nertsmommy Posted January 21, 2013 Share Posted January 21, 2013 DH inherited his mother's 1984 single wide trailer. It only has 2 small bedrooms and it needs a lot of work. It is in a great location for us. I'm trying to decide if we can make this work for our family of 5. We would have to downsize A LOT. If we could sell the place we are in now we could use that for a down payment on a newer modular to put there. We would probably have to live in the smaller place for about 2 yrs before we would be able to afford all that would need to be done for a new place. I'm trying to decide if we should and could live in a tiny place like that. The girls would share the master bedroom, DS would have the smaller bedroom and DH & I would be stuck in the living room. We do need to eventually move form where we are because of DH's health. He has osteoporosis in his spine and we live on a hillside where he has to raise and lower a push mower on a rope to mow our front lawn. Our backyard is a hill as well the he has to push mow, this takes about 2 hours to do. It's too steep for me to do it. We have 32 steps to get up to our house. Right now we are paying bills on both places and we can't afford to keep up two places so we need to get rid of one. Any thoughts? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Susan C. Posted January 21, 2013 Share Posted January 21, 2013 Would you get enough $$ to do what you need if you sell both? It looks to me like neither place fits your needs. Keep in mind for the trailer that if the weather is hot and/or cold, you will lose a lot of $$ on heating/cooling costs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kalanamak Posted January 21, 2013 Share Posted January 21, 2013 Right now we are paying bills on both places and we can't afford to keep up two places so we need to get rid of one. Any thoughts? I would write out all your other options as well. E.g. sell both and get a double wide in the same area? Don't limit yourself to yea and nay on this one move. Also, you're kids are young. If you are going to downsize, doing it now will be easier before they accumulate a wad of carp. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bettyandbob Posted January 21, 2013 Share Posted January 21, 2013 I would move if I knew the timeline and knew we were both on the same page working on that time line. Your kids are young enough that I'd put all 3 in the master bedroom. Based on their ages the outside limit f the timeline would be 4 years. Save money for that long and be very long term thinking in your plans. Don't go with what looks good and is bigger. If your dh has osteoporosis, you need to be thinking about housing tht will rean accessible to him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nertsmommy Posted January 21, 2013 Author Share Posted January 21, 2013 Would you get enough $$ to do what you need if you sell both? It looks to me like neither place fits your needs. We'd get a pretty good down payment if we could sell both. Places have been selling slow here. If we sold the trailer there would be a huge fall out from his side of the family though. I don't know if he's ready to tackle that. MIL just passed away in Nov. and he was really close to her. I would write out all your other options as well. E.g. sell both and get a double wide in the same area? Don't limit yourself to yea and nay on this one move. Also, you're kids are young. If you are going to downsize, doing it now will be easier before they accumulate a wad of carp. My kids already have too much crap. My mom insists on bringing them something every time she visits. We do have the option to buy a smaller house at a discounted price on flat ground. There is no yard though and the layout is very bad. We could either have a room to eat in or a living room, but not both. I've spent some time today looking into if we could add a second story to that one. I'd still like a yard for the kids to play in. Your kids are young enough that I'd put all 3 in the master bedroom. If your dh has osteoporosis, you need to be thinking about housing tht will rean accessible to him. The second bedroom is so small DH & I would have to downsize to a twin bed. :laugh: That could be funny! We do want something that will work for him in later years and that is why we were thinking of going to a one story even though I don't like them. I do think selling both would be a better option and then finding something else that would fit us better. The housing around us is horrible though. There either is no yard at all, a yard that is a horrible hill, or they want too much for the house. This is frustrating! :cursing: I know his mom wanted to help him out by leaving the trailer to him, but it is just costing us more and really isn't right for us now that we have three kids. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kalanamak Posted January 21, 2013 Share Posted January 21, 2013 We'd get a pretty good down payment if we could sell both. Places have been selling slow here. If we sold the trailer there would be a huge fall out from his side of the family though. Would they buy him out? Really, if they are not paying to keep the place going, they have no right to carp. Not that that stops some people. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skeeterbug Posted January 21, 2013 Share Posted January 21, 2013 I wouldn't move to a place where I had to live in the living room and share a twin bed with my husband. I'm all for downsizing but that just wouldn't work for me. If you sell the trailer, can you then afford to have someone come mow so your dh doesn't have to do it? That would buy you more time to find a more suitable place. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jhschool Posted January 24, 2013 Share Posted January 24, 2013 Sell the trailer. Then you'll have some savings. Get rid of your lawn. Get rid of the grass and mulch or put pebbles in--you can put those short evergreens every 3 feet, or just ground cover like periwinkle or something you like and pay someone once a season to weed it. Or you could plant trees all over and mulch under them--put bulbs under the mulch. Or pay a teenager to mow from your savings from the trailer. Ignore the DH side of the family. If the trailer is yours, you can sell it if you want. Moving to a tiny space sounds nice now, but kids grow to huge sizes. I also like a PP's idea of selling both and buying something you really like. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Parrothead Posted January 24, 2013 Share Posted January 24, 2013 Why are you mowing? Why not plant it in junipers or something? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elfgivas Posted January 24, 2013 Share Posted January 24, 2013 how good is the location? because if its really, really good, that would influence my answer. if its unbelievably good, i would move into it, but i would consider one of those three way bunks, so that your ds could have a top bunk, and your dds could have the bottom double bunk and you and your husband could have the master bedroom. really. or you could all share the master..... they are still pretty little...... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nertsmommy Posted January 26, 2013 Author Share Posted January 26, 2013 Thank you everyone for your advice. A few of you questioned about the mowing. We looked into planting some kind of ground cover on the front bank. The problem is that without a deep root system the hill would erode away and the house sits very close to the edge. I have called around to get some prices on things that would need done to be able to move to where the trailer is located. The water system we'd need isn't as expensive as we thought. The sewage is what we were really concerned about because of the regulations. If you pull out the old trailer and put a new one or a modular in, as long as we only go with a 3 bedroom place we don't need to do anything. If we want a 4 bedroom then we'd need to have a test done to see if the system that's in there would pass the regulations for what is required for a 4 bedroom. If it passed fine, if not then we'd need a new system. If we sell the house we live in now then we could use that money towards putting a new home on the land. My brother works for a modular home place and we can get his discount. The only problem is we'd need to sell this place first. I'm not sure where we would stay between selling and having a new house set. We are on a time schedule though if we are going that route. The regulations on the septic change if the place has set unoccupied for a while. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrulySusan Posted January 26, 2013 Share Posted January 26, 2013 I think I might move, but before I did I would have a trial week at the trailer. Maybe your family can spend a week or weekend there to get a better idea of how crowded you would feel living in that space. After a few days, everyone will be having a cozy, wonderful family experience OR everyone will be grumpy, miserable, and ready to go home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebacabunch Posted January 27, 2013 Share Posted January 27, 2013 If dh's family will be upset about selling the trailer will they get mad if you replace it? ALso, if they are really attached to the property are they going to be all up in your business all the time? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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