Guilty Pleasure

Yesterday on our way from the WP Farmers' Market to Hot Dog Heaven, for our usual Saturday lunch, Jamie and I passed an open house sign- but not just any old open house, a luxury home open house. I was sold (sorry for the bad pun) and told Jamie that we needed to go back after lunch. I will let you in on a little secret, I LOVE to go into open houses! I love to look at peoples houses, see where they have things and plainly just to see what they look like inside. If you don't already know, I am a people watcher. I love to watch people and try to "figure out" their lives/ stories. So maybe this unique fascination with homes has something to do with that, maybe it's just another way for me to get to know someone. I don't really know but either way I love it and I had so much fun.

Not only was there one luxury open house, but much to my delight today was a luxury home tour. Yup, there was a whole bunch of fancy houses on display- just open for me to walk through and gape at. It was great!!! We toured a total of 7 houses in Old Winter Park, Windsong, and Baldwin Park (all within a 10 minute drive from our home) I would have loved to tour the ones in Isleworth but you had to call for an appointment and that would have meant serious business, which I wasn't up for. They ranged in size from 6,000 sq feet to 4,800 sq feet and in price from 2.8 million to a meager 1.9 million- you know- definitely in our price range. Needless to say my favorite was not the most expensive; however it was the second most expensive coming in at a whopping 2.4 million. I say it was my favorite because of all of the really cool things that it had in it but there was only really one house that I could have seen myself calling home, the others were too lavish. The one that could have been called home was a traditional colonial style home, simple(in it's own way), clean, and classic- all things well, me.

Let's get back to the favorite home, because it is the one that I have pictures of. We spoke to, and got chummy with the lady that was showing it and to the VP of the building company (or some type of big wig, I cannot exactly remember) and after chatting for quite some time we asked if I could take some pictures of it. She said absolutely as long as I didn't publish them (shh- don't tell). Here are the highlights:

1st Highlight:

This is probably the coolest thing that Jamie or I had ever seen in a house. 2 out of the 4 walls in the family room folded back, they were sliding glass walls (sliding glass doors- if you are a normal person and live in a normal home), so that the family room essentially became part of the outside porch. Then the screened-in porch was somewhat removable. You were able to roll the screens up like a shade so your family room could be open completely or screened in. You had both options, it was very cool. You could have beautiful big windows, a family room that had no walls but a screen or a family room with 2 out of the 3 walls missing.

Half Family Room/ Half Porch

Roll Away Screened-in Porch

2nd Highlight:

The bathrooms were huge in all of the houses but this one had an outdoor shower. Not just some pool shower, but a private garden shower off of the master bath- one that could be used after swimming in the beautiful pool or used if you wanted to shower under the stars, sigh... AMAZING!!!

3rd Highlight:

Last but not least the closets in all of the houses were huge. But, just so you have an idea how big they were, our kitchen could have fit in this one and it had an island in it- so jealous, don't even have one in our kitchen! I am sure that the people who said i was okay to take the photos would be too impressed with the last photo but I just couldn't resist- this place was huge.

To give you some size perspective :)

The Outside- not really impressive looking in my opinion