Storage and Stuff and Squirrels, Oh My!

  Despite getting rid of all of our stuff, we keep stashing it away into smaller and smaller compartments as we move locations. It's getting culled down, but we keep mini-hoarding without realizing it. Just one closet full of stuff --> Just one suitcase full of stuff --> Just one box full of stuff....  People are crazy, us included.

Selling all of our furniture was on the Champagne List. Well, we did that. Actually most of it went to a friend from my work who is setting up a new home (What's up, Jess!). But some things, and some furniture are too sentimental to leave behind or sell (family heirlooms, etc). So we got a storage locker. It's the smallest one we could find 5x8, and it's a bit out of town (cheaper!) - but it's still an expense we're carrying with us.

Money Disclosure: Our storage locker is costing us $92/month to keep while we're gone. We auto-pay it monthly and can manage it remotely while we're gone. After traveling for a while it may seem like a large expense, but for now it's worth it to us to keep the heirlooms and such safe.

And I think this brings us to the end of the story of our Stuff! Yeay!

$275.99

Hey Friends! 

Brief Interruption: I disappeared again for a bit - I guess 'the internets' spooked me out a bit. I started this blog using my full real name without thinking too much about it, and recently several casual acquaintances and friends have found out about the blog (not too hard really). It has always been my intention to let all of my family and friends know about the blog... but being 'outed' about the blog spooked me, and I was avoiding it for a while (can I get a woot-woot from the other avoiders out there?!) On the the fun stuff:

After the negotiations in the pub in Portland - we had to run off to an Office Depot…. 

But - You're dying to know if we made our millions selling the house! So, drum roll please….

$275.99

After lawyer fees, real estate fees, negotiations with the buyer and all that jazz... That's how much we made selling our house. I know, don't spend it all an once, right? It was a hard process that we alluded to HERE and HERE and even HERE. And in the end we shared our excitement over selling HERE! That was a fun day. After all was said and done, we broke even - coming out just a squeak ahead!  

We sold our furniture. We donated our clothes to Goodwill. It's crazy how much stuff people accumulate when living in a set place for what they expect to be an indeterminate amount of time. We're still culling through it, scaling back and cutting down. The good news is that seeing your 'stuff' in boxes on the floor of your mom's basements sure adds perspective to their worth. It's simplicity time!! 


Cheers, until next time!

House Selling 101: Do it in a bar.

Okay friends, I know you all want to know about our trips, but we have WAY MORE EXCITING NEWS to share!

We sold our house!

WHILE ON VACATION. 

Yep, the deal is already firm and possession is June 15. That is exactly 30 days from today. Or 722 hours... but who's counting? Money question: We'll end up breaking even.After nearly 3 months on the market, we're happy with that.

Here's the funny part for you - we got it all on video!  Juliano [the video nerd] was trying to film some beer tastings we were doing for his Portland video when I got the call from our realtor. So, through the magic of technology - I present you:

Selling a house while sampling beer in the middle of the day!

And that is our tale bloggy friends. I'll be rolling out our trip stuff and keeping you posted about the move - yikes! Meanwhile, out of town family will be staying with us this weekend and next... so we'll be busy!

ARGH! Frustration and a House

Our house deal was supposed to go firm today - but our deal fell through. The buyers decided not to go through with the purchase and backed out. Argh!

We're frustrated, disappointed and trying hard not to be angry. We've sold a bunch of stuff, booked a storage locker and redone our budgets in anticipation of a mid-April possession... and now it looks like we're back to showings and waiting. Waiting and showings.

Feels like someone threw an ice-cold bucket of negativity on our excitement. Tell me friends - how do you stay motivated and positive when nothing seems to be going your way??

** Update: Okay, sorry for being such a downer friends! I wrote this last night... but even today I'm feeling much more cheery. I've found a short term solution:

[1] Put the sign back and move forward!
[2] Go to Dairy Queen and get a mint Oreo blizzard.

Kijiji Time: Sell your sh*t!

