard to pick. Plus, I don't really want to pay anyone commision, not that I have a choice. I don't know where I"ll stand with taking a second mortgage on another property without selling this one first. They may require it so I don't have two big payments. Hopefully I can sell this one quick, and pull the equity out of it and use that as the down payment on the next one. This time I'm going to do a 10/30 Interest Only. I got lucky on this house I'm in because I should be able to make a little bit, and I have a 30 year conventional mortgage on it. As soon as the kid is old enough to go to school full time, I want to build a custom home down there once we've lived there for a few years and know what's what. So, I'd rather do interest only on the next house. Biggest mistake I made on this house I"m in now is that it's a conventional mortgage. I thought I'd die in it. Oh well, it was built cheap enough so I can make some money.
dan,if you are serious pm me... i live just outside orlando and work in the area every day.i know the school districs and the home values
Will do, thanks. I need a few to catch up and then I'll send you a PM. Just started talking to an agent today. :)
Dan ..... you have a PM. Not related to this topic though.
Rick
;D Thanks.
QuoteRichboy ??? Hardly.
No, I live in Washington Twp. I work in Grosse Pointe. Our offices were in Troy, and they moved us to Grosse Pointe so we could be closer to the General Malfunction HQ.
Werner Spitz ??? Don't know him. Why would I? I've never been to the Medical Examiners Office.
You lost me on this one Rev...
Can I help ya with something? Need to contact or ... ?
nah.. just a world reknown pathologist that lives in Grosse Pointe and also a relative. :P
oh. I thought maybe you were trying to put a hit out on someone or something ;D :P