This is a story that started a year and a half ago…and it just goes to show how things happen in ways that we never could have planned. Stick with it and see how it all unravels.
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Once upon a time, there was a girl by the name of Kate, who grew up in New Hampshire and came to a small village in upstate NY. It was a quaint little town where Kate raised her 3 kids and worked at her business. She could walk to her office on the Main Street, she could walk to her favorite cafe for breakfast or lunch and she could even walk to meet her kids at school.
One morning, before Kate went off to work, in the spring of 2017, she received a call from a colleague, neighbor, and friend. He wanted to let her know that he and his wife were going to be putting their house on the market.
Kate thought, wow! What a great place. I would love to own that house with such a cool office space in the bottom. Wouldn’t it just be fabulous to live and work out of the same property?
Kate knew it seemed like one of those dreams that would never come to be. She didn’t even want to move, she liked her comfy little house on Church Street. And her office. And really, she had no desire to work at home everyday.
But still, after talking with her neighbor friend, with excitement, she burst through the office door that morning and blurted out to her team of 2, who were already there, her news about the house/office that was going on the market. The co-workers knew it well.
They all sighed…Wouldn’t that be perfect for the Morning Ag Clips?
Everyone in the office agreed, and went back to work…dreams. Someday maybe…but certainly not in the plan now.
Business was very busy that summer of 2017 and Kate’s family was going in all different directions. Bookkeeping was getting harder and harder for Kate to find the time to do so she hired a bookkeeper that September.
About 3 months after Kate hired her bookkeeper, the bookkeeper started asking questions about the amount of time that Kate and her team actually spent in their office. They were in the throws of a cold winter and other than Wednesday mornings and every other Friday morning, it didn’t seem to the bookkeeper that the office was really used and questioned its necessity. It wasn’t as if the business required foot traffic.
Early that winter the book keeper actually suggested to Kate that she move the office to her house. She emphasized the financial benefits of saving on rent and utility money.
Kate agreed and appreciated her input but was struggling at the thought of working from home every day, and how things would work for their once a week team meeting–would she have that at her dining room table every week?
The book keeper’s solution–rent a room at the library.
No, Kate didn’t like that idea. She enjoyed going to the office, she enjoyed getting dressed up and going to work every day–she thought. Although she had to admit it was kind of nice to dive into work as soon as the kids went to school…
Kate and her bookkeeper, and even her team went round and round into the winter of 2018 on the topic, always coming to the same conclusion, no move.
Then, the Ides of March fell upon them. Up the street from Kate’s house, a beautiful 6 bedroom colonial was coming on the market. It had ample room for Kate’s office and her house… AND, Kate had started doing the math in her head. Or maybe she was beginning to wear down a bit as she was adding up the amount of time that she wasn’t in the office.
Hmmm. Kate was thinking. Her current house just would not work as a place to have an office for her growing business. However, the other house, coming on the market, now that would have plenty of space for her…including a separate entrance and even a conference room space. The office lease was up at the end of June…
After a week of deliberating, and with the blessing of her children, she decided. It was time to get her house sold and put an offer on the other house.
So, Kate set to work that early spring, pulling up carpet, refinishing floors, painting walls. On May 17th, she put her house on the market. And waited…
In the meantime, earlier that spring, Kate had spoken to her neighbor friends, you know, the folk’s who had been trying to sell with the big house and office space? They had gotten no bites on their house and were going to take it off the market and stay put.
In the conversation, the woman-friend had mentioned that really, there was only one house in the village that they would want to buy anyways if their house had sold–her grandmother’s old house, and that was not even on the market. So for them, the timing just wasn’t right, and they were ok with it.
Too bad, Kate thought, she knew, in their hearts, they really wanted to move, their business was changing, and they didn’t need the big house anymore. But, like everything that Kate had experienced in her life, things happen for a reason and there must be a bigger plan for them…so Kate went about her business.
One evening, early in July, Kate went on a walk with her dog, Trixie. As she was deep in thought, walking, a woman who was out on her lawn gardening spoke to her. It startled Kate, enough so that she stopped–and it happened to be the owner of her neighbor’s grandmother’s house. The woman asked Kate about her realtor and then went on to explain that she was going to have to sell her house but wasn’t quite sure when it would be.
