Mark Claypool and Mark Gibson were on a cruise to the Baltic Sea when they got an offer on their Portland, Ore., home in just four days. After returning from their trip, they had two weeks to move out.
A series of moves – including living in an apartment in Portland while starting the search for a home in Atlanta, then living with Gibson’s family in North Carolina – finally resulted in them moving to Marietta.
Why Atlanta?
Proximity to family and the moderate climate brought them to Georgia. They wanted to be closer to Gibson’s family in North Carolina, and the amount of rain and cold temperatures in Oregon sent them to the South. “I wanted something with a little warmer climate,” Gibson said.
Putting down roots
A search on Trulia.com connected Claypool and Gibson with Donna Murphy and Ann Sander of Atlanta Fine Homes Sotheby’s International Realty. “We put in a request to see a home and they were the first people to call back,” Claypool said. “We were still out in Portland. We told them what we were looking for.”
After looking at pictures and information about hundreds of homes online, Claypool and Gibson traveled to Atlanta and visited about 30 homes during a handful of trips from January to April 2013.
They wanted to be close to the city, but not inside the city, and looked for homes in smaller communities with more space between the houses. “In Portland there was only eight feet between houses in the development,” Gibson said. “I grew up in the mountains. Our closet neighbor was a quarter mile away. I was wanting to get back to where we had a little more breathing space.”
Space inside the home also was important, with Gibson and Claypool seeking rooms for hobbies such as quilting, canning fruits and vegetables, and watching movies. They paid about the same price for the six-bedroom, five full and one half bath home in Marietta, but nearly doubled the square footage. They also ended up with a much bigger yard – for their dogs, Dolly Mae, a Maltese, and Maggie Lynn, a golden retriever – and an outdoor living area.
“That was one of the benefits of staying outside of Atlanta, was the fact that you could get more bang for your buck,” Gibson said.
They purchased the home in July in a Marietta neighborhood with only 11 homes. Living in the Cobb County area means that Gibson and Claypool, both nurses, are centrally located to a number of hospitals, including WellStar Kennestone Hospital in Marietta and Atlanta’s Northside Hospital and Children’s at Scottish Rite Pediatric Hospital.
Relocation tip
If working with a real estate agent while living in another city, make sure you let the agent know exactly what you want. That way, an agent can refine the search to maximize your time when you are viewing homes in person, Claypool said. “They were constantly looking for things that matched what we wanted. They were in touch with us constantly, daily and sometimes three to four times a day,” he said. “They got everything down to exactly what we wanted.”
