House Hunters: Taking a Break

Last week my husband moved his office to a town two hours away from where we live now. He’s actually living there now, and will be living there without us for the foreseeable future until we find a farm up there. We knew the move was coming, which was why we’ve been driving ourselves insane trying to find a farm. It’s also why our search field was pretty narrow: we can’t live just anywhere, we need to be close to his job and be in a good school district for our kids.

As I’ve said before, the housing market has taken a nosedive in the last 10 years, and things just aren’t worth what they were during the housing bubble in the early 2000s. Somehow, the realtors in this part of NJ haven’t gotten that memo and they’re fighting tooth and nail to not only hold on to pre-2008 prices, but also to try to appreciate value to the properties like the market hasn’t been circling the drain for over a decade. It’s getting ridiculous, and these realtors are getting downright vicious. I’ve never dealt with a nastier set of “professionals” in my life, and I’ve been working with horses for 30 years.

Here’s some highlights from the last few weeks:

A realtor told us our children “would be looked down on” if we didn’t buy in a particular town. That’s not a selling point, it’s a red flag to avoid that town!

A house we were actually very interested in failed the building inspection spectacularly… as in, you could not legally live in this house because it was falling apart…. and when we tried to renegotiate the price we were told that we “just don’t understand how things work here”, all because we didn’t want to pay above market value for a house that was actively falling down.

Several realtors condescendingly explained to us that “we don’t understand the market” while trying to shill their client’s farm that’s been for sale for 5 years.

FYI: If your property has been for sale for several years, it’s not because you’re an expert in real estate values.

Also FYI: My husband has a degree in economics and is a financial planner. The reason we’re moving up there is because that’s where his clients are. I’ve been running farms for 30 years. We know what we’re doing. If we say your farm isn’t worth what you’re selling it for, and it’s been for sale for years, maybe you should listen to us.

Ooooph. That got super rant-y. Sorry. Here’s a picture of my garden:

And another picture of my 28 year old retiree trimming the edges of my arena:

For now, we’re taking a break from the real estate market. When we return, we’ll be looking at plots of land that we can build on.