August 2007.

Just before we left for Aruba, we settled on a new house in Lancaster. We bought a new house in Manheim Township. This is the "Main Line" of Lancaster. It boasts the best public schools. The nicest homes. It's also where my buddy Chico grew up and went to high school.

We had met with the builder in March even before the ground was broken. After negotiating for about a couple weeks and agreeing to a price, we backed out of the deal. We were uncomfortable with a lot of the process. When we had bought in New Jersey, it was from a large builder. All the options were laid out and priced ahead of time. This is how our interaction went with this builder:

Us: Are you going to put in double ovens?
Builder: You could do that.
Us: Granite countertops?
Builder: Yeah, you could do that.
Us: Tile in the bathrooms?
Builder: Probably.

This uncertainty had us uneasy. Here we had agreed to a price that we and the builder wasn't sure what it included.

Anyway, the lot is a huge plus. There is a mandatory open space behind the lot. Our neighborhood does not have a home owner's association. The open space behind us is actually maintained by the development behind us that does have a HOA fee. The other benefit is the house is located in the best elementary school in the entire county. So, we walked away in March.

Fast forward to June. We get a call from our realtor. She tells us that she ran into the builder and the house is almost complete. She wanted to take us through it. She went through it with the builder and loved the house. We went through and saw that the builder had done a lot of upgrades that we wanted and some that we would have wanted, but probably would not have paid for.

Long story short, we agree to a price that is $5K more than in March. He had risen the asking price $10K. Here are some pictures of the house:

Front View.

Kitchen.


Stove top.


Dining Room.


Master Shower.