Tag Archives: first home

Millennial Marriage

This blog is called Wifey Chat and I haven’t talked about marriage or relationships yet! Let’s start from the beginning.. I’ve got baby brain right now so I’ll have to ask him for some help.

My husband (Tyler) and I went to the same high school and college. We had a few classes together in high school but never really talked much. I was the new girl and never really went out. Tyler was the cool kid and we didn’t really hang around the same crowd. I had a “serious” boyfriend in high school and into college and he had a few girlfriends too. He claims that highschool is when he started liking me, but I challenge that every time. I asked him how he could like me when he didn’t even know anything about me and he said he didn’t know. He said we never hung out so he didn’t say anything. He also quoted me and said “when you know, you know.”

When we got to college we lived in the same Co-Ed dorm, and had a few classes together, but still didn’t talk much. One time something happened with his phone and charger and he knocked at my dorm door and asked me to take him to Wal-Mart to get a new one. I asked him how he knew which one was mine, and he says he can’t remember, but I know I didn’t tell him. Again we didn’t hang around the same crowd, and even though I went out a lot more in college we never crossed paths besides class. He also left often to see one of his friends at another college, he never really wanted to go to our college in the first place but I’m obviously I’m glad he did.

So how did we officially “meet”? It’s funny really. I don’t remember the exact date but I know it was sophomore year around Halloween. Halloween is my favorite Holiday and I use to celebrate it all month back then. But I was in my room (off campus apartment now, big time) getting ready to go out for Halloween with my friend when he hit my blackberry. I thought it was a mistake but answered anyways. He was out with his friends, and drunk, obviously it’s Halloween, and decided to call me and tell me his feelings. He said he thought I was at the college he was at, and he wanted to hang out so he called me. I cheered and had a game the next day, so we stayed at our school. Our phone conversation went something like this.. I can take care of you, and your friends, I like you and want to go out when I come back. My initial reaction, wow he’s weird and no, I don’t date white boys (yes I really said this 🤣).

When he came back to school nothing really changed. I think we did go on a date, and he would invite me and my friends over to hang out. But we weren’t dating and I was still “talking” to other guys. I use to stay the night with him sometimes, and he would walk me to my car for 6 am cheer workouts. It was one of these mornings he tried to kiss me, and I backed up. He acts like he doesn’t remember that happening, and always combats with “but we’re married now”, true but it’s still funny and will be a story I tell our kids. By Christmas I was actually really into him.I remember over Christmas Break I almost stopped talking to him because I wanted him to come over and he was spending time with his old high school friends instead. But eventually he did and he met my parents. My mom said he was to quiet, and that’s true he is, until you get to know him. By January 2012 I decided that he needed to be my boyfriend and I made sure that he and everyone else knew it. I was all over him ALL the time. Even though he didn’t like to go out, he would come with me and my friends. By this time most of his friends left our college or dropped out. So you know, more time for me. We spent all of our time together, mostly drinking and eating. But in between classes, weekends and even started overnights (sorry mom). I had never been with anyone like Tyler. So sweet, so caring and just so easy to be with.

We didn’t fight about anything. And people always use to comment about that. And I’d always tell them what do we have to fight about? We are in college and living our best life. We don’t have kids, property or bills together so what is there to argue about. Mind you we still don’t fight about those things, today our fight was when I spilled water on myself and HE didn’t clean it up fast enough. And I don’t like his sassy tone we gets with the dogs sometimes.

March 24th 2012 he asked me to go this musical thing so he could get extra credit for a class and asked me to be his girlfriend. I obviously said yes, and he knew I would because I’d been telling him for the past 2 months that he would be my future husband. We spent the rest of college loving on each other and enjoying our time. It probably would have happened even without a boyfriend but I stopped going out as much and spending most of my time with Tyler. We didn’t live together but still spent most nights together. Usually in bed by 9pm to catch American Dad and Bobs Burgers, which by the way we still love Bobs Burgers.

The day Tyler asked me to be his girlfriend

Senior year when we started planning graduation parities we decided to do it together with my best friend. Our parents told us if we broke up the party was still happening, so suck it up butter cup! Graduation and party went on and we moved back in with our parents after graduation. Our parents only lived about 5 minutes from each other so he would come over everyday. He couldn’t stay the night for a while but eventually my parents started letting him stay over in the guest room out of convenience. We did everything together, so when I decided to apply to school in 2014 there was never a question on should we move in together, it was when are we leaving. Once I was accepted into school my sweet husband got a job in our new city. His job started almost a month before we could move into our new apartment so he stayed with friends during the week and would come back on the weekends.