Since we have a {still conditional} offer on the house... it's time to start getting it ready! I'm nervous and excited to sell all my stuff... the house is looking a bit emptier already! Lots of decor stuff is on it's way out - with the big pieces getting listed the moment our conditions are all met.

Hope you had a great weekend!

We got an Offer!!

 Hey Friends!

We got a conditional offer on our house last night! I’m running around collecting condo documents, ensuring everything is ready for the home inspection and preparing to sell more stuff on Kijiji.... The offer goes firm in 10 days – so I’ll keep you posted. April 27 could be our last day in our home!

Side Note about keeping stuff: We’re getting a storage locker for some things {mainly family heirlooms, old business records, etc} but I’ve been mentally adding other things from around the house to it… Remember here when I had a hard time selling my bike? Yep – the same thing is happening for our bedroom suite. I know, I know – just sell it you’re saying {Juliano’s with you on that one}. 

 

Talking to Juliano last night {who has been endlessly patient with my unreasonable amount of attachment to stuff – good Buddhist, I am not} I realized that we bought that bedroom suite as a newly married couple. We had everything from our first arguments – to secret whispers about making trip plans here… it represents the stability of the work we’ve put into this marriage and this home we’ve built together. How can I sell that?!?!

But I can. I’ll list the bedroom set, and it will sell. But it won’t be my marriage and my home going out the door with it – it will just be some {nice} furniture. Selling our things has been way more difficult than I was expecting and trying to reconcile that has been a work in progress – it’s not as easy as it looks!

I don’t want to sound like I’m throwing a pity-party here – 

just keeping it real on the de Brito front!

Timing & Climbing: The Corporate Ladder

Isn’t ‘timing’ something? Good/ Bad Timing gets a lot of credit for things that happen in our lives – and I’m not sure that I buy into that. Sometimes, timing is just timing. 

If you’re a reader of our blog, you know that we are both still working full time in the Oil & Gas corporate world. We plan on staying here as long as we can before we leave [we have to accomplish several things on the Champagne List before we go!].

However, this week – both of us have been presented with excellent career building opportunities.  These are not flash-in-a-pan things, but rather the results of growing companies and time and work invested*.  The shifts in our employment clearly open up our Calgary career paths in positive and unexpected ways.  The path in front of us is clear, comfortable and stereotypically successful.

Honest Moment: This idea is attractive. We thought about it.

We allowed imagination to wander 2, 5, 10 years down the road that was opening up in front of us. Good jobs, great money, stability, big house, babies, yearly vacations…

But just for a moment. 

Then we realized that lack of potential success was NOT what was driving us out of this city, this lifestyle. It was a desire for different adventures. So we called our realtor to come over: We’re dropping the price of our house AGAIN.

I’m glad that we have the occasional moments of wavering – because I think it forces us to keep on track for a reason. It keeps us motivated to continue pushing for the life we want.

Have you wavered in your decision to leave the familiar behind? Have you turned down opportunities for success because you wanted something different?

*Sorry for being vague – these are our actual jobs and we want to keep them private.

Stop Being Complacent!

 
House Update: We dropped the list price by $7000 in an attempt to speed up the process.

Honest Moment: I've been feeling really complacent lately.


With no offers on the house and not much going on adventure-wise - it's been easy to lose sight of our goal a bit and get comfortable with our lives here again... it's a trap I don't want to get stuck in. So, to combat this: I want to move forward with things we need to do anyways! I know the house isn't sold, but packing up might send out some good intentions to ol' universe...

I got all of our boxes from a nearby wine store... we didn't drink all that booze. Unfortunately.

Cheers!

House Update

This is the first time we've ever sold a house. Have I mentioned that? We've bought two, but never sold.

It's really nerve wracking! We are SO GLAD that we have a great realtor, who's helping us with every step of the way. She helped us with the staging, organizes all of the showings, and I know she'll be a star when it comes to negotiations!

We've had about 8 showings in 2 weeks, and we have 2 more tonight. We have to leave the house {in perfect condition} for an hour or so every time this happens. So.. we go on a lot of coffee dates :) I'm really hoping that we sell this month!

