Dreams

The word Dream has different meanings. Of course the first meaning to mind is the dreams we have when we are sleeping. Other meanings to it is to dream or hope or aspire towards something. My blog name Growing towards a dream is the second meaning. Growing towards life/things/ways of being in the future.

My progress so far?

In 2005 my husband and I bought our first home, a major fixer upper. (I'll post pics next time with before and afters). When we bought our home our family thought we were crazy. It was a 2200 sq ,3 story home that needed fixing in every single room! Inside and out, top to bottom! We had just finished school and been working full-time for about a year when we got into this, Me 24 and my husband 26. We spent our evenings and weekends fixing it all up ourselves, painting/plumbing/making kitchens and bathrooms. Actually our first day here our shower head broke off behind the wall and water was just flowing between the walls! Fun huh! We had surprises like this for the first year. (Remember that 80's movie Money Pit, we rented that movie when we bought the house ha! very similar) After a year of fixing it up we separated our house into 3 apartments. The two apartments we rented out, a bachelor and a basement apartment that had back yard entrances, then our section was part of the main floor/2nd and 3rd floor with the front entrance. More than enough room for the 2 of us. Many people never even new we had part of the house rented, we did a great job in separating it. We always had pleasant tenants and never any problems, whew!. Income from rent was 1400/month which was great and helped with the bills and even the paying for our wedding in 2007.
Our goal for this home was to turn over a large profit, and we did just that when we sold it this spring for 118k more than we bought it for ;).

Hard work does pay off!

When we first put our home on the market last year, the plan was to move into a condo in downtown Toronto. The reason for this was to be able to easily rent out our condo when we decide to leave and work in other countries 6 months at a time. Our dream... to work in San diego first for 6 months. So last year the house did not sell, and the thought of the condo didn't look so good anymore. We ended up buying another house with no rental income potential.

Does the move to SanDiego seem far fetched? We don't seem to think so ;) The new home has much much less to worry about than our current home therefore leaving it for months at a time will not be so bad. As per cost, we ensured that the new home we purchased altho more expensive in price, but with the amazing interest rates and larger down payment our mortgage is less and the house bills on a newer home is much cheaper compared to what we pay now in our 100 year old home ;) (we thought this through really well)

My husband and I are the type of people that ensure we are doing what we want for ourselves and ourselves only. We like nice things but will not sacrifice ourselves for them. We are very happy for our new home, nice and new and fresh, but by ensuring our costs were lower than what we are paying now also allows us to keep dreaming of those other things we want to do in life. Like 6 months in San Diego! I'll keep you updated on this for sure even if it is in a couple years! ;)

With this current move I'm really beginning to see how we are growing towards our dream. I can see that with our expenses lower we will be able to save much more money and focus on what makes us happy like our online business/travel/investments and even 6 months in San Diego! All feel that our goals are more attainable and looking forward in growing towards our dream!!!!!

and Singing your own song is what it is all about for us!