House Hunting: Cute Cape Cod Near Shops
So with the Cottage In the Woods off our list, let’s turn our attention to another house that we toured: the cute cape cod near shops. We were a bit skeptical about this one because it was in a totally new area for us, but we though its hints of city feel might reawaken the part of us that once loved living in NYC and being able to walk to the store. So we decided to check it out. Here it is in its slightly-doctored-photo glory (see why we’re not sharing tons of pics out of respect to the sellers here):
THE STATS:
- Age: 1945
- House size: 2,001 square feet
- Lot size: 0.25 acres
- Bedrooms: 3
- Bathrooms: 2
THE PROS:
- Cute, friendly & walkable neighborhood (we could even walk to Target!)
- County schools/taxes with city feel
- Old and definitely in need of work
- Gorgeous hardwood floors throughout
THE CONS:
- Expensive per square foot compared to others we looked at
- Layout made house feel chopped up and closed in
- Master on 1st floor, others upstairs (we’d like ‘em on the same level)
- No central air
- Not very close to family
This particular home didn’t quite feel right to us once we got inside (we’re sort of waiting for the same gut reaction that we had when buying our current house) but we’re glad we saw it because we realized that we did like this sort of neighborhood, even though it was a new area for us entirely. The fact that it was a bit pricier and further away from our family wasn’t ideal, but we did like the charming exterior and hope to look at other two-level houses in Bon Air just to keep our options open beyond ranches (read more about why Bon Air is the promised land for us here). On to the next one…
Altered exterior photo taken by us and edited thanks to our friend Photoshop.
Psst- Want to see the coolest nursery we’ve seen in a while? Check out this week’s BabyCenter post right here for a Nursery Crashing adventure.
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Love this cute cape cod! It is easy to expand in the future if you so choose… Great job on Nate’s show yesterday! I was so excited to come home from work and watch it on DVR:)
Walking to Target would be nice. I’m glad you aren’t settling for something with a choppy layout that isn’t near your family!
Also, not having central air seems so odd to me, but then I live in Florida!
aw, it looks so cute on the outside! but i know that “gut” feeling. haven’t gotten it yet to buy our own home, but so looking forward to it!
how are the houses doing on the inside?
Hey Emily,
So far, the two we’ve posted aren’t living up to the good exterior impressions they gave us once we got inside. But we know the perfect house is out there!
xo,
s
No central air? That would be a deal-breaker for me!
I can walk to Target from my house. That’s probably why my bank account hates me. ;)
I miss unique homes. All thehomes in Fla look the same! I cant wait until you all find “the one” so excited.
OMG – this house is LITERALLY exactly the same looking (despite it being blurry) to my parents home in St. Paul, MN. That’s too funny!
My parents used your criteria when they bought our house when I was 2 years old. We moved to the next town over from both sets of grandparents because it had a much better school district yet we were just a 5-minute drive from family. It’s a great way to grow up so I hope for Clara’s sake you find the perfect place nearby. (And if it were me, I couldn’t live that close to a Target without it being a hazard to my wallet.)
I’ve always considered the ‘cap cod’ style to be one of those ‘cute but I’d never live there’ designs. I’m impressed that you guys can open up your pallet enough to include such different houses.
I’m a fan of the ‘walkable’ neighborhoods. That is high on my list of ‘things I will want for my house one day’. Are you all looking for a house near commercial properties? Or sticking with the more suburban neighborhoods?
Hey Loren,
Due to our preference for highly ranked schools, we’re looking at homes outside of Richmond city, which means a lot fewer commercial properties and a lot more neighborhoods.
xo,
s
Walking to target? amazing. No central air? NEXT!!!!!!!
<3
the exterior of this house is so cute!!!
Bummer about the choppy layout! But good for you for staying close to what you want.
We chose our house, in an town that wasn’t originally on our area list, because it is walkable to town (granted, that only means a grocery store, some bars, and a bowling alley – this is Idaho after all) and also has hundreds of miles of hiking trails out the back door. To me, walkable is amazing!
