Our new hood

Before I go "all in" and show you the interior of our house, why don't I show you around the neighborhood a bit? Let's do it.

Mark and I first started looking mainly in Dallas. We were focusing on the Lake Highlands area of Dallas because a)Mark has a lot of friends that live in the area, b)the houses are more our style, c)the location is still close to work and our families, d)the school district can be good, if you get into the Richardson school district, which means the school would feed into Lake Highlands High School, which is good! So, Lake Highlands is where we saw the first few houses with Greg. We soon realized, however, that the homes there were at the top of our budget and weren't quite what we were looking for. We went to one home in a GREAT part of the neighborhood that was at our max budget and was a COMPLETE gut job. It was pitiful. 

So, as the days marched on, we got a little more adventurous and considered stepping outside the box a little. Mark's rule was that he wanted to be within 15 miles of work, so we realized that we could stretch into Richardson. As we went to look at our first house in Richardson, I told Mark that "I don't really ever want to live in Richardson". It never seemed that appealing to me. It just seemed like a city that bled into Dallas and lost all of it's identity. At least with Plano, Arlington, Frisco, etc. you have downtown areas, but not so much with Richardson. Anyway, I obviously opened my eyes and we are 16 short days from closing on a house IN RICHARDSON. Also, it turns out that our new home is actually 15.3 miles from Mark's office, so I guess he compromised as well. ;)

Our neighborhood is called Northrich, in case you didn't catch on to that with the title of my blog. It is a neighborhood bordered by US-75, Arapaho Rd, Campbell Rd, and Floyd Rd. It's a community of 1950's and 1960's homes. The neighborhood even has a blog, although it doesn't look like it's been updated recently...

As you enter the neighborhood, there are signs that greet you. This seems to be a common thing in Richardson, as I've noticed other neighborhoods have welcoming signs. 

We really like the area and neighborhood because of our placement in the district. We are one street away from Northrich elementary, which is where my Uncle Jim went to school! IF (and that's a BIG if) we have kids at this house, it will be fun to get to walk them to school or to the playground. Speaking of playgrounds, there are a ton of great parks around for my nieces and nephews to visit! There is Heights Park, which is also a neighborhood, which includes Heights Recreation Center, which just opened in May! I will have to look up all of the specifics on this, but it is a Rec center with a great looking pool and super nice park behind it. Hopefully we can use that to our advantage!



Also included in the school district is Richardson North Junior High and J.J. Pearce High School, which I've heard is one of the best high schools in Richardson. We aren't exactly worried about where our future potential (I think I have eager family members reading this) kids will go, but school districts make up a big part of resale value, so it's good to know we will be covered with this house.



One BIG downfall to the new house is we will be over 50 miles from my parent's house. This makes us all sad, but I'm thankful that I'm ONLY 50 miles away, rather than further. I have never been afraid of a long drive, so I'm sure we will see them often. Now, when they come visit, we won't have to crowd into our small apartment! Our visits will just be more about quality rather than quantity. Plus, they have a pool, so they are definitely not going to get rid of me that easily!

On the other hand, we are now only 17 miles from Mark's family, so we are excited about that! It will be that much easier to get together with them and to get to watch Luke, Mason, and Griffin grow up. 

We are excited about living in an established neighborhood with a lot of fun things to do. We can't wait to get out and explore our new surroundings!