Top Sellers, Transitional Coastal Design!

HELLO FRIENDS!

My goodness, it’s been a wild but fun week. We are officially moved into our new home and I still wake up excited. After pouring our hearts into this space for the last year, dreaming of one day sitting on the porch sipping our coffee or grilling out back, it’s really wild to actually be doing it now. It feels like a dream come true.

I have so loved designing things and bringing you along with me throughout the whole journey. I love seeing what you guys are buying for yourselves from my curated HOME collection, too, and I feel somehow closer to you guys after doing this whole thing together! I wanted to share your top purchased pieces so far from the home to help you as you navigate making over your own spaces. I have learned my specific style is Transitional Coastal… WHO KNEW? It’s so funny how different my design style has changed over the years, but knowing the technical term for my style has really helped me as I search for pieces. I have been shocked that majority of my purchases have ended up being from Target, y’all. The Studio McGee line is AMAZING and, while I had budgeted to purchase items from McGee & Co./Pottery Barn/West Elm… I have ended up going with the Studio McGee line with Threshold at Target more than anything else. I am not one to buy “cheap” or skimp on quality, so I can assure you this line is truly impressive. I actually even returned some West Elm purchases to exchange for Target because I liked it better! … it’s the REAL deal. To be honest, in all likelihood, pieces in the line at Target are probably the McGee & Co. design but manufactured by Threshold [making it THOUSANDS of dollars cheaper!] As you’ll see below, 4/6 items you have bought the most are from Target!

I can’t wait to show you guys every little detail of this home. It’s so fun and I have felt so supported in this move. It feels like you guys are just as excited as we are!

Emery Bench | Whitewash Beaded Chandelier | Emery Backless Stool | Felt Artwork

 Upholstered Accent Chair | Casaluna Bedding

 

Favorite Target Finds for the Home

Can y’all believe we are SO CLOSE to our move in date?! One month and 6 days to be exact… hehe. I cannot wait to get my hands on my home and start truly making this space that I have dreamed of and designed into OURS, once and for all. I have mentioned it throughout the process, but majority of my design inspiration comes from Studio McGee. Crisp, traditional meets modern, and a neutral space that you can build off of. With that said, I have rounded up my favorite items currently available at Target – much of which is from the Threshold x Studio McGee line itself. I hope this helps you find that new piece you’ve been hunting for to make your home exactly what you have been dreaming of *and on a budget!!*

You will catch on that I go neutral on the big stuff and add color with vases, dishes, throws and pillows, and artwork that is easy to exchange when my style changes! Replacing these items is a lot easier to do than replacing tile or a $3k sofa/large piece of furniture.

Anthropologie New Releases

If you haven’t caught on… Anthro Home is basically my style to a T in one spot. I love a neutral space with pops of color. You’ll see me add color in dishes, kitchen accessories, towels, trinkets, and furniture that isn’t a major staple piece [like a bench rather than a sofa]. I find their prices to be surprising more often than not, as I believe majority of their decor and home/kitchen items are fairly achievable price points. Plates and mugs for the season around $20 is not bad in my book when it’s quality and unique!

I rounded up some of the colorful items in my cart right now. With our move-in date in May, I am READY for a bright, colorful, clean space full of inspiration and opportunity. I believe the pieces below say just that.

How To Easily Elevate Your Home

We are about 50 days out from our closing date (PRAISES – there’s an end in sight!) and I cannot wait to get my hands on this home. Obviously, it’s going to be beautiful as-is when we move in, but I have a lot of plans to further customize our semi-custom build and really make it unique. I did my best with our tile and basic choices to create a space that provides a blank canvas for design. I chose unique floor tiles and splurged on these more than anything else at our builder’s design center, because it’s something much more difficult to change once you’ve moved in.

Lighting, bathroom mirrors, wallpaper, and doors are things we will be doing to elevate our space once moved in.

Tip: We asked our builder to not even install the builder grade mirrors in our bathrooms so that we wouldn’t have to deal with damaged walls the moment we moved in after removing them. They were totally down to skip that step of installation! As far as lighting goes, majority of our home is recessed canned lighting. I will be replacing all bedrooms (4) and main living/dining space lights.

WALLPAPER

I have BIG plans for our downstairs powder bath, including a beautiful gold mirror and wallpapered ceiling. I have been sifting through every wallpaper website imaginable, trying to find THE perfect wallpaper – see my current top contenders below! I also plan to replace our stand alone sink in there with a beautiful vanity down the line. But for now, I am happy with a standalone white porcelain sink with black hardware.

Knox’s Reading Nook:

Lighting

Literally, the moment we move in, I plan to replace lighting. It will immediately make the space feel less like a new build and a little more customized. Currently, they have in gray/silver ceiling fans and the dreaded dome flushed lights that look precariously like … something I won’t say here. I will be replacing ALL the dome flushed lights as well as the gray (cheap looking) dining room light and the large gray fan currently in our living room. This will be a slightly hefty initial investment, but one that is VERY worth it in my opinion. See all my top picks below (I can’t wait to show the EXACT ones I end up buying!)