Hold out for a 4 bedroom home! Since you plan on having more children, 3 bedrooms will feel cramped really fast – take it from someone who’s been there. Our next house will definitely have a laundry room and/or utility or mudroom too. With three kids we just don’t have space to stash shoes, backpacks, sports stuff and jackets neatly, and it would be nice to have a laundry room to sort laundry and be able to shut the door. Right now we just have a laundry closet, similar to yours, and on laundry days it can look a mess. Kids dirty up clothes so fast I’m always doing laundry.
I love cape cod style houses! We looked at a few when we were house hunting and the choppy layout was a deal breaker for us too. I’m excited to see when you find “the one”!
I can’t find it on Zillow, but it sure sounds like you’re looking in my dream neighborhood (there aren’t THAT many Targets around here :) I would love to be able to actually walk places – Target, the mall, the gym, etc. And still being in the county is a plus.
Crikey, now I really want to find this house.
I can’t say enough about the benefits of living in a walker-friendly area urban area. We just bought our first home in Grandview Heights, Ohio, a little urban suburb less than 10 minutes from downtown Columbus. We did have to pay a premium for the neighborhood (but of course, we got a gorgeous home!), but it was important to us to be able to walk to a library and to schools, and we have the added benefit of being within a block of downtown Grandview, which is loaded with adorable little shops and restaurants (even a little movie theater)- all within walking distance! We can also walk to the pharmacy, the pet store, the dry cleaner and 2 grocery stores and we’re near the busline which makes commuting a breeze and it’s much better than having a 25+ minute commute, an extra car payment and paying $50+ a month for downtown parking. We really had to weigh the pros and cons of buying in a true suburb vs. our little urban suburb and it’s true we could have bought a huge McMansion for what we paid for our 1945 colonial, but we bought more than just a house – we also bought a lifestyle. And we love it!
you had me at walking to target, but then i got to your cons and agree that some of them might be deal breakers. no central air though – you could always get it put in (my sis did and it wasn’t as expensive as i thought it would be).
I thought you guys would be looking for 4 bedrooms though – or do the houses you are looking at with 3 bedrooms have a separate office area?
Hey Danielle,
We were hoping we could finagle the layout of this one to create an office area if we liked it (which would free up all three bedrooms for us and kiddos, which is better than our current situation) but alas, the layout wouldn’t have worked for that. Onward!
xo,
s
LOve the outside! Super cute, and very southern looking! But living in Virginia myself, I can’t believe that any house here doesn’t have central air! Good Luck House Hunting!
Very cute, but what a shame about the layout!
As much as I love the quaint cottage look of this home, I think I would personally miss having a porch. I have four children and I can’t tell you how often they’re out on the porch on a rainy afternoon, coloring or reading a book. We have a back porch too, but it’s just not the same. So for me, I would pass on this one… and no a/c? Yikes. lol I suppose it wouldn’t matter if you’re in Alaska…but um, you all have hot summers. I know. I used to live there. lol
If you find the perfect house now would you put an offer on it without selling the old house first? What if it was perfect for you? Or are you just looking to see what is out there?
Hey Maggie,
Oh yes, we’d pounce! We’d just have to cross our fingers that the seller would be ok with us putting in an offer that was contingent on selling our house (since we couldn’t close on a new house without selling ours). So complicated!
xo,
s
Hooray! I love living in Bon Air. We moved to Bon Air a little over three years ago and we love it. We love our house, our neighborhood, our neighbors and the schools! I can’t wait to see where you land.
Are you planning to stick with a three bedroom house? I would’ve figured that you’d want to add another room for future bambinos?? Did I miss a post about that?
Hey Kristen,
Ideally we’d find a four bedroom house or a three bedroom with an office (which would free up all three bedrooms for us and kiddos instead of having to devote one to an office like we do now).
xo,
s
Cute house! I like having all bedrooms on the same floor although, I’d opt to have a split plan…master on one side of house, other BRs on the other side.
Good luck on your continued search!
: )
I like that the footage was bigger than the yellow cottage. But no central air would be no fun down the road and expensive to add. Always go with your gut. Just wait a bit…Your house is waiting for you to find it! :)
Ah, well, c’est la vie. I thought it was so fun to look through other people’s houses that I didn’t even mind when it wasn’t the right one for us.
