Back to Tampa

Our two weeks at the beach came to an end today. We packed everything up into Roy, climbed in and drove up to "move in" to our temporary furnished rental which we will stay in month to month until we either find a house to buy or give up looking and get a long-term rental.

Our temporary furnished rental is a two bedroom ground floor condo in a condo complex called Grand Key. It is on a major street and across the street from a Lowe's, among other large stores. It has some nice perks like a shared pool and a small fitness center. The condo itself is exactly what you would expect from a temporary furnished rental: I would rate it a medium on a scale of grim-ness.*

It is good that the "master" bedroom has an enormous closet because that can be Emerson's room while my mother stays with us to help out for a while. It turns out that the day before she came down here for a week-long visit she was informed that she had lost her job. Eric and I were sure to say how sorry we were before eagerly asking if she might be willing to stay with us and look after Emerson while I finish up this project for work. She agreed, so she gets the second bedroom. Sometimes things do seem to just work out.

After moving all of our stuff into the condo, we went out for another marathon day of house-hunting. We saw 11 places all in a new part of town called Westchase. We have seen everything there is to see in South Tampa within our price range it is all garbage. We have seen good places come on the market in our price range so we know it isn't impossible but it seems like it will take a while and I am not sure we have that kind of endurance at this point. Westchase is a little further out and it is subdivision-land, but it has great schools and we will be able to get more space for our money. Eric says he is willing to do the extra driving. This does mean we would need to get a second car.

Of the 11 we saw, a few places have potential. We're going to sleep on it and see what clarity we have. I go to St Louis in the morning for a few days so maybe that will bring extra perspective as well.


*Not a scale of grim to great, but a scale of really grim to not too grim.