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Also, I'm using CSS to place the images, and some of y'all's browsers may not handle it well. If the images are in weird places or the text isn't flowing around them nicely, lemme know what browser you're using. If enough people complain, I'll move the images. In the current version, they should all be either against the left edge or against the right edge of the page.

This morning I walked over to the townhouse for the official inspection. Mike, my real estate agent, is out of town, so S., the seller's agent, came to open the place up for the inspector.

S turned out to be friendly and nice, and he told me a fair bit about the history of the situation. S has known the seller, J., for 20-some years, and in fact was J's agent when he first bought the place, five years ago. But when J was ready to sell, he ended up with another agent, for reasons too complicated to go into here. That agent apparently ended up doing some pretty unsavory things, and eventually J took the house off the market and asked S to represent him. Unfortunately for J—but fortunately for me—since the place had been on the market for a month at a price lower than the price it had been appraised at (and the agent had lowered the price twice without consulting J), they couldn't list it at the full price it had been appraised at. The result being that they listed it at the price the previous agent had listed it at.

S found a potential buyer—but she couldn't quite afford even the too-low price it was listed at. She made a slightly lower offer, with S representing her as well as J; that was the offer that came in on the morning of the day I made my offer.

I offered the full asking price. Partly this was because I knew there was another offer on the table (which I gathered had been a bit below the asking price) and I wanted my offer to sound attractive; partly it was because, from what Mike had told me about smaller and higher-priced places across the street that had recently sold, it sounded like a reasonable price to me, and I really didn't want to be told "Sorry, we're not gonna take your offer 'cause it was a couple thousand dollars too low" or something.

So now, knowing that the price was lower than it really should've been, and hearing about the hard times J has been through lately (RSI surgery on both wrists at once, followed by a long recuperation, and then as soon as he went back to work he got laid off, from the job he'd been at for 28 years; meanwhile, the house is in foreclosure), I'm glad I didn't try to dicker about it. A slightly lower price wouldn't have made a substantial difference to me over the (ulp, I'm trying not to think about this part) 30-year life of the loan.

Anyway. So S told me all this, which was interesting, but it meant I didn't get as much of an opportunity as I'd hoped for to ask the inspector a bunch of dumb questions. I don't know anything about this stuff, so I was hoping I could just get the expert to tell me everything. (M has worked with this inspector for years, possibly decades, and apparently he's extremely good.) But I did get some questions answered—every outlet in the place is grounded, yay! (when I moved into my current place, I asked "Is there any chance I could get you to put in grounded outlets?" and they said "Nope")—and it looks like there just isn't much wrong with the place, so I think it's fine that I didn't get to ask many questions. And while S and the inspector were chatting about people they knew in common, and the contracting business, and the door-selling business (which S used to be in), I took the opportunity to measure some of the rooms and take a bunch of pictures.

This was only the second time I've been inside the place. The first time, I neglected to bring my measuring tape or my camera, and I've been plagued ever since with worries that, after all my careful decisions about minimum room sizes, I had ended up getting a place with an even narrower living room than the one I currently have, which has always been too narrow to comfortably hold a social gathering that involves people sitting in a circle (like story reading or workshop).

And it turns out I was right, the new living room is a little narrower than the current one—but not all that much. The new one is about 10.5' x 20'; the current one is about 12' x 15'. And the new one has no door at the far end, so I can have people sitting against the narrow wall, not just along the long wall; my apartment's living room is open at both narrow ends.

Also, my apt's living room usually has a queen-size futon unfolded into bed form filling up much of it. In the new place, there's an entire guest bedroom, so the living room won't have to have a bed in it. Which should make it feel a bit more spacious.

It's still not quite perfect. But I can live with a few imperfections, and I doubt I'd have found anyplace with a much bigger living room and two bedrooms that would've fit my price range.

The bedrooms are also slightly narrower than my current bedroom, but also somewhat longer. And there are two of them.

The kitchen, sadly, is significantly smaller than my current kitchen. I figure I don't use the kitchen much, and Mary Anne and other cooking types can probably cope when they visit. Plenty of cabinet space, and even a reasonable amount of counter space (and a dishwasher, so I won't take up so much of my counter space with dirty dishes); just not a lot of moving-around space.

The bathtub is one of those ugly fiberglass all-in-one units. But at least it'll be easier to keep clean than my current shower. Btw, the inspector said that the best way to treat fiberglass bathtubs is to use car wax on them.

The bedroom closets are very wide and fairly shallow; a little disappointing after my 5' x 7' (or so) walk-in closet at home, but fine. The closet doors have come off the rails; I'll probably replace those.

The whole place needs various kinds of touch-up work. One rug should probably be replaced; a couple of doors need adjustment or replacement; one toilet is a little wobbly. My current plan is to hire someone to come in and just fix all those minor little problems, because the chance that I'll get around to doing it myself ever is pretty slim, and I'd like everything to be in good shape when I move in, even if it does mean spending some more money and some more time. I'll ask Mike to recommend a professional who can do a good job, and I'll leave it all in their hands.

I think that one of the things that really sold me on the place, oddly, is the outside. Who ever heard of a condo with a private yard? A deck, a sturdy porch swing that J built, a fenced-off dog run (I imagine I'll take down the fence at some point), grass that will need to be mowed or replaced or something. I really had no intention of getting a yard, or desire for one, but it's so nice! I may feel differently when the deck inevitably collapses from rot (I hear that all decks are in bad shape underneath), but for now, I like it.

I stopped by on the way home from work to get one more shot of the exterior.

The deal's not entirely done yet, certainly; there are plenty of hoops left to jump through. But the last item I was really concerned about was the inspection, and it sounds like there are no serious problems on that front.