Do you guys still have your house listed on the FSBO site? I wanted to share it with a friend looking to move to the area, but I can’t find it anymore.
We’ll email you a link.
xo,
s
I know the walking to Target thing might be a pro, but it can be a con, too! When we had our condo, we were walking distance to Target — lets just say we spent WAY too much money there simply because is was ridic close and convenient.
When I lived in L.A., I lived in a walkable neighborhood and my favorite part was the local grocery store would let you push the cart home with your groceries in it and then a truck drove around and picked them all up!
As a fellow Cape Cod owner and lover (we live on Cape Cod, too!)…i love the outside!!
Pros:
- its super cheap to get the outside of your house re-painted because there isn’t much to paint!
- the shingles are adorable and very durable
- they are usually deceptively big in comparison to what they look like on the outside
- they are cute!
- they inspire all sorts of nautical and white-friendly design schemes :)
Cons:
-the walls upstairs in bedrooms can be annoying with the slants
-roof replacements can be expensive because there is so much roof
-one of our bedrooms is downstairs, too, and we don’t LOVE it
good luck!
Wow- a cape cod expert! Love it!
xo,
s
My first house was a 1946 cape cod, and although I loved how cute it was, I was soon wishing for AC and a more open layout. Well, and just more space in general! (It was only 2BR 1 bath.) Keep looking!
I LOVE these posts.
We are cape cod owners too. To tack another item onto Lindsay’s list, take note of the insulation in the upper level when looking at a cape cod. Our is not insluated at all and we have warm in the summer, cold in the winter. Insulation is high on our wish list.
On the plus side, many cape cods take advantage of those awkwarsd kneewalls to create tons of walk-in storage.
We love our cape cod!
Growing up in a cape cod, I know how nice and cozy they can be…if you happen to be downstairs. I had an upstairs bedroom with those god awful slanted ceilings that made decor a pain in the you-know-what, the closet space very odd, and a literal headache for this 5’9″ girl. I often wonder if my parents lied in bed at night (in the downstairs master) laughing, “Hahaha, we put the tall kid in the low-ceilinged room!”
Wow! That house could be ours, except for the white columns. Our brick Cape Cod ended up being “The One”, but I totally hear ya on the layout thing. When you open our front door, it’s 6-9 inches from the stairs! And yeah, I’ve never really understood the whole “split your house into two” aspect of c.cods. Oh well, we still LOVE our home. It does only have three bedrooms, but a whole open office area, so we didn’t need a bedroom for our computers. Did that house have a basement? Because another plus our home had going for it was a very, very large basement, semi-finished, which could easily be finished up and a bedroom and a bathroom added down there (that’s where the laundry is). It’s our family room right now and very cosy I might add! Good luck on your search (we didn’t get to look very long because our home was the second one we looked at!).
P.S. I remembered through the day yesterday to watch your show, but when 5:00 came, did I?! No! I remembered at 6:00! So bummed, but I enjoyed watching your clips this morning, and loved your post. Thanks!
Hey LauraC,
Nope, there wasn’t a basement (which definitely would have landed itself on the pro list). Oh well, more house hunting fun!
So sorry you missed the show, the clips pretty much share the gist of it anyway. And who knows, maybe they’ll rerun it someday…
xo,
s
Watched the episode of Nate today with you guys on it, great job you were both so cute!
I know you are a long way off but my parent’s bedroom was on the first floor while my sister and my bedrooms were on the 2nd. Once we got into middle school/high school, i think they really enjoyed not being on the same floor as us so they didn’t have to put up with all of the stupid fights we got in!
Having kids, bedrooms on sep. floors would kill it for me. Some people like that but I prefer to be close to my kids, no matter what the age. Cute house and close to shops is nice though…
I LOVE this house!
Do you think these exterior photos are still pretty obvious to those “in the know”? I’m wondering if the owners would still know their house, even if it is a blurred photo. Just looking at this one – black shutters, brick house portion to the right, white painted portion to the left, big white flower bush in front…? Maybe not, or maybe it’s not a big deal (which it’s not to me, I’m just asking).
And I’m wondering if you guys are going to be back with more DIY posts rather than so centered on house-hunting or getting yours ready to sell. These aren’t as “average Joe” friendly (IMO) because they’re so specific to you guys. I miss your other types of posts (i.e. decorating, redoing or repurposing objects, etc.).