The day we found our first apartment

We agreed on a 500 sq ft apartment in the city for $1000 a month. I was able to walk to school and we were close to all the hustle and bustle of the city. We loved it! So much that the next year we moved into a loft with a little more space and higher rent. Soon after I became a dropout and had to find a job. The struggle was real, it didn’t take long for me to get a temporary position, but it only lasted for 3 months and then didn’t have a job for 6 months. For 6 months Tyler had to support himself, me and our dog princess. We had to make some major cutbacks. We didn’t go out anymore, we stayed home and ate ramen for a while. Not to be dramatic but we were struggling. I called my mom once and asked to borrow $50 to pay my credit card, of course she gave it to me but I felt really guilty that I didn’t have money to take care of myself. Tyler never said it, but I know he felt bad he didn’t have it to give to me. This way the lowest I’ve ever felt, and there is no way I would have ever got through it without Tyler. I had no money in the bank, and none coming in. I know our struggles may seem small to some, and I know people always have it worst but that doesn’t help you feel any better or make what you’re going through any easier. I applied for food stamps and got about $80 a month, wasn’t much but it helped. I was never ashamed about it rather disappointed that we both have Masters Degrees and were living pay check to pay check on one paycheck. Tyler actually found my food stamp card the other day and we had a little laugh about it, but kept it just incase we ever need to humble ourselves.

Our lease was coming to an end and I told Tyler that purchasing a home was our best option, crazy right? No it really was. Our rent was about $1200 and our mortgage was about $600. Tyler agreed and said let’s get a house. Tyler went and got approved by himself because I still wasn’t working. I eventually got a job working 20 hours a week, and Tyler purchased a small town home for us. I won’t go into detail about our first home because I have a separate post all about it, I will link it here https://wifeychat.wordpress.com/2020/05/23/diy-first-house/

We moved into our first home in April 2016, and it’s one the best decisions we’ve never made. I started working full time and with our mortgage being so low we were able to start saving money and going out again. We just recently talked about how we spent SO much money going out, and we could have a beach condo right now if we saved that money, but we will just have to teach Baby P to do better.

Okay, so a lot has happened by now. We had been dating for over 5 years and I was wondering if Tyler was ever going to make an “honest woman out of me.” I knew he wanted to get married but I also knew he wanted to make sure he was in a place where he could take care of me. My dad use to tell him that next time my car needs tires he has to buy them. So Tyler would say we couldn’t get married until he could put tires on my car. FINALLY in December 2016 we got engaged, and he has since help me put tires on my car. I later found out that he wanted it to be sooner, but then I suggested we should purchase a house and he wanted to do that first.

Our engagement was very short, in November 2017 we got married. I wanted a Fall Wedding but there was no way I was waiting another year. Before we got married I found out I was accepted into the Police Academy (https://wifeychat.wordpress.com/2020/06/26/the-academy/). 2017 was MUCH better than previous years.

I made it through the academy with Tyler by my side. And then made it through my first year as an Officer. In July 2019 we purchased our second home with the intent of starting our family in it. Today when we were walking back to our house from the pool Tyler looks at our house and says “thank you baby” I asked him for what and he tells me for picking this house in this neighborhood and giving him the opportunity to spend a Friday afternoon at the pool with his wife. After all he does my sweet husband still thanks me for what WE have accomplished together.

Closing day on our 2nd home

We decided after I’d been working for a year that we would start trying for a baby, we pushed it back a little but in December 2019 we found out I was pregnant. It’s still so surreal sometimes. Everything we’ve talked about we are now doing. We picked out a name for our daughter way before we were ever even engaged. The life we live now we’ve accomplished together. We’ve grown together and I don’t think there is anyone who would complete me better.

