Backstory Part IV – Finding our Gem

It was the Sunday before our wedding, only 23 days after we decided (thanks to my real estate attorney) to get married, and we needed a day off. A day off from all of the chaos surrounding the planning of a wedding, the travel arrangements for visiting family and friends, the back and forth with my attorney and real estate agent on the sale of my apartment, and the general exhaustion that both of us felt from lack of calm in our lives for the last month.

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Backstory Part III – A Manhattan Real Estate Shotgun Wedding?

[Photo: The day after my proposal in Provincetown, MA. July 2013]

So the plan was this….

  • Propose to Yoav (done in July 13)
  • Move in together (done in Jan 14)
  • Sell my Hell’s Kitchen apartment
  • Buy an apartment together to call our home.
  • Keep his apartment of 15 years as an investment property
  • And then in spring of 2015, get married

Plans change….

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Backstory Part II – Open House after Open House after Open House

Yoav and I came to the conclusion early on (before I proposed, but after we said “I love you”) that real estate was going to be a top priority early on in our relationship. We both owned our own co-ops. He bought his small one bedroom, close to Riverside Park south of 110th Street back in the late 90s. I bought my very small studio (294 sq. ft.) in a pre-war doorman building in Hell’s Kitchen in 2010. It was fairly clear that we both wanted to buy a place together to make “our” home in, and not try to fit our lives into the others place (which would be impossible in my tiny studio). A place that we both love and look forward to building our future in.

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Backstory Part I– Love and the Pursuit of Happiness

Allow me to introduce myself…

My name is Devyn and I am not your typical gay middle-aged man. I was born and raised in Central California and from a very young age I had dreams of a life in Manhattan always followed by the fears of making that dream come true. Well, in 2007, after living in Chicago for eight years, I set my fears aside, sold my loft and decided to fulfill my dream of a life in Manhattan. I have never looked back.

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Contract Signed…

 

Contract Signed…. It is official! And we are super excited! We have signed the dotted line on a fixer upper one bedroom apartment in a 1910 building on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

Welcome to this Half Classic Six, my blog about the adventures of finding, buying, renovating, fixing up, restoring, DIY’ing, and decorating a part of New York housing legacy. As well as general musings about life in Manhattan.

In about 8-12 weeks (God willing), we will close on our new home and the adventure will begin! In the posts to follow I hope to tell our tale of finding real estate bliss in Manhattan and turning it into our dream home.

I hope you will join us on our journey of making a dream come true.