Kate took note and continued on her way, thinking, hmmm, too bad. Her neighbors with the big house took their house off the market a little too early–ah but, could be tomorrow, could be next year, the woman didn’t know when she was going to be selling the house anyways. But Kate would be certain to tell them the next time she visited with them.
2 weeks later, the house Kate wanted to buy went under contract–not with Kate. Kate still had not been able to sell her house. But Kate decided to hang in there, she knew that realestate deals fell apart every day. She was going to still try to find a buyer for her house regardless. Besides, the office lease had ended, and her home was getting rather small for her family AND the Morning Ag Clips. Kate knew she had to make this happen.
1 week later Kate saw her neighbor-friends at a summer league basketball game and mentioned that their grandmother’s house was going to be coming up for sale. Her neighbor friend was naturally disappointed but declared that for whatever reason they were meant to stay in the big house with the office.
The third week of August always welcomes in the Washington County Fair. Busy with getting projects ready for display and cows to the fair, the offer finally came in on Kate’s house, and it was really good. But now what?
Kate got wind of another house that was going to be coming on the market that could work as a plan B if the Plan A house that she really wanted actually did sell… the inspections hadn’t happened yet. Maybe it will fail? 😉
However, Kate was only mediocre on Plan B, but with encouragement from her kids she decided to go for it, figuring that she would at least be moving to a better house with an easier, more professional office situation then what she was currently dealing with at her house.
Within a matter of days, while at the Washington County Fair, one thing led to another, and that contract on Plan B never got off the ground, Plan A house passed its inspections, and a closing date of the first week in September was in the works. Now, Kate had a buyer with no house to go to. Oh those buyers, they just kept hanging in for Kate to find a house. Really, how lucky was she?
With much to think about, Kate got back from the fair, and went for a walk with her dog to try to figure things out in her head. She saw that the grandmother’s house was now for sale. That definitely was a lot faster than what was indicated to her by the owner originally. So she noted to herself that she must tell her neighbor friend that it was on the market officially. However she knew, that it was futile for them, they had no buyer for their house.
So the first few days of September hit and Kate, still determined to figure her house and office situation out, started going up and down her street looking for a place to buy that she felt would work well for a house and an office. She wrote letters, she spoke to people she knew. She got responses and even went into one of the beautiful old homes that she really loved. But after a 3 hour visit she knew in her heart that they were not ready to sell within a timeframe that Kate needed to operate under.
September 6th the Plan A house closed, with a new owner, not Kate. Kate was disappointed, but she knew, there had to be a bigger plan, she couldn’t give up, she had to keep searching. She had a young family that really wanted to buy her house, and she wanted them to have it. They just kept hanging in there with her, giving her time and space to figure out if she could indeed find a place to buy.
That same week her neighbor friend reached out to her…the one with the perfect office location and house who took it off the market. She emailed her about some business items and said that she saw Kate’s house listed as sale pending. She wanted to know where Kate was moving to.
Kate claimed back to her, in the email, well, I am not sure. And so innocently, Kate replied in the email, not even thinking about all of the coincidences that had lead her to that moment, “Yes, I have a buyer but now no where to go! Any suggestions on Church, Gray or Cottage? ….If you know any of the larger homeowners on Church and if they are selling or going to be selling in the near future please keep me in mind for an introduction–I could use one.”
So 5 days passed by…and then, Kate got an email, “Our house.”
It had to sink in a bit, because Kate’s response was, “You are funny.”
And the rest is history. The two neighbor-friends went back and forth and arrived at a price. The neighbor-friend bought the grandmother’s house and Kate is now in a space that is even more perfect then her Plan A could ever have been.
On the day of the closing, the friends went into together laughing and joyful, and rode off into the sunset, happily ever after…
And Kate’s bookkeeper is saying “Cha-ching,” because she no longer writes a check to build someone else’s equity but is building Kate’s instead.
The End
Funny how things come around in ways that we never expect, and we arrive in the place where we should be. Stay open to the possibilities…so glad to be back after 2 weeks of packing, moving, and unloading boxes! Cheers to new beginnings!
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