The End of an Era

Our story of becoming first time homeowners + what's next for us!

When Tyler and I began travel therapy over two years ago, we had two primary goals we set out to meet which were: 1. Paying off my student loan debt and 2. Saving for a down payment on a house. Back in April we met our first goal of paying off nearly $100k of student loan debt. Behind the scenes this summer, Tyler and I began our home search in Kansas City all the way from Washington. We spent most of June and early July constantly in touch with our realtor and good friend, Seth, who was vetting each and every house we would send him for weeks. Tyler and I had decided back in January that in our ideal scenario we would be able to purchase a house by summer to move into in the fall. We knew the housing market was crazy, especially in a hot spot like Kansas City, but were not quite prepared for the emotional toll the process would take on us. We made generous offers on several homes, offering well beyond listed price, only to lose out on each one. Tears were shed and hope was slowly dwindling - how could we compete with all of the other first time home buyers who were also just trying to get their foot in a door? We decided to take a short break from the process in mid June - we were emotionally exhausted from the highs and lows of trying to buy a house in this market. This is where the story gets good and all of the glory goes to God.

Seth reached out to us in late June about a few houses that would be coming to market in July. He decided to make off market offers for us, in an attempt to avoid the outrageous bidding wars we had kept finding ourselves in. Only one home that we were interested in was willing to negotiate with us pre-market. The caveat to an off-market offer is that you are not able to preview the home in person whatsoever. You would assume that this would be a very unsettling scenario - making an offer on a house you have not stepped a single foot in. God must have been working overtime to provide peace to two Type A personalities, because Tyler and I both felt a strange sense of calmness and confidence in moving forward with an offer, sight unseen. A couple of days after our offer was made, we were signing documents on what was on track to become our first home. We officially closed on our house on August 16th! We are still in shock, as we STILL have not been to our house in person yet. We are counting down the days until we finally get to walk into a home that is simply ours. Ours to make memories in, ours to make our own and ours to share with our family and friends.

This process has once again reinforced what we always deep down know to be true, that God has a plan better than anything we could dream up on our own. He is the way-maker, even when the outlook seems utterly impossible. He is SO good and generous and all we can do is praise Him!

We also recognize that we would not be homeowners without our dear friend, Seth, guiding us through every step of this process. Seth went above and beyond for us - driving from Topeka to Kansas City multiple times a week on our behalf. Thankful that God has given us such a true friend. If you need a realtor in Kansas we would love to refer him to you!

So, you might be wondering - what does all of this mean in regard to travel therapy? Well, we are closing the door to our travel therapy era and will open the door to our new home in just a few days. When Tyler and I started out on this journey we thought we would travel for a year, max. Well, a year quickly turned into two and a half years. While the past two and a half years have been the absolute best times of our lives, we also yearn for the next best time in our life, which for us means: simplicity. Having our family over, getting lunch (or playing golf) with friends, finding a church home, building community and feeling settled. I am longing for the weekends where we feel content with just being at home - traveling has given us a mindset of urgency and a feeling of needing to fill every single second with some kind of activity or adventure. Your girl is ready to relax, slow down and have a cozy fall. I look forward to having the security of knowing our new house is OUR home - no one can kick us out or decide to raise our rent.

This summer, we had been working through the highs and lows of buying our first home and getting ready to end a lifestyle that has been better than our wildest dreams. Early in the summer we had our reservations and doubts - was this the right decision? Were we REALLY ready to give up traveling? Back in January, Tyler and I agreed that if we were meant to settle down somewhere, God would make the path clear and obvious. The absolute miracle of being able to purchase our home when we did proved to us that we had made the right decision. God slowly started working on both of our hearts and minds back in January, preparing us for what He knew would be coming. At times Tyler has been even more excited about our new house than me, researching projects that he hopes to complete for hours on end. We have enjoyed creating Pinterest boards for style inspo and walking the isles of Home Depot, in search of pieces to make our home ours.

We look forward to our homeowner chapter as we “retire” from our travel chapter. I cannot wait to fill our new home with pictures of our amazing memories and beautiful views from the past two and a half years.

In a previous blog post, “A Tug Between the Head and the Heart”, I ended the post by writing ”While my heart longs to be home and for a home of our own, we both know in our head and our hearts that we have been graciously given the opportunity to make wise decisions now that our future selves will be thankful for.”

Well… our future selves are here and those words have held true. We are in awe of what God has done for us since the beginning of this journey. We left Kansas with nearly 100k in student loan debt, and are returning with zero. We left Kansas with no home of our own, just a storage unit with most of our belongings. We get to return to Kansas on Thursday and walk into our own house for the very first time!

The decisions we made then, led to the dream we get to live now.

Thank you to our family and friends for following our travel journey with us. I guess our idea to move across the country two and a half years ago wasn't so crazy after all. While it has been the time of our lives, we believe that the best is still yet to come!

Love always,

The (retired) Wandering Wrights