Rain or Shine, Jacksonville Jazz Fest will go on

Well it has been raining not stop for the past few days here in Jacksonville. Unfortunately the Jacksonville Jazz Festival also starts up this weekend. It is set up for the first time in downtown Jax. If you look at the picture of my logo, they were suppose to set up in the park along with the street next to it. Because of the rain they had to move all the stage indoors. I sure hope that the rest of the weekend is a bright sun shiny day or there may not be a jazz fest in downtown next year. Anyways for anyone in Jacksonville, I would encourage you to come and join the festivities.

Our first house!

Today is the day that me and my wife, Lita, close on our new (old) house.
We live in Jacksonville, Florida, home of the most recent Superbowl. Here in this city, we have 2 historic districts, one which is Riverside/Avondale (which is really 2 historic districts put into one) and the historic district of Springfield.

When me and my wife first decided to buy a house, we wanted a house in Riverside/Avondale. There the houses were large and gorgeous, all historic and right next to the river. The only downside is that a house with a total square footage of 1200 ft, cost roughly around $150 - 200,000. Now that might not be much to you, since Jacksonville's real estate is actually very cheap, but to a couple like us it was too much. We needed something bigger at that price. So we said farewell to Riverside/Avondale.

We then came across Springfield, which our realtor showed us. Our realtor, Reggie, actually lives in Springfield. He showed us around and at first we were at awe at all the historic 2 story homes there, but the downside was that the neighborhood looked a little iffy, if you know what I mean. It was in the downtown area and literally walking distance from our work. But we had our doubts.

After 4 months of looking at houses and turning them down, my realtor showed us a house and we loved it. It looked to be a four-square with a wrap around porch, updated plumbing, electrical and had a/c. It had most of the original woodwork, but had carpet and tile installed throughout the house. I lifted part of it up to find the original hardwood flooring. So after many days of thinking we decided to bid on the house. To our amazement, the offer was accepted and brings us up to this point today, where we signed the paperwork and officially had ourselves a home.

Since this is our first home and first renovation project, we know that it will take awhile and we will most likely do things wrong, but hopefully this will be a great learning tool and maybe in a few years we will be renovating another home in Springfield.