Finding a Lot: The Beginning of a Dream

It began as a dream. Our number one priority was that we needed a home that was handicapped accessible, and one that a wheelchair could move around in with ease. Looking on Zillow, we saw and then visited a lot that was for sale in an older neighborhood. I fell in love with the neighborhood. It was a little quirky on the edges and reminded me of Florida, a happy place where I visited my grandmother many times as a child.

Upon inquiry, we found that the lot we visited was in the floodplain. That lot then became a “no.” Since I liked the neighborhood, and there seemed to be several empty lots, we drove around scoping out the empty lots. Scott saw an empty lot across the street from a small playground shaded by Mesquite trees. It was a playground filled with lovely sounds of free children playing and ringing bells. Even though I could not envision a home there on that lot, Scott could see it and he knew this lot was the one.

A problem was that this lot on Mesquite St. was not for sale. I asked my realtor about it, and he suggested writing a letter to the owner. If you remember, the real estate market had exploded during the pandemic, and land and homes were selling in hours for exceedingly high prices. People began writing letters to obtain property. I began the process of locating all of the empty lots in the neighborhood and finding their owners on the county tax assessment website. Scott and I spent some days writing the same letter to all of the different owners of the empty lots. One owner responded. Which one responded? The owner of the lot across from the Mesquite St. playground. And he was ready to sell.

The owner of the lot on Mesquite St. lived in Massachusetts, many hundreds of miles away from Texas. We began negotiating by telephone. After many phone calls, we agreed upon a price, and the lot became ours.