by Brian
This is not your typical coming of age story and it is certainly not a sensationalized story like Britney Spears’ emancipation. What you will read here is a decision, plain and simple. Although the road we were on as a family was relatively straight and tested, we decided to put a fork right in the middle of it! After living under one roof for the entirety of our children’s lives to date, we were determined to validate whether they were ready, willing, and capable to live on their own.
We are here with you because we wanted to catalog our journey this year, gathering our potentially brilliant ideas, key learnings, and missteps to memorialize how far we have come or may still have to go. If even one person finds value from our effort, it will be well worth it.
So how can you test independence?
Honestly, we were just becoming aware that our children were too comfortable and our living situation would need to be challenged if we were to understand their capabilities. We also realized our family was at a crossroads. Our niece Alex was moving out after 6 years with us as her guardians. This was bittersweet because she had really progressed since joining our family at 15. Now at age 21, she was heading back to South Carolina to live with her best friend. Although she still has things to work on, she was clearly ready to take a crack at life in the real world. Our nephew JJ was graduating high school, and he too was ready to make a change. The difference was he was not yet ready to live alone, or in a dorm for that matter. We give him credit for recognizing that he needed more time, that life currently was a bit too easy, and the right decision for him was to move back to live with his mom in South Carolina. We are still able to provide guidance to JJ from a distance and we are proud that he is working hard to set himself up for his next phase of life. Dylan and Jolee were completing their certificates at community college and contemplating how to find meaningful work in their lives.
With the departure of 1/3 of our family, it was time to think about next steps for the four of us and contemplate a living arrangement that would encourage growth to independence.
When you live in a neighborhood like ours, you see dozens of houses turn over every year. Thanks to Realtor.com and Zillow you get a detailed view of the market and realtors who sell more than their share of those houses. Suffice it to say, we had a feeling which realtor we wanted as our ally when we too chose to make our exit from the neighborhood. Enter a letter from said realtor, letting us (and everyone else in the neighborhood) know that she had multiple buyers ready to bid above market for our house. The time seemed right, so we signed on the dotted line and our house went on the market in March of 2022.
It turns out the market was even hotter than we imagined and we sold our house in only 2 days. Even with a generous lease-back, the new problem at hand was figuring out where we should move. There was added pressure with it being a “seller’s market” and now we were buyers, and unique buyers at that.
We contemplated buying a larger house, with a separate “wing” for the kids to live independently in a safe space connected to our primary dwelling. But we determined that bigger in this case was not better because it missed testing many skills and proof of aptitude that we were after. Should we buy two houses in a neighborhood, a small one for the kids down the street from our new house? That proved near impossible to find and honestly too expensive, particularly if the path to independence was not successful. Ultimately, we decided to test the waters, seeking apartment living where Dylan and Jolee could live together and rely on each other for support (while still living close to us).
We were very fortunate to find two apartments, one for the kids and one for the parents (and dog and Jo’s bearded dragon). Without driver’s licenses, the key was amenities (grocery store, restaurants, etc.) and surroundings that were familiar and walkable. The final signal that this was the right decision was that we could literally walk door to door from our apartment to theirs in under a minute.
Life is full of opportunities and gambles. Who knows whether the real estate market will cool down or get tighter over the next year? Will interest rates continue to rise or perhaps flatten or decline. Time will tell what the financial return of our decision will be. Alas, progress and the right path are not always a function of strong financial return. Sometimes the return is measured by individual progress and aptitude to set loved ones up for lifetime success.