Tyler has always been so supportive of anything I wanted to do. Often times he believes in me more than I believe in myself. He thanks me for being a good mom to our baby, and high fives me after our appointments and tells me way to go when the midwife says baby is growing right in track. He does alllll my house projects with (minimal) complaints. He’s so intelligent and can really do anything he sets his mind to. Might take some cussing breaks to watch youtube but he always gets it done. He’s respectful and caring. He always encourages me and when I told him I wanted to start a blog and YouTube he told me to go for it and helped me pick a camera. He watches every video and reads every blog before I post (hey hunny my editor & chief), so if you have any grammar or editing complaints please forward them to him. Oh how could I forget, he helped and encouraged me to start our first business, where I’m the President and he’s happily the VP. You can follow us on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/6440graphics/).

I’m no relationship expert but we communicate often and about everything and I think this really helps keeps us happy in our relationship. They say the top 3 reasons for divorce are infidelity, finances and lack of communication. Well my husband is hot and has a fiooonne wife so I’m not worried about the first and the last two are why we communicate so much. I have no problem telling Tyler how I feel, and same for him. We have little “rules” that just work for us. For example, we like to discuss any purchase over $100. We consider that a large purchase and feel like we should agree where our money is going. He didn’t break that rule 2 weeks ago when he spent over $100 at the cigar store, and justified it with the $50 gift card he got for his purchase. He started the conversation with “hear me out,” but it wasn’t a big deal. He works hard and he’s good with money, plus it was his 30th birthday he deserved it. We’ve been talking about our short and long terms goals a lot lately. We read something that said the average millionaire has 7 sources of income, so we’ve been trying to figure out how we can get 14 sources of income so we can both be millionaires.

We definitely don’t have it all figured out, we are always learning about each other. We fight and disagree but we talk about it and get through it rather than ignore it and the feelings linger. But our core values align. No we don’t enjoy the same movies all the time and no Tyler wasn’t to happy about my 7am smoothie request this morning but I watch his zombie movies because he enjoys them and he took me to Smoothie King because he loves me (but mainly because I’m pregnant and probably would have cried if he didn’t).

I could probably write a book on all the reasons I love Tyler, and all the reasons we work so well together but I think I’ve got my point across. For those of you who are still searching for the one or are unhappy with someone should listen to the saying “don’t settle.” And like I love to say “when you know, you know.” Trust your heart and get you a Tyler.

Until next week.

xo

How We Completely Renovated Our First Home, then flipped it

In April 2016 we bought our first (town) home. At the time we weren’t married, I was only working 20-hours a week and we had a modest budget. But we were paying almost $1200 in rent for our loft. And prior to that we lived in a 500 sq ft studio for $1000 a month. We were use to living in small spaces, so we were excited to have more than one bathroom, a bedroom door that closed and most importantly to start saving money!

When we were parents of 1

I think it is important to be transparent about our house buying process, so I am going to try my best.

We purchased our townhouse for $60,000. It was a 900 sq ft home with 2 bedrooms and 1.5 bathrooms. It was listed significantly below our budget so we went in full asking price. It was the 4th house we put an offer in, and we didn’t want to miss another one. Our lease was up and we were fortunate enough to have friends let us stay with them for 3 weeks while everything was finalized. So there was no grace period moving in, we moved in the same day we closed and our families came up to help us get started on the house.

You will see from the photos below that there was a lot to be done in the house. But the location was perfect (at the time), and that was a huge factor for us. It was a quick uber ride uptown and we had access to the light rail right across the street .

The main question I get from people looking to purchase a home is what is the most important thing, and for us it was location and layout. Two things you can’t do a whole lot to change so you have to be okay with them. We knew when we purchased our home we only wanted to be in it for 2-3 years. It allowed us to save money for our wedding and make a profit when we sold it 3 years later. We knew we wanted a home with a little more space with room for our family to visit. When we purchased our first home we didn’t look at school districts, proximity to parks or anything like that. It wasn’t important at the time.

We were very fortunate to have help getting our house together. Tyler and I did not have a clue what we were doing. We (I) knew how we wanted everything to look, but did not know exactly how to accomplish it. Between Pinterest, visits from my parents, and many FaceTime calls and texts with my mom everything turned about great.

We painted the whole house a light gray color, and dark accent walls in some rooms. Honestly, we bought the cheapest paint I don’t even know the brand. But it was about $80 for a 5 gallon bucket, and then I grabbed a gallon of dark gray paint from the clearance rack at Lowes.