Side Note: Some of the realtors who've shown the property give feedback to our realtor. It's usually nit-picky stuff like this:  

"It is unfortunate that they have used peel&stick tile lino and laminate flooring in the majority of the home. However the layout is one of a kind for sure and that huge bathroom is a definite bonus! I think despite it's "average" rating my client still has put it on her short list."

I most certainly DID NOT use peel & stick lino! It was there when we moved in! I wanted to change it! Ha ha ha.. I can't take it personally, but it's hard when someone criticizes your home - no matter how accurate they are.

House Before & Afters

I love home decor. I think I'll miss it when we're away - creating a space that's comfortable and stylish and perfect for us is a great feeling... We've only lived in our house for a bit over a year, but we've made so many changes!

Take a look at some of the work that's gone into it:

Front of the house: Not much change... but this was the actual picture from the MLS listing!

Living Room: Mostly just paint, new window treatments, and some fresh colours... brown's not really my bag.

Fireplace: Another great one! I hate this green marble - and the bronze and oak accents only made it worse. High-Heat black paint toned down the 80s fireplace, and the mantle became glossy white. Yummy.

Front Entry: Less oak! The railings on the stairs were all painted out bright white. Also the house is a nice grey. Blinds were taken off the front door to let some light in, the glass was frosted instead.

 Kitchen:  Paint makes all the difference! We still have the same blah tiles on the floor - but less crap all over the counters and some sunny paint makes a big difference!

Dining Room: This was probably my favorite make over room. I made that chandelier, and I love our photo wall! Don't be confused by the photography... those are the same floors! Also - less furniture and a big mirror add so much space.

Master Bedroom: Paint only! Same drapes, same flooring - just with our stuff. We were lazy here. I had big plans - but no time.

Second Bedroom: And this is why I loooove Behr Paint + Primer. Seriously, who paints a tiny room the darkest brown they can get their hands on? It was a cave - and now it's a bedroom. Done and done.

Bathroom: Yeay!! My other favorite reno! This bathroom is huge, has a jetted tub - and was the ugliest thing to ever creep out of the 90s. Painted the bathroom, painted the cabinets, new mirror, new art. Amazing.

Basement: No change. We work out here too - just with less stuff.

And that's all of our makeovers in a year! We had lots more big plans - but now we're off to other adventures!

Our House is LISTED!

It's finally time! After LOTS of cleaning and prepping - we're on the market. The contract is signed, the pictures are up and we're ready for our showings... Curious? Here the pictures of our house:

Front of our house:

This post is long and full of pictures - see the rest after the jump!

Good Day for Goodwill!

In a mixture of staging the house and downsizing our stuff - I finally went through all of my clothes. Holy Shit - I have WAY TOO MUCH stuff! I'll be glad to give away some great things to someone in need.

I made 4 categories and all my clothes had to fit into one of them:

1. Bring to Florida - this is still a work in progress... Not sure what I'm going to bring.
2. Wear for the next 4 months  - mostly work clothes, work out gear, casual stuff
3. Donate - good quality items that don't fit 1 or 2
4. Garbage - worn out/torn/paint clothes etc.

This is what I ended up with:

It's a mountain of clothes! Lots of it went to my sister-in-law/friends and the rest will be donated. I can't believe I even owned this much clothes. [In a futile defense, I will say that we have VERY distinct seasons in Calgary! You have to dress for them all!]

It's such a good feeling to downsize and get rid of excess stuff - and now my closets are so tidy and organized, getting ready in the morning is already faster.

House photos are coming soon - the photographer is coming this Thursday! I'll keep you posted :)

Staging our House for Sale

 It's finally time! We're staging our house for sale! I'm so excited because this is a really fun process - and it will force us to get packing... Staging is 'the art of designing your house for sale' and its a big deal now  - There's even a show about it!

Check out this slide show of staged homes sold by our Realtor Anne:

 

Our stager came over last night and left us with a looong list of things to do, pictures to hang, and mostly - stuff to get rid of! We're cleaning out our stuff and re-organizing furniture like mad!

