Bosque Cranes
I had viewed my residence in Santa Fe, just across Alameda Street from the waterfall on the Santa Fe River, as permanent home. With Leah, my canine companion, I took daily walks along the cottonwood-shaded trails along the river, up and down Canyon Road, and up Camino Pequeno to Armijo Park, and beyond. Or maybe around the beautiful desert of Arroyo Chamiso, San Ysidro Crossing in Agua Fria, or Ortiz Dog Park, dropping by Downtown Subscription for coffee, or stopping at Valentina’s for an omelet on the patio. We became known to regulars, by sight if not by name, all around these places. I couldn’t have hoped for a more bountiful and beautiful set of walking trails. The least that can be said about Santa Fe, says my friend Dave, is that “it’s in a nice place;” and I had myself a beautiful spot indeed, plunk in the middle of it.
I fixed it up and decorated with my collection of southwestern rugs and art and felt the resonance of the ambience with my taste and chemistry as a source of energy -- like a kind of psychophysical nutrition, in addition to the charm and comfort it provided. I hung pictures on the walls, and they exuded soul, beauty, and sustenance into the room. The sum was greater than its parts. Even the architectural space, with its subtly obtuse angles, added a vitality that was unmistakable, once I learned to tune in to it. It was a real source of energy for my daily rounds and challenges.
I happened also to own the condominium next door, which I had bought and used as a rental. I had bought it privately from my eccentric neighbor after the dysfunctional homeowners’ association had drawn its first blood (i.e., after I had gone to court and obtained a permanent restraining order against the neighbor woman who kept on with the toxic notes and calls, following a disagreement at the first meeting I attended). In other words, I bought it for the additional vote in the tenaciously negative four-member association. That proved to be a highly questionable maneuver in the end, but I will leave critical judgment on that hanging for now to get on with the story.
After the restraining order, the dysfunction of the association only came to the fore intermittently – when a meeting was approaching. So, most of the time, I enjoyed the energy and spirit of the place in a very splendid environment. But when a meeting loomed, fear and loathing came with it and found discordant expression, until it was over and could be blown off again, in favor of renewed quiet enjoyment. The conflicts in the association were inevitable and intractable. There was a perpetual deadlock around a tied two-to-two vote, with no one willing to give in to the other so-and-so. For me, the fear and loathing would overwhelm enjoyment of the surrounding beauty, if and when I let it, and then come around again before the next meeting.
In the midst of this, I one day hatched a thought -- that I might create a win-win situation by selling one of my units, or essentially trading it, for, let’s say, a rural home, not too far away, while keeping the other condominium as a pied a terre in the Santa Fe Historic District. I didn’t really need the two next-door condominiums. I’m not sure whether this idea occurred to me before I saw the prospective new place, or whether seeing the place prompted the notion.
The place was just off Highway 14, the Turquoise Trail, three miles south of the colorful town of Madrid, in a beautiful cradle of the Ortiz Mountains, grandly overlooking the vast Galisteo Watershed. It had a beautiful small adobe house with a large separate studio on ten acres that stretched up the side of a butte called Cerro Chato (“snub-nosed hill”). It was off-the-grid, with solar power, an adequate well, and reliable internet.
Cerro Chato, on the Turquoise Trail
Both the place and the idea were so attractive that I believe I heard and felt that butte and property calling me; and I wanted it badly. The idea of having that beautiful piece of northern New Mexico, only a forty-five minute drive away from my Santa Fe condo, filled me with desire for that town-and-country lifestyle, the homeowners association be damned. The prospect looked to me like arrival at a meaningful version of fulfillment -- if in fact I could negotiate the necessary transactions. In this regard, the idea had considerable egoistic, as well as the esthetic appeal.
This particular property had caught my eye before I knew anything about it. I had discovered it during explorations out to other rural properties off of that same highway, which had led me out incredibly rough roads, to unattractive houses that would be unlikely ever to sell for what was being asked, despite their beautiful locations. But this place, in addition to its natural beauty, stood out as being very conveniently located, accessible to the highway and to nearby Madrid, as well as to Santa Fe.
