Mortgage Monday: The Beginning

It is time for a new series… having purchased and moved into our new home last week I thought it appropriate to write a post every Monday about being a new homeowner. While the topics may vary these blogs will all be rooted in our recent purchase, the process, and some of the things that happen along the way. I will be writing about the services we use, experiences we have had, or simply how much things have changed in comparison to our years (and year) or renting. It is certainly a change for us but a great one that I want to share with all of you that continue to read these posts.

The process of finding a home was a long one to say the least. As I have written about numerous times before, this has been a dream of ours for years (certainly preceding the formation of this blog) and a search that has taken us to numerous places throughout the area, into other states, and even to a foreign country. While our criteria has changed since our first discussion about what we wanted our home to be, we currently find ourselves in the perfect place at the perfect time. Finally, we have a place to set our roots and a place where we can raise our son.

Looking back there are certainly things that we would have liked to have changed along the way. Even recently, it took a deal falling through on inspections in order for us to find our perfect home but, as we have been told many times before and as we keep telling ourselves, things happen for a reason. However, while we are happy with this wonderful change and becoming homeowners, my wife and I definitely agree and wish that this whole process had gone differently. Our ability to find a home came at a price that we were forced to pay and we know that we would give this all back if a refund were offered.

Look for more posts in the future that will get into some of the additional details about the process and some of the experiences that we have along the way both good and bad (hopefully there will be an absence of content for the latter). But, for now, we are going to enjoy this new way of living and the additional comfort and security that owning a home has to offer to us. And, of course, some stories about the adjustments that we are all making to this new reality.

Considering A Few Changes

I have been thinking about making a few changes to the blog over the next month or two. The main problem is finding the time to roll those things out so that they might be sustainable. Additionally, there are certain instances where I have to educate myself as to what the heck I am doing and how certain things can be done.

The first change that I am slowly starting to line up is the presence of guest bloggers. In addition to providing a different perspective and expertise (both of which are lacking to this point) it will also, in theory, free up some of my time so that I can pursue some of the logistical aspects of other ideas and put greater thought into the posts that I would like to focus on. While I am not going to take anything and everything that is submitted, I welcome submissions for consideration.

Something else that I am considering is starting a Patreon campaign to, potentially, cover some of the costs of the existing themes (i.e. travel, research time, admission fees, etc.) but also grant me the flexibility to pursue some other ideas (product reviews, range days, videos, etc.). You may not realize it, but this endeavor is a costly one at times. While I don’t expect to ever make anything blogging, it would be nice to break even now and again.

For those unfamiliar with the site, Patreon is a way for people (patrons) to support the blog on an ongoing basis based on the amount of content that is posted. Basically, you can make the commitment to give one dollar per post (you can also set monthly limits such as ten or twenty dollars). Essentially, I would only earn support by maintaining production.

Patreon would also allow me to provide more content (exclusive to partons) which would largely consist of additional photographs from trips, maybe a few videos, live chats, and additional content from other projects I am working on. This seems to be the easiest way for me to leverage the excess of content that never makes it onto the blog. Of course, I would also try to include a few giveaways now and again to make things a little more interesting. So, with all that information, do you think that this is something that is worth pursuing? Would that be enough to make you interested in becoming a patron?  

Lastly, and I have to figure out the logistics of this one, I am thinking about implementing permanent ads. While AdSense provides such promotions I actually have limited control over what is posted. I would much rather invest the time supporting companies and organizations that I agree with. I consider this the no surprises ad approach… you know what you are going to see every time you go onto my blog. Of course this also brings about the challenge of transferring the content to an actual URL without the blogspot portion of the address (with redirect from the old URL as well). Definitely something that can be done (and rather easily by those who know what they are doing) but it is a task that I am ill equipped to handle. I would greatly appreciate someone willing to donate their time to this task!

So, that is the list of things that I am considering at this moment. However, I would like your feedback as to what you think of those potential changes to the blog. Is it too much? Am I missing anything? Let me know your thoughts. After all, you are the ones visiting and reading these daily posts.