Today we ventured north of Spokane to Colville, Chewelah, Deer Park and Chattaroy to look at five properties. It was definitely more scenic as there were more trees. Temps were in the 37-44 range and there was still snow on the ground for the first few houses.
House #1 – 738 Applegate Road, Colville, WA
This house was better than anything we had seen the day before. It had a nice updated kitchen and open floor plan and four outbuildings: a shop decked out with heating and wired for sound, a 2-car garage, another huge shop that would fit multiple RVs and toys, and a barn. The 30-acre property had a nice mix of trees and suitable farmland for Shawn’s planting desires. The major drawback was no cell service. We want to be remote, but still connected!
House #2 – 2660 Burnt Valley Road, Chewelah, WA
When we arrived at this house the owners were there and it started out a bit awkward but turned out to be quite informative. The 80-year old gentleman was quite spry and took us on a tour of the 30 acres up and down hills and through the snow. The house needed a lot of work and wasn’t quite what we were looking for but it was fun to traipse around the property…until I saw the bear tracks.
House #3 – 4935 W Casberg Burroughs Road, Deer Park, WA
I wasn’t feeling good about this house as we drove up, and touring the house didn’t improve my impression. The house had a crazy layout including the laundry room looking down on the living room…seriously, it only had half walls like a loft and you could see it from below. Spent about 5 minutes here and didn’t even take pictures before moving on.
House #4 – 36104 N Milan Elk Road, Chattaroy, WA
This was a beautifully maintained 20-acre parcel with 2 houses. The main house was an A-frame built by the owner in the 70’s. He was 80 and decided it was time to sell so he could spend more time traveling and with his girlfriend. The house definitely needed updating but it had great windows and views. There was also a cute little log cabin where grandma used to live (she probably died there too). While it was a very pretty property, it wasn’t quite what we are looking for.
House #5 – 37010 N Rabe Road, Chattaroy, WA
I was a bit skeptical on this one after looking at it on Zillow and it was even worse than pictured. When it said it had a few updates, it meant they replaced the closet doors in the master with sliding barn doors a la Chip & Joanna Gaines and put a new sink in the bathroom. The rest of this house and land was very run down. We were out of there in 5 minutes.
The first house was the most promising, but we aren’t in love with it. Tomorrow we are off to Idaho to meet our realtor Tony and check out 10 more properties.
For dinner in Spokane, we came across a charcuterie a few blocks from our hotel. It was a great find and we ended up sitting next to the chef’s parents who were there to celebrate their 31st anniversary. We started with cocktails and a fresh beet salad with bacon and local creamy blue cheese. I had a bowl of chicken and black bean soup and Shawn had one of the best steaks I’ve ever tasted. We finished with ice cream topped with dried condensed milk crumbles. Salty and sweet, you can’t go wrong.