Our House-Hunting trip to Mannheim

On March 28th, Matt and I traveled to Mannheim to find our new home.  Matt and my parents were gracious enough to care for the girls, while we spent a week learning about our new location.  Matt and I did manage to find some time to visit some local pubs and restaurants, shop and relax in our hotel’s pool, but the majority of the time was spent learning how to get around (since neither Matt nor I can speak or read German this took awhile) and finding our new home.  It was just like HGTVs, “House-Hunters International”:)!

We were able to find a home that both Matt & I fell in love with.  Matt fell in love with it due to the RARE 2-stall, large garage and yard.  I fell in love with it due to it feeling safe (gated entrance and limited entrances to get inside the home) and a having a great floor plan and backyard (or as the Germans say “Garden”) for the girls to get around and play.  It is a 3-story, single-family home.  The basement will have the girls’ toy room, laundry room, storage and a ½ bath. The main floor has an open-staircase, entryway, ¾ bath, kitchen, eating area and living room.  The main floor also has the entrance to our patio and backyard.  The second floor has three bedrooms and a full bath.  And finally, the third floor has a guest room, full bath, office and storage.  The house is much smaller than our current home, but will meet our needs perfectly.  It is located next to a lovely Gelato (i.e. ice cream) shop, 3 bakeries, a pharmacy, a little shopping and park all within walking distance of our home.  A huge disadvantage, or at least I feel this way now, of our home is that there is no air conditioning (thus the shutters).  Due to the cost of electricity being so high, the majority of Germans do not have air conditioning.  I feel that this could be quite an adjustment for me, considering I like to keep our thermostat at 67 degrees in the summer!  Another difference with all of the German homes is that it is uncommon for the homes to have any carpet.  For example, our home has marble floors throughout, so I will be going to IKEA (only 1 mile from our home), to get some rugs once we get to Germany!  All and all, we could not be happier with our home.  We looked at probably 20 homes and it was the LAST one we looked at; it was a huge check off of the to-do list!!   

A picture of Elle’s Kindergarten



Our sweet rental while on our trip!