The house was carpeted, but old dirty carpet. We decided that we didn’t want carpet wherever we moved because we have dogs. So putting down flooring was the best option. We went with a grayish laminate flooring because we knew the rest of the house would be gray. I don’t remember the exact cost but my husband remembers it was about $50 a box. We put it down in the entire house including the restrooms and kitchen. My dad was a huge help to Tyler and showed him how to do it in the living room. Then later Tyler was able to do it in the rest of the house.

One of the the easiest projects, that I was able to do all by myself, was the stairs. The stairs were carpeted and I had no hesitation ripping it all off. Luckily the stairs were wood underneath so I just removed all the carpet, nails and then stained the stairs and repainted all the white.

I also eventually ended up removing one of the banisters, it wasn’t necessary for us to have both. Over time the stairs did get a little worn, but I actually liked the way that it looked and never re did them.

Possibly one of the hardest projects, but my favorite room in the house was the kitchen. Tyler worked HARD on getting the kitchen together. At one point we didn’t have a kitchen for a week and didn’t have water for 2 days. He had to turn it off to get everything connected, and we used the shower at the gym (strugggglllle).

The original plan was to repaint the cabinets white and just change the handles. But after further inspection we noticed mold under the sink. My parents gifted us new lower cabinets so that we didn’t have to worry about the mold issue. We ripped the old cabinets out and cleaned where they were and left it open to air out for a few days. The new cabinets, a new sink and new faucet were installed. We also got a new stove, dishwasher, fridge and range.

We went with open shelving on top since the space was so small I thought it would open it up.

Okay the countertops were tricky, I say that but I didn’t do anything but pick out what I wanted. I really wanted concrete countertops but we decided to go with concrete looking tile. This was something else that Tyler had no experience with but my dad brought his saw and showed him the ropes. These were done almost 8 months after we moved in and I remember both of them outside working all day and it was kinda cold. But they looked soo good when they were done. They were a dark gray, with a dark gray grout. The tiles and supplies were also purchased from Lowes. We weren’t exactly sure how we were going to do the counter top edge but my mom had the idea to use the grout and create a rough edge, we did and it worked out perfect and went with the concrete look.

We purchased the peel & stick backsplash from either Home Depot or Lowes cut it in half and used it for the backsplash.

The appliances were a little tricky because it was an old home. A standard fridge did not fit in our space so we went with a 30 in whirlpool fridge. The house also had an older drop in stove which wasn’t standard size either. So we purchased a new stove and have to purchase a mini dishwasher to fit in the space. Since there is just two of us this wasn’t an issue.

Before

Before
He had no idea how to hook anything up, lots of youtube help make our beautiful kitchen
After

My next favorite room was the living room. It was small, but so cozy and I moved it around often. There was wallpaper so we removed it, painted and put in new floor. Then I just spent way to much time decorating and re decorating.

Bar was from Craigslist, stained it to match the stairs.
And the shelf was from our previous apartment, I just spray painted it gray.
Then we got some new bar stools from my mom, which I also spray painted and used some new fabric for the seats. The shelves were a steal from the IKEA “as is” section for $20.
Then I spray painted the shelves and pretty sure moved this area around 3 or 4 more times.
See it’s moved again in this photo 🤣 I spray painted the end tables and our coffee table to match with everything else. We mounted the tv because we really didn’t have room for a tv stand.

Upstairs we had 2 rooms and a full bath. One room was used as an office. Just like downstairs we painted, put down floor and decorated.

Before
I don’t have an after. But this is close, I used 2 of those book shelves and added some decor.

We did the same in our bedroom as the other room, some paint and floor.

This area is where my vanity went
Since our bathroom was so small I was able to squeeze in a little vanity area in our room.

Unfortunately at some point when I switched phones I lost a lot of photos so I don’t have any after photos of our bathrooms. But we painted, our down floor and replaced the vanity in both. In our full bath I took off the shower door. It was gold and a paint to clean. Added some decor and we had a whole new space.

Last, but not least was our backyard. It wasn’t difficult but the previous owner left a lot of stuff back there so we just had to clean up and get some furniture.

WHY is patio furniture so expensive? This simple set was $199 from world market and is living its best life with my in-laws.

Okay that’s the super long version of purchasing and renovating (ish) our first home. We are in the process of doing it all over again, with a less help and way more knowledge. When we are done I’ll be doing another blog showing you our new house.

Our new home, doing it all over again.

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If you have any questions or want to share about your home buying process comment below.

xo