It all started when we were looking for a house in 2012.  At the time (and it continues today) there was very very little on the market, especially in the area we wanted to live, the Upper East neighborhood of Santa Barbara.  We wanted to live somewhere that was walk-able, and close to things, like parks, stores, and the freeway.

The Upper East fit that bill perfectly, being bordered by three block size parks and the Santa Barbara Mission, within walking or biking distance of downtown Santa Barbara, and just a 3 minute drive to the freeway.

But in 2012, as now, there were just a handful of larger houses for sale.  We made things more difficult for ourselves by deciding that we wanted an classic older house, and fell hard for the Craftsman style.  We even went so far as making an offer on a large 1885 Craftsman.  But we were unable to come to terms with the owners and the amount of maintenance required by an older house like that scared us a bit.

We looked for almost a year and found nothing that we felt would or could become our dream house, the house we wanted to spend the next 30 or more years in.

But, having a good friend who is a contractor, we started thinking about finding a nice property that we could build a house on.