The House Hunt

Previous to moving to Tucson, we had been poor college students for a few years. Three degrees plus one baby is not really a formula for a really solid nest egg. We decided that we'd rent an apartment for at least a year and save for a down payment on a house. A few weeks ago, we met with a mortgage broker just to see if we were on track and what all sort of house we could afford when it came time for that sort of thing. He ran some numbers for us and based on our credit scores and the market and the housing legislation just signed into law by President Bush, he convinced us that we should buy a house sooner rather than later.

Thus, what was a casual interest in the housing market became an active interest. We've been going out with a realtor every Saturday for a month and this week, I think we found at least the area we'd like to live: Rancho Sahuarita. It's a new community, so it's shiny and clean. On every block or so is a mini park with grass and a playground and in the middle is this amazing community center with a gym, pool, drop-in child care, above pictured splash park, massive play structure, little tricycles for the kids to play around in, an electric train, a lake (about the size of tri-city park for all my family in California) which you can boat on and fish in, hiking trails, and biking trails. I mean, the city has a staff of event planners.

We haven't found a specific house we like yet, but at least we can stop looking everywhere in the greater Tucson area and concentrate on one area.