So…I missed blogging last week. Not because I didn’t wanna…I just over overbooked and over-worked myself. And then I found myself having to make an important decision.
Years ago, I created a rate a date spreadsheet to help me decide who was good for me to date and who wasn’t. Yes, I could’ve blindly followed my gut instinct, but that seemed to get me into more trouble than not. The last time I used the rate a date spreadsheet was when I met Doug, now fiancee. By following a criteria I had set for myself and then sticking to the numbers, I found myself a pretty decent soul mate. My life significantly improved since he’s been in it.
Back to my very important decision…
Many of you know I moved from St Petersburg to Lutz permanently in October. We decided we liked the location of our vacation home so much that we needed to be here full time. Unfortunately, our vacation home appears to be a really lousy permanent home.
Doug and I were in a disagreement about what to do next. I’m an emotional and intuitive decision maker. I felt constrained by our current living conditions and wanted to move into a place better suited to our needs. Doug is a numbers guys. He thought we should stay put, as it’s going to cost additional money to move again, especially since we’d be moving into our forever home in 2-3 years. I felt that that 2-3 years to be in a place we both hate living in full-time is a long time. He ran the numbers and decided the extra expense of moving was not worth it. I countered who knows how long it’s going to take to build a house with current building supply shortages and inflation. Round and round we went.
Doug suggested we use my old rate-a-date system to help us decide what our next move should be. The rate a date system accounts for both emotions and numbers as you’ll soon see.
We took our current home and the 2 other places we were thinking about buying, and compared them next to each other.
We created a criteria, room by room, feature by feature, so we could compare the homes to each other. We started with the kitchen. We felt our current kitchen was a 0. Option 1 had a very dated kitchen, which was a 5. Option 2 had the counter space we wanted, tons of storage and new appliances, which made it a 10.
Then we moved to the Master Bedroom. Our current bedroom is a 5. Option 1 & Option 2 came in at 10, because they were much larger.
The Master Bath was next. Our current bathroom was a 5. Options 1 & 2 were 10s. We went through each room or desired feature assigning a number to how we “felt” about it. Then we totaled the numbers.
On a first run through, our current condo scored a 57 out of 160. Option 1 scored 101, and Option 2 was a 103.
Doug admitted that looking at the numbers, it became very very clear our current situation was “not optimal for us. We would clearly be much happier in another condo because it was better suited to our needs. By moving, we’d gain a more desirable kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, and storage. Option 1 came with a garage and a well cared for golf cart which we could really use. It then came down to which one would be the better long term investment, which one would be easier to move in to, and which one was less “overpriced.” Option 1 was the answer.
I’m so glad we were able to solve this dilemma using a method that appeased both “emotional me” and “numbers Doug.” Attached is the original Rate-A-Date Worksheet, and I hope you find this technique useful for many decisions to come!
Here's the Rate-A-Date Worksheet, in the event you need to make a big decision and need an easy way to calculate it.
And now…we prepare for our next move!
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