For most of the past two years, since the fire and my illness, Suzie and I have been unusually indecisive about our long-term housing situation. The house we were renting on Grizzly Peak in Kensington was good for us, it gave us a place that seemed more like home than our little condo in Larkfield (at least it seemed more like home to me, Suzie might disagree). But it wasn’t ours, and we couldn’t know how long we’d be able to stay there. Even though the rent was reasonable, we chafed at the idea of paying tens of thousands dollars without getting any equity in return. We also kept toying with the idea of living a significant part of the year in France, which added to the complexity.
In order to continue to receive temporary rental assistance from our insurance company, we had to show that we were actively looking for a replacement property. So we engaged a realtor with knowledge of the North Berkeley/Kensington/El Cerrito market, and started viewing houses. An activity that depressed us most of the time: There was a limit on how much we would spend, and the asking prices for small, unkept, weirdly-configured homes that we would never, ever buy pushed up against that limit.
It became apparent early on that we’d have to compromise on something (or several things) if we were ever to make an offer. Our criteria included a close-in location (we didn’t want to live far out in El Cerrito), a minimum of three bedrooms and two baths, a quiet neighborhood, a garage (we were shocked at how many houses we looked at didn’t have one), some kind of a view, an adequately-sized lot, in more-or-less “move in” condition. We looked at an average of five or six houses a week, some of them true dogs (you want $1.1 million for that … have you no shame?). We became convinced that we weren’t going to find anything acceptable given our budget.
Then, just a week or so before we were to leave for six weeks in France, we found three viable candidates, two in close-in El Cerrito, and one in Kensington. The choice wasn’t that close, and we made an offer on the Kensington house. Included in the offer was a letter I wrote and Suzie edited, explaining what a horrible two years we had experienced, what good-hearted public-interest-minded folks we were, and how much we loved their house. The letter did the trick in the end; they wanted to sell to us and allowed us to match a higher offer they’d received from someone else. Then it was a rush to find financing and close — in seven days (!) (that being the standard period in this area). A mad dash, while we were packing for France. At the end we were owners of a little piece of the East Bay.
We scheduled our move for October 28. Which meant we were packing as the winds were howling and the Kincade Fire was raging in Sonoma County, dislocating all of our friends, threatening their homes (and our condo in Larkfield), bringing back the awfulness of two years before. It was surreal, moving in the middle of a catastrophe, with the eerie dry gusty winds and no power at either place. An inauspicious start.
But after living here just eight days, we feel completely right about our decision. We love our little (but not too-little) house. It was built in 1937 and has been obviously well-cared for and loved through the years. The same family occupied the house until the daughter of the original owners died here earlier this year at a ripe old age. Her children gave us a picture of the house right after it was built (the Berkeley Hills were grassy and bare), as well as the original hand-drawn blueprints and the bill-of-sale from the builder ($7,153.73 was the cost to build it):
The house has almost everything we wanted, at least to some degree. A great location (on Yale Avenue in Kensington, a pretty neighborhood, just a three-minute walk to the Kensington commercial area on Arlington Avenue, which includes a hardware store and a market, and bus access to Downtown Berkeley and BART), enough size for our boys to come visit (four good-sized bedrooms, two upstairs and two downstairs), two (smallish) full baths, gorgeous dark hardwood floors, classic mouldings and built-in cabinets and bookshelves, a wonderful light and open dining room and living room (the whole house is light), a two-car garage (albeit a tight squeeze), a quarter-basement, tons of storage space, a small bit of a view (from upstairs and the kitchen) of the Bay and Mount Tam, a nice-sized (if moderately sloped) backyard, containing an enormous redwood tree, a small balcony on the front, nice quiet neighbors. The only (very) significant compromise we had to make concerns the kitchen: It is very small, although so far Suzie seems to find it altogether manageable.
From the front it looks like this:
The backyard looks like this:
We’ve turned one of the upstairs bedrooms — a room completely paneled in light knotty pine (which we go back and forth on, sometimes we like the cabin/Tahoe feel, sometimes it’s too much) — into a TV room, allowing us to leave the sizeable downstairs living room as a more elegant space.
All in all, we’re very happy. We paid more than we wanted, but we found a place that we feel comfortable in. The house suits us. It’s got charm, and it feels completely solid. As for the money, well (as Suzie is tired of hearing me say) it’s only the boys’ inheritance, and in any event, if the market continues to climb, we’ll/they’ll probably come out ahead of where we would have been if we’d continued renting.
We hope to have a housewarming event shortly, and hope you will all come and visit. We’d very much like to show you all our new home.
Categories: Updates