Reply to Would you buy an otherwise perfect, fantastic house w/ very little backyard and on a main street?

Forum Index » Real Estate

Reply to "Would you buy an otherwise perfect, fantastic house w/ very little backyard and on a main street?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous]OP here, and thank you everyone for the great feedback.  Very much appreciated. To answer a few questions:

(1) the house is in Takoma Park/MoCo, so a good school district, and this is one of the key reasons we are moving there (I know some people will criticize the TP schools as not "as good" as others, but we have vetted them, are impressed, and feel most at home there overall, are in preschool there, have lots of friends in the immediate neighborhood, etc.);
 
(2) the busy street is only 2 lanes wide (one way each direction) so that helps (it's not Arlington Boulevard busy) and, like the 12:33 PP, it's only [i]very[/i] busy twice a day, at rush hour, at which time you have a pretty constant stream of traffic; it's one of the main arteries through the neighborhood (Takoma Park) so it can be decently busy at other times, too (i.e. Saturday), but not so busy that it totally turns me off;

(3) there are indeed sidewalks (decently wide ones on which you can walk 2 abreast) and coffee shops, restaurants, etc., within a block/two of the house (yet it feels VERY residential), plus it has a deep front yard, and deep front porch (the house sits probably 30 full feet, maybe more, from the street);
 
(4) the driveway is on the back side, on the small street, so there is no need to pull out into the main street at all (the house is almost to the tip (2nd to last house) of a triangular junction of two road (one main road, one small one-way quiet road), hence the lack of backyard and entry to main house on front and in-law suite on backside);

(5) our kids are 3 and 1, and we use our backyard a lot right now--I am indeed having a hard time seeing that want/need change unless it has to b/c we don't have the backyard any longer b/c we've decided the other great elements of this house outweigh the "luxury" of a big, lovely backyard; there is a park 1 block away, and many, many playgrounds, and sligo creek, w/in immediate walking distance; also the quiet, one-way street on the back-side has sidewalks and is perfect for riding bikes, throwing a ball around, etc.;

(6)  it's not that noisy (we've spent much time in and on the porch of the house--noise just isn't an issue, prob. b/c it's only 2 lanes, and it's such a "quiet" area, i.e. Historic Takoma), that's not really a concern to me;

(7)  we could probably take out the driveway and fence what limited green space there is out back--that's a good suggestion; we'd have to go through the protracted process of getting a permit to do so in the Historic districtm and prob. keep the fence/wall low, in keeping w/ the other fences in the neighborhood, but we would do that anyway; the only issue would be need for the driveway; w/ MIL having a car, and DH and I each having one (I know, I know, not very Takoma Park to have 3 cars to one family!) we might need the parking spaces, but w/ us being suddenly walking distance to the Metro, we could conceivably go down to 2 cars (i.e. MILs, and one for our nuclear family); I'd have to go over and visualize what that would give us and what we'd lose; it will never be what we have now, in the way of our large, lovely backyard (no room for treehouse, sandbox, lots of people over for BBQs, etc.) but I know it's unrealistic to imagine we can find the perfect house WITH the perfect in-law suite IN our precisely desired spot WITH the perfect backyard.

I can get over the main street (it seems a lot less "main" after thinking about places like Arlington Boulevard, Philadelphia Ave, or the like), I think I'm just really struggling w/ giving up the backyard...but leaning toward doing it, as the other factors weigh so heavily...

Thank you again for the thoughts/suggestions, and I would appreciate any further thoughts PPs or others may have.  Thanks again.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics