Moving to PA

Yeah, its official. My wife, my son and I are moving to York, Pennsylvania, soon. We have have been talking about moving for a little over a year now. Our initial plans were to move out of Baltimore County for sure but definitely not out of state. We have simply outgrown our current home in good ‘ole Dundalk Maryland! Besides outgrowing our current house, we also were thinking about Joshua’s schooling. Although Dundalk is decent place to live, I personally don’t think its the best place to go to school. Why well, just ask my wife, she is a High School teacher so she has the inside scoop on all things schools! Personally, I don’t like it because its ghetto. Dundalk is convenient to everywhere and the new home in PA is surrounded by almost all corn fields. Talk about a drastic change. We are definitely going to miss the short and convenient drive to almost anything but I’m sure it will be worth it in the long run.

As far as Joshua and his schooling, don’t get me wrong, I grew up in pretty tough neighborhoods so it doesn’t bother me so much. However, being a parent has made me think about my son’s welfare. I want to be able to provide him with a much better life than what I had. I hear nothing but good things about the PA school system, especially from my wife. She graduated from Slippery Rock University, a PA school, figures she would like the schools in PA. I also hear that teachers get paid more so salary wise, its better I guess. My wife thinks she will eventually end up teaching in PA. Not just for the money, but because it would obviously cut her commute down considerably. I, on the other hand, will most likely still have to make that long drive to Baltimore. Oh well, I hear you get used to it.

Anyway, back to us leaving MD. We spoke to the Realtor and she seemed very optimistic that our current home will be sold in less than 2 weeks. Actually, she called up yesterday and she told me that she already has someone that was interested. The funny thing is that its not even listed yet, well, not officially anyway. Our neighbors also sounded interested when my wife told them we were moving. It always seems like they have an uncle, aunt, cousin, sister, brother, grandma, or whatever that “always” wanted the house.

Here lies the problem. If our house sells in the amount of time the Realtor says it will, then we are S.O.L. Why you ask? You didnt ask? Well, I will tell you anyway since its my blog! Our new home is currently being built in York, PA. Its not scheduled to be finished until late August, early September! Do the math.

So, our choices are:

• Dont sell our current house until the new home is done
• Sell the house but work out a plan with the new home owners where they cant move in until we move out
• Sell the house but rent it back from the new home owners
• Sell the house, rent some storage and move in with the in-laws

We already rented a 10X10 room for storage since the Realtor wanted us to clean up the “clutter” in the house so it can be ready for the showings. The Realtor said its all a “looks” thing. Needless to say, my wife and I were busy this weekend. You never know how much junk you have until you start packing it all up and getting it ready to move. All weekend, I was like, “OK, throw this away, throw that away, throw everything away!” I’m talking about things that we had in our basement that I had totally forgot about. One word of advice, if you forget that you ever had something, then honestly, you don’t need it. Throw it away!

If there is any interest, I will post of pictures of the progress of our new home thats being built. I will try to drive up there 2 or 3 times per month to take pictures and do what the usually “excited new home owners do”, gaze endlessly at a pile of dirt and lumber. I spoke with the builder and they said they are going to “break ground” later this week and to expect to have a completed home in 100 or so days. My wife and I are so excited about our new home. Stopping short of sounding like wuss (shut up Steve), its a dream come true for both of us.