Iron Arched Door

I am SO excited about this. Taking inspiration from Studio McGee and Cara Loren, I am having a custom iron arched door installed in our master bedroom for the entry into our bathroom. It will tie into our black vanity, black hardware, and iron black shower frame as well as our black metal canopy bed! Additionally, I will have black iron accents all throughout the home as well as the black metal awning on the front of our home. We have a few different quotes for this and I will share once we have somebody booked. BUT, in general, replacing your doors or having a custom entryway like this installed makes your home feel luxurious!

Building a Home & Financial Tips

We are just WEEKS away from moving into our new home, and I am over the moon. We close on our current home next week and will prorate rent it from the owners (who happen to also be some of our BFFs hehe) until we get the keys to our new place. To be honest, this transition couldn’t be easier and I know it won’t always be the case if or when we ever move in the future, but dang I am thankful. It’s been so fun walking this building journey together, and I wanted to put the most asked questions here about it for a reference sheet in the future if ever you build.

I wrote about picking your builder and location here a while back. Today I wanted to focus a bit more on the logistics and financial side of it all! Of course, there are many different avenues in which you can buy and build, so do note as you read that this is just one of many. We are buying with an FHA and closing in advance on our current home sell so we don’t have any looming contingency clauses of any kind. Those aren’t bad by any means, but since we could sell to our friends with such flexibility it REALLY made this all so much better. If a seller is flexible, you can ask about a contingency as well for in between buying/selling. Often times, people will do a contingency with 60 days if they  put an offer on a home but need to sell their current one to be able to actually purchase the home. For us, we are stoked that we can pay off our current home loan, have our equity sitting in our account and pull the trigger the moment our builder tells us the home is ready for us to move in.

What did you have to put down? We had to put down 3.5% of the home as our earnest money. Your earnest money is essentially a down payment that you can’t get back if you back out of the build at any point. It’s securing your home and tells the builder you are serious about building. Fully custom builds require more down because it’s more customized and in theory tougher to sell if you were to back out of your contract. Make sense? The best part about it all though is we paid our earnest money (and over 3 months, which we totally didn’t expect the option for!), and instead of having a check written to us at closing of that amount, we are opting for it to transfer to the builder as our down payment. So when you buy an already built home, you need your down payment AND closing costs all at once. But, since we’ve really already paid our downpayment, we’ve had this entire year to put money away for our closing costs *which is far less than the down payment.* You tracking?

How did you save up for the home? We have been on a financial journey for a couple of years, and it’s actually been fun to be honest. I like to say we’ve been doing the Dave Ramsey-ish plan with virtual envelopes. Paul is far more educated on all things Dave Ramsey than I am. But, I took the envelope system and ran with it. You can read about our banking system here. It always has felt odd to me to talk about money, but I genuinely have learned I love it and have enjoyed helping my friends reach their own goals. This post about our banking hack has been one of my most read and asked for posts ever. I believe that says SO MUCH about you and this community – we mean business with our finances! So even though it feels taboo to talk about it, I have learned talking about money is really helpful for us. So, top thing, the banking hack has been HUGE for us. In addition to that, we started paying massive payments toward debt (appliances we’ve purchased/medical bills/cars/etc). This has freed up our monthly income as well as heavily spiking our credit scores. For the first time in my life, I have a credit score over 700 and I feel like I can take on the world hehe. To reach our goals, we’ve been living entirely on one income as best we can for over a year and putting all surplus into our savings.

So… I have a savings… now what? TBH this part is hard for me and where Paul is smarter. If it were up to me, I would keep my savings account untouched and save it for a rainy day. BUT, there are far wiser things to do with it. 

Investments

We have had money off and on in stocks, and it’s been a huge help as we’ve prepared for buying our new home. We basically start with a number and continue to invest that amount, sending the surplus to us as an income. Though we have chosen not to has investments running for a while due to the state of the market/world, we will be starting this back up once we move with some of the money we have saved up. Paul trades with MT Options.

Debt Snowball

Paul has a plan in place for us *with Dave Ramsey* to do what he calls the Debt Snowball. We have really big plans for our savings to put toward debts like paying off cars and school in the next 3-5 years. Ultimately, putting what we’ve saved toward those assets and debts will free us up from monthly payments early in life and be essentially worth more than owe. Two years ago, I would have thought the idea of paying off a car in two years sounded like insanity… now, it’s very digestible to think about when you follow the plan. *But… trust me, I would be lying if I didn’t challenge Paul on it multiple times a week because it DOES feel scary to pay such large amounts* But, honestly, it’s just true… Dave Ramsey is onto something. Our whole life shouldn’t be paying debt… It should feel weird that our society has made it so normal to live in debt and on payment plans.

Our NEXT big goal that I am dreaming about *and I mean dreaming, hehe* is to start property investments! We will see… it’s a very early stage thought. But, my BFF and I have some plans 😉

I hope this helps you navigate your own finances! What are your goals? Write them out and start taking steps TODAY toward them.

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