TO BUY OR TO BUILD

            Conventional wisdom (and most realtors) claim that you get much more bang for your buck if you buy an existing home rather than building a new one.  That may be true, but we couldn’t find a home in Payson that (a) we liked, and (b) was also within our price range.   And what, exactly, was our price range?  Whatever we could get for the sale of our Flagstaff home.  We had just paid off one mortgage and were dead determined not to accrue another one.  Or in Michael’s words: “I didn’t retire so I could go back to work to  pay off another mortgage. In the words of Huck Finn, no thanks, ma’am; I been there before.”  As for the other criterion, “like” is a very personal and subjective term.  Yes, there were certain qualities we wanted in our new home—“great room” design, one level, and so forth.  But more importantly, the house had to say something—not something “nice” or “pleasant” or “comfortable.”  We didn’t want a house that smiled and whispered politely, “Buy me, I’m a nice house.”   No, it had to punch us in the face, grab us by the aorta, tackle us at the knees, and holler, “Me!  I’m it!  You know it and I know it!  Shop no further!”    

             However, great expectations are too often dashed on the hard rocks of reality.  Weren’t we being totally thoroughly absolutely positively unrealistic?  Shooting for the stars when we couldn’t afford a one-way ticket to the moon?  Window shopping at Neiman Marcus when we should have been scouring the aisles of Wal-Mart?  But wait!  Wait!  Wait!  Wait!  If (we reasoned) we couldn’t find an affordable home in Payson that makes our hearts leap and our eyeballs spin (in a good way), why on Earth should we sell our mortgage-free home with forty ponderosa pine trees in a very desirable neighborhood in Flagstaff?  So we were back to our original criterion:  must be better than or equal to our little bird in the hand.              

             We toured hundreds (or so it seemed) of homes in Payson but only two gave us enough pause for a return visit.  Both were a little out of our price range. Both were also designed by Bill Easton, a local designer.  In fact, we soon discovered that every home in Payson that had caught our eye (yes, the big, expensive ones too) was a Bill Easton design.  And the wheels started churning:  why should we  buy a pre-inhabited (i.e., old) house that might have some of the features we wanted but probably not all of them not to mention a furnace or a roof on its last legs when for about the same cost we could build a brand new house with a new furnace, new roof, new everything  designed exactly the way we wanted it?  In other words, our proverbial Dream Home? 

             “Well, for one reason,” Rebecca said, also quoting Huck Finn, “I been there before.”  And she had!  She, of course, had been the contractor for our home on Raintree Road In Flagstaff.  She knew full well what this little shopping spree would entail, and she made that very clear:  “Are you crazy?  Have you totally completely thoroughly absolutely lost your mind?”

             Apparently, yes.   And apparently there were no other affordable homes in Payson that either Michael or Rebecca liked. So Michael deftly played his trump card:  we either build in Payson or we stay in Flagstaff.  Rebecca considered the options, opened a window and inhaled the late afternoon burned dog food aroma of Nestle-Purina.  “Let’s build,” she said. 

             A week later we stopped by Mr. Easton’s office and following a long visit we popped the big question:  “Do you think you could design us a home we could build for $150 a square foot?”

            There was a pause—a long, pensive pause.  “You two are going to be the contractors?” he asked.

             Michael looked at Rebecca and Rebecca looked at Michael.  Michael was smiling because he had never contracted a home before; it was a new adventure.  Rebecca  was grimacing because she had. 

             “Yes,” they said, but Rebecca’s eyes remained shut throughout the rest of the conversation.  She looked as if she had said “I do” at a shot-gun wedding or  had agreed to have another baby.  Michael looked like a stupid, slap-happy dog that wants to go on a twenty mile hike with its master, tongue wagging, big ears flapping.

             Bill nodded gravely.  At that moment he looked like General Eisenhower discharging us the beaches of Normandy.  “Yes, I think you can build it for $150 a square foot,” he said.  “If you don’t go crazy, you know.”

            “Define ‘crazy?’” Rebecca said.

           “When do we start?” Michael said. 

           Bill shook his head and smiled.