We Moved!
Last fall we started looking for houses. We had a short wish list of what we were looking for:
- In or near Trumansburg (the home we love!, where our parents and several of our siblings are still, and the school district we prefer)
- Something we wouldn’t outgrow and ideally could see ourselves staying in the rest of our lives
Beyond that we were pretty open, but the housing market around us was not. There was very little for sale in the area going into the winter so we figured we wouldn’t find something soon and would likely need to put the search on pause until summer to focus on the wedding. But we kept our eyes peeled, and let some friends and family know in case they heard of anything that might be listed soon.
In November Olivia’s friend Indigo told her about a property outside of T-burg that was off market going through probate, but said to contact the listing agent who she was friends with and ask for an off market tour. We eventually reached out to the realtor and got a tour in mid December. It was a unique property, an old farmhouse and a barn turned additional dwelling unit, on several acres in the Trumansburg school district. It checked our few boxes and then some, but both buildings clearly needed some work. We asked if we could come back to see it with Liam’s dad after the holidays to get his input on the repairs.
January came and the second visit with Liam’s dad, Ezra, on the 14th made us more confident that our good feeling about the house and its potential was not ill advised. We got a referral for a buyer’s agent to help us make an offer later that week before the property went back on market. Monday the 19th was Olivia’s birthday and we were on a 10 mile hike with spotty cell reception when we finally received our pre qualification letter from the bank to complete our offer. We waited in a clearing on the trail with one slow bar of service to forward the email to our realtor!
The next two weeks moved at light speed with something new to do every day for the buying process. After we had an accepted offer we scheduled an inspection which went as expected with no surprises as far as the repairs we already assumed were necessary. A few days later, Olivia was over at her mom’s house and realized she hadn’t updated her mother in the frenzy of the last two weeks – we’re buying a house! Olivia’s mom, Laurie, had known we were looking for houses, but things moved quickly and suddenly we were mid way through the process, all signs pointing toward yes, this would be our home. Laurie was excited for us and asked to tell her more and to see pictures.
Olivia started describing the property while she tried to pull up the listing to show her mom pictures. Laurie started asking very specific questions. Not “what is __ like?”, more like “is X like Y?” After a few yeses from Olivia, her mom said, “Olivia, this isn’t the house my dad grew up in, is it?” Olivia exclaimed, “I don’t know, is it?!” quickly pulling up a picture to show her mom. It was! Laurie and Olivia broke out into ecstatic disbelief, and called Liam to tell him the incredible revelation.
Olivia had heard so many stories about this house from her mom’s childhood, but it had been out of the family since long before Olivia was born and she never saw a picture let alone knew the address. It was crazy having her mom recount so many familiar and new stories and realize they all happened at our to-be-home. It was the best and most unbelievable news. Later that night Olivia skimmed through the memory stories written and shared over the last several years in emails from her Great Aunt Mary (Borden) Jamison, sister of her beloved late grandfather Delano Borden. In the one titled “We Were Immigrants” were a couple of paragraphs chronicling the Borden’s move to the United States from Panama in the 1950s, eventually buying their first home in Trumansburg.
Through the details recorded by Mary, we learned lots more about the history of our new home. Here’s her snippet about the house:
When we left Connecticut we went to Interlaken, NY in order for my father to find more and better working conditions – work had petered out in our area of Connecticut. Interlaken was chosen because cousin Gladys (Ma’s niece) and her husband Charlie Swartout lived there, and told Daddy of job opportunities in the area. After Interlaken, with the help of our former landlord, Bernie Stout, Daddy bought a very sad place outside of Trumansburg on Grove Road. It had plank walls, hardly any insulation, no running water – a pitcher pump on an open porch outside – no electricity or plumbing, just an outdoor 2-seater outhouse. Elsie and I cried our first night there – it was really awful!! Elsie and I took turns waking each other up to go together to that outhouse – very dark outdoors and no flashlights or any light. Daddy worked very hard to fix up that old house, with Page and me helping all we could. He worked for 3 years to get electricity up the hill to our and other houses. The power company finally forced the issue with some law that gave the neighbors no choice about allowing the power lines to cross their property. We finally had a nice liveable home to share and it was warm and much, much better than what we first had. Ma cooked in what became our dining room on a wood/coal burning kitchen range, with a “well” at one end that held hot water. It was so hot in the summers to have to light that stove up to cook and get hot water. Eventually, Daddy made a shed that was attached to the bigger room the kitchen. We kept smelling something, and it turned out to be a cistern under an old linoleum that the former owners had dumped their garbage in when they left. The room with the kitchen stove had plaster lathe walls that were hanging in shreds where they had torn off the cupboards and taken with them. So, no cupboards and only a cast iron sink (black) barely hanging on that wall. It was the PITS!! But Daddy only had to pay $1700 for that place that had a small barn and came with about 3 or more acres of land. The house has 3 bedrooms upstairs, 1 bedroom downstairs, and eventually a living room, dining room, bathroom, and kitchen. Two concrete “porches” had been built, but not enclosed. Daddy enclosed both of them, and we had some shelter from the storms because of them. Daddy eventually tore down the barn and put up a 2 story garage where he had all of the tools he was able to purchase after he got some good jobs. He had big vegetable gardens, as well as flower beds that he loved taking care of.
Excerpt from “We Were Immigrants”
Written by Mary Elizabeth Borden Ditmars Jamison – March 2024
Closing took a long time but we are the official homeowners of 5390 Grove Road as of April 29th and are moving in right away! It is bittersweet to be leaving the Darling Road house, Olivia’s older sister Lindsay’s first home with her family that Olivia has been renting from them since 2022. Liam moved in in August 2024 and we have shared so many happy memories here together and with our friends, family, and cats, Snickers and dearly departed Catty Mouse.
It has been a whirlwind. We can’t say we recommend buying a house in the months before your wedding, but we could not be more thankful, happy, or in awe of everything that led us to our home. As with the rest of our love story, it all feels remarkably meant to be.
One more month till our wedding! We’ve updated our mailing address on our registry and have set up mail forwarding with USPS. We will still have access to and will check our old house for mail through May just in case. We are so excited to see you all and celebrate together. Thank you so much for all the love and support we have already and continue to receive from our wonderful family and friends. We are so lucky to have you!