Hey Beth,
Sure, the sellers might recognize the front of the houses, but we didn’t want to share interior shots with their furniture and personal belongings (photos of the exterior of most houses can be snapped on the street without any feelings of invasion of privacy). We kind of just thought the photoshop filter was fun. As for DIY posts, we’re still definitely into those. Did you see our pumpkin makeovers, our silhouette tutorial, and our cup makeovers last week? We also did a crack-puttying post, a mood board, and included a video clip in this morning’s post full of DIY ideas! All that in just the last week. As we stated in this post, we’re going back to blogging about what’s going on in our life. So we’ll definitely continue to share our house hunting and selling adventures along with other DIY related undertakings! And some weeks there might be more of one while other weeks there are more of others. We’re getting back to the true diary feeling that we had going on a few years back, so it might be all over the place, but that’s kind of our life!
xo,
s
Just found your site through your NATE BERKUS APPEARANCE!!! I was SO EXCITED for you and I don’t even know you :). I LOVED the segment that you 3 did with the inexpensive home accessories that look really luxe! Are y’all interested in any of the historic neighborhoods — we have friends who moved to Richmond and are in a row house in The Fan with 2 small kids (3B/2Ba) and love it! Granted, his job is near there (St. Paul’s Episcopal) which isn’t as big a deal for y’all. I like to have more green around my house so I don’t that I could do what they’ve done in The Fan but thought I’d mention it. Thus ends my knowledge of the Richmond housing market ;). Molly (in a cute little Florida beach town)
Hey Molly,
So glad you found our blog! Wahoo. As for those great historic areas, we love them but we’ve decided to stay near family and the great Chesterfield schools that we know and love our here in Bon Air. You can read more about that decision here. Hope it helps!
xo,
s
Sorry to hear the inside is choppy, because the outside is about perfect in my book! I love a cape cod, but they can have some interesting layouts! Loving following your house saga, as we are trying to sell ours as well. Too bad it’s not in Richmond :)
We have a two story with the master on the first and the other three bedrooms on the second floor. It’s not that big of a deal. All the houses around here are like that so I guess I never even thought about it. I personally would never want the master upstairs. That would be a deal breaker for me. When my son was a baby, he just stayed in a cradle in our room and then we moved him upstairs to his room at about 4 months. We had a video monitor and it worked great. Now that he’s 7 he loves being up there.
I am a new blogger…but NOT new to your site. I’ve been following it for a few years now. :)I also just watched you on the Nate Show yesterday! You guys rocked it!
I am a biiiig DIY lover and really enjoy your tips and ideas!
-Carly at Ruffles & Such
(I also love babies….a lot. So the fact that you sneak Clara in there every once in while is my fave. DIY and babies…nothing better!)
Your other post (about house location decision) makes me even MORE excited to visit Richmond one day. I don’t know if I could ever live away from the coast but what I hear about RVA makes me want to try :). Molly in Fla.
This is random, but I searched the site and didn’t see anything so I wanted to see if anyone had an answer in the comments section!
I’m looking for a free, easy to use, floor planner. Any tips?
We actually like floorplanner.com. It’s free and pretty easy!
xo,
s
How are your showings on your current place going?
They’re going well! We’re busy! We had one every day last week and four this weekend! Fingers crossed…
xo,
s
We’ve lived in that very neighborhood next to that very Target, brings back fond memories :) All the bedrooms were upstairs though, and now that we have four kids I would never want to be on a different floor from them. I know you mentioned you ruled out Richmond city because of the schools, but Mary Munford and Fox are the two exceptions in my opinion. Happy hunting guys!
I love the Cape Cod style. That is the style of my current house in the heart of North Carolina. The only drawback for me is that all of our bedrooms are on the main level and we have a guest suite upstairs with our huge family room. I wish the layout was such that all my bedrooms were upstairs with bigger living areas downstairs. However, I still love this type of home. We call it a story and a half here in NC. Happy househunting.
It’s darling! I love a cape cod. My last home was a brick cape from 1925. Mint green and black bathroom to boot!