Also - despite all of our selling posts, she wants us to BUY STUFF! Yep, we need some additional decorations, and touches to make our house look like a show home!

We even had to buy RUGS! I know it sounds counter-intuitive to buy things to sell a house but it makes such an impression on the buyers - you'll more than make your money back (and you can Kijiji everything in the end - making it worth EVEN MORE!).

Here's the guys getting dragged through Costco to buy rugs:

We've got lots of work ahead of us before the house gets photographed - we'll let you know how it goes!

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle - and trash?

Stuff Stuff Stuff! What to do with all our Stuff?! We have a lot of stuff in our house - and we have to start paring it all down now if we want a compact and well organized storage solution while we're gone. I admit that I'm not a naturally organized person, so this comes with a bit of hesitation on my part...

Our real question is what to do with our excess stuff that we neither want to pack and bring, nor save at home.
I don't want to send perfectly good things to the DUMP! So our solutions have started to become a mixture of recycling unusable things, and donating the rest! Charity organizations like Salvation Army accept donation of clothing and household items in good condition.

This may be a bit boring, but we'll keep you posted on how we deal with getting rid of our stuff!

Exciting News: Our home Stager is coming today to make everything pretty!

I'm a Landlady!

Nobody will ever argue against me on this - Passive income is the best income. I mentioned before that we don't mind working hard, but easy money is great! Here's something else about our financial situation: I'm a Landlady!

Yep, we own a condo that we rent out. Again, this tends to separate us from the 'usual' freelance travel bloggers.. we DO have some financial ties to 'home'. The condo is great - actually, we lived in it for a year! It was our first home as a married couple, and still dear to my heart :)

When we bought our townhouse, we had the opportunity to keep the condo as an additional property. Our other option would have been to sell the condo and buy a big-ass house - which we neither wanted, nor needed. So... townhouse for two it was!

So, the condo has remained in our possession for several years. We've been luck to find some great tenants {mostly using this website if you're local to Calgary} that wanted to stay with us for a minimum of a year each. One of our long-term income goals is to grow this business of landlord-ing and purchase additional property for income generation. {This is a 'takes money to make money} prospect - so a bit longer term for us!

While we're away, we hope that our tenants stay happy and cozy in our little apartment (about 780 sq ft) and don't move anywhere! ha ha... But if they do move out - we're going to have to get a backup plan to help find new renters! We have a couple of options, including using a rental agency ($$) or bribing family/friends into interviewing potential tenants if this comes up.... These are some strings left a bit 'untied' that we'll have to deal with as we go.

Since I've made you read all about it - want to take a tour? This is the condo as it was when we lived in it! Tour is after the jump:

Kijiji-fication of our lives ~ Round 1

You know what I love? Kijiji. It's pretty much the best invention ever. Except that Ebay invented it, sooo... it's not exactly a family-feel-good story. Nevermind. It's just like craigslist, but less hookers.

 **Tip: If you are going to get rid of your suburban big-city life, become best friends with Kijiji. Strangers will come to your house, pick up the stuff you don't want anymore and GIVE YOU MONEY FOR IT. And you can spend that money on drinking with your friends staging your house for sale.

Check out all this sweet stuff I'm selling on Kijiji - hint: everything...

Everybody has junk in their house - sell it for drinking $$! And that's not even the big stuff :)

Winning Entry for Best Sale Ever on Kijiji? A bidding war for these Angry Birds costumes:

Prepping the House

Sooo... we had our realtor over {Anne Lindsay if you live in Calgary - She's awesome}and she mentioned a few 'upgrades' that our house could use before we sell. Here's some news for you:

SELLING STUFF IS WAY HARDER THAN BUYING STUFF.

I didn't think you'd be surprised, but really - it is. So... painting and hanging curtains are all on the list! Since we're using this blog to let you know HOW we executed our plan...
Here's a big part of it: We painted.....

I'll save you the before pictures... but here's how it looks now - want to buy my house?? It's not listed yet, maybe in January?

That's all for now - we'll update on the progress of the house/sale as we go :)