After the "Near Miss," We Scored a Hit!

The search for a new home had been spanning four months, (see the previous two entries) and now we were taking a break that nearly was disastrous, but fortunately averted.

The arrival in Ellensburg was several hours later than planned, after attempting to find a welder who could make some repairs to the RV hitch, but it just couldn't get done.

Kitchen is updated and easy to use.

Everyone was pretty glad to see us, realizing after hearing the story of the angelic guy who stopped us, how close we had come to a different scenario for the day.

After the party, we returned to the Vantage campsite (almost the same one we were at five months prior) and started reviewing properties in the local area, more as entertainment than anything else. One popped up as being a "For Sale By Owner" in Moses Lake. Only an hour from Vantage, Wayne suggested we just go for a drive and see the area the next day. We made plans with his son-in-law, Wayne Smith, to meet up in Ephrata, also near by.

Living room as seen from the kitchen. master bedroom is
seen to right down the hall.

So on Friday morning, Oct. 5, we drove to the property and the owners were outside working on the yard. We asked if we could walk around and they invited us inside, showed us everything, and we were surprised both at the size and the cleanliness of everything. After looking, we said we had some other places to visit and we drove off to view them. But after less than an hour, we were back, wanting to talk to the owners again about accepting an offer.

Master bedroom has an east-facing window.

Second bath, updated, too.

To shorten the story, here we are just a week later with a signed offer all the way around, the home inspection is tomorrow, we have preliminary loan approval and everyone is hoping for a closing mid-November.

One of the three bedrooms ...

Plenty of yard for Wayne's gardening...

Property is just under an acre of good soil.

An added bonus is a back shed for art or storage.

It started to rain so the house doesn't look its best here, but
its got three bedrooms, two baths and two bays of garage.

Back side of the house; porches both front and back.

We are pretty excited to have found a place that meets all our wants and needs, and all the children are relieved to know their dad will be living closer. We spent several days exploring Moses Lake, finding stores, getting the well tested, and enjoying some of the restaurants here. We will have square dance connections and know where we can ballroom dance once a week.

Moving to this area also means that our long-distance RV trips can get started more effectively without having to drive three hours off the Olympic Peninsula. Moses Lake is an hour and a half from Spokane, also from Yakima, an hour from Wenatchee and Ellensburg, and about three hours from Seattle.

While we will miss our friends in Sequim, Gardiner, Port Angeles, Quilcene, Forks and other places on the Peninsula, we can still visit them and they are more than welcome to come and visit us. We are just off I-90 and we have guest rooms!

And then... a very near miss!

This lavender rose is my absolute favorite. When we move,
it will go with us.

If you haven't read "We've Been Searching..." then I have to bring you up to speed with a four-month search for a new home. Basically we had made a serious offer, backed out, and tried to make several others which did not go anywhere leaving us discouraged. We stopped all searching for a week.

It was during this time that our Realtor was away for some training, so it worked out well. And then, a few days just before she was to return, we re-looked at one home we had excluded because the price was more than we had budgeted but they had just reduced it into our range.

Our agent's brother, the Broker for her company, agreed to meet us in Rochester but when we arrived, he said, "I've just discovered I don't have the MLS key." So he contacted the listing agent and she agreed to come out and open up the house for us.

South side of the home we looked at...

While we waited, we both walked around. Wayne paced out the pasture and determined there was indeed slightly more than an acre of sunny, flat land with no rocks.

I also walked around and noted the North-South placement of the home (Moss on the north side of one of the outbuildings was a good clue.) and could see that there were several places my roses would love.

Something about the location, the air, the feeling of openness was all we both wanted. Then once the agent let us inside, Wayne said, "I've already decided I want this house and land."

Wayne and Peaches are pacing the lot line to see how big
it is and to assess the quality of the soil.

There were the usual steps to determine if we could manage the higher costs and we made an offer which was accepted. But just as we were about to have a house inspection, our loan officer said it would not go with her bank because the house had been moved three times.

Sigh. Apparently the VA will not loan on manufactured homes with multiple moves, even with documentation. So we had to walk away from that most desirable situation.

Discouraged but not daunted, we continued to look and evaluate other properties. But really nothing seemed quite as nice as this one. We saw several places that, again, looked good in the sales websites, but when we drove up the driveway or street, it was considerably less than what was promised. Then a property we had bid on but lost out on was rumored to be coming back on the market. That excited Wayne because he loved all the big metal buildings that place had, but I was less enthusiastic.

"We said we would not settle, and we would not get something unless we both really liked it," Wayne reminded me.

It was time to get ready for his birthday and a party for the grandkids who have birthdays on his day and close to it in Ellensburg. We put all house hunting on hold and packed up the RV. Food and computers loaded, warm clothing, fishing rods, and at 8 a.m. we pulled out of Sequim.

In Tacoma, while heading for the exit to Highway 18, a young man in a truck starting signaling us to pull over. Once we were stopped he said, "Your tow hitch, the one attached to the RV, is coming loose!" If we had not been alerted, it could have been disastrous for us and for anyone nearby... a near miss that necessitated separating the Jeep and the RV and I would have to drive behind again, just like on our honeymoon. We were very, very lucky. Definitely felt like angels were working overtime for us.