A Quick Look Back 5.0

Throughout the Summer and into the fall, we had a variety of meetings with TJB looking at pieces of land in both Eagan and Apple Valley. We were pretty sure that if we were going to build, it was going to be with TJB because they build a quality house, and they were offering incentives to those who owned existing homes.

We were focused on two areas specifically.

Our friends Jen and Thad were hoping we'd build East down Cliff Road just a few blocks from them. (They were a little surprised when a couple of blocks ended up being on the opposite side of the metropolitan area.) The neighborhood was just being developed and was right across a small lake from a huge regional park in Eagan. Very private and quiet. The homes that had been built were comparable to what we were hoping for. The neighborhood dramatically changed the commute; especially for Sara. And there appeared to be no guarantees (covenants or otherwise) as to what would happen with the other lots along the street we were looking at.

The other plot was about five minutes south of where we were living in Eagan, in a small, almost completely undeveloped neighborhood. When complete, there would have been about 10 homes. The lots we would have considered were owned by a builder that had gone bankrupt during the down turn. We had Jereomy from TJB seeking out the bankrupt builder, the banker and others to try to see how we could get them to offload a lot to TJB. I was just looking at an old email from Sara to Jereomy on Sept. 22nd 2009 with the subject "Land" that read "Just thought I'd check to see if there's been any noise or movement regarding the land on 128th St. Ct in Apple Valley."

At some point in here, we had decided it would be a good idea to take second jobs as care taker's at an apartment complex fairly near that 128th St. Ct. address in Apple Valley. That was a terrible idea for a whole bunch of reasons, and lasted a very short period of time.

We had no idea at the time the challenges the new mortgage restrictions would have place on us building at 128th St. Ct. in the same zip code as our townhouse in Eagan. But things happen for a reason, and thankfully (in hind sight) the bankrupt builder wasn't a good communicator with Jereomy and the folks from TJB.