Just then, coincidentally, I called my old realtor friend Beth to suggest a casual lunch date. Incredibly, it turned out that she was acquainted with the owner of this property, a fellow who had retired and was waiting for permanent residency papers for Finland, his family home. Beth was hoping to list the property for sale. I took this far-fetched coincidence as further, compelling evidence that Cerro Chato and the beautiful place were calling me there.
We arranged a viewing with him, even though it was not yet listed for sale. We had a cordial conversation in which I expressed a lively interest in buying his property, provided I could work out selling one of my condos, either as a contingency toward buying his place, or perhaps before he formally put his place on the market. Leaving the viewing, I told Beth, “Well, you’ve got your work cut out for you now, working this negotiation out.”
As it turned out, though, she was not inclined to represent my side of any such transaction without first obtaining a formal listing for the property. The owner didn’t seem to have a very definite, or realistic idea of its market value, so my entreaties to sell it for what I thought I could realize for one of my places fell flat. After about ten days of waiting and hoping, my vision of the high desert town-and-country lifestyle started to fade, and I began exploring other areas that might have something of interest. Placitas, Corrales, Sandia mountains, all up and down Highway 14. It was pure exploration really, more than looking for a place.
Then, somehow, I ended up viewing a listing on Zillow for a place in the Bosque of Albuquerque that reportedly backed up onto the Candelaria Nature Preserve. That, I thought, sounded interesting and worth an exploratory look, so I headed down there. It was about a mile and a half south of where I had maintained a much-loved secondary residence for seven years previously. I can’t remember what prompted me to go to that website, but I definitely had no intention of looking for a place in Albuquerque.
Other than the trip with Beth to Cerro Chato, this was the first time I actually called a realtor to go inside for a proper viewing. What I found was a beautiful, gracious house that did indeed have the Candelaria Nature Preserve for its back yard. Merely open the back door and you’re on the Preserve, where coyotes, cranes, porcupines, and sometimes bobcats and other creatures roam freely. The Nature Preserve belongs to the City of Albuquerque and is kept as a refuge for migratory birds and other creatures. I’m sitting, looking out at it now as I write and as flocks of sandhill cranes come and go across the meadow. And I’m wondering how I got so lucky as to find it. And again, I have a strong sense that the place found me, more than the reverse. The Rio Grande flows past, a beautiful five-minute walk from the house.
Sandhill cranes in “the back yard.”
The Nature Preserve made a stronger initial impression on me than the rest of the house, although the house itself has an inviting, comfortable, and spacious open floor plan that shows off my stuff and works extremely well for me. As I drove away, an internal voice advised that if I didn’t make a move for this place now, I wouldn’t come across another one like it again. And just that simply, I decided to see if the seller would entertain a contingent contract, pending the sale of one of my condos.
The answer came back quickly: yes, she would. The house had some unusual features, such as a wood stove and some conspicuous senior-citizen rails on counters, and a couple of other idiosyncrasies, but they didn’t bother or deter me. Thus began a difficult episode of two intertwined real estate transactions, which turned out to be a very rough gauntlet to run, though in the end both transactions closed.
Of the two Santa Fe condominiums, my residence unit had been remodeled before I found it, and it showed a bit better than the other. It was also marginally larger, with a better back patio and yard, and I decided it would be more salable and bring marginally more revenue.
I was also deeply ensconced in that place, all the way, completely at home, and I thought it would be difficult to do justice to the Cerro Chato place, which was surely more a primary than a secondary residence. My other unit had been occupied on a month-to-month basis by two elderly sisters from Dallas. When they moved out, just after I made the decision to sell, I moved over to it and prepared the other for sale. That too was a beautiful, comfortable place that I had furnished well, but it would have served much better as a secondary residence than my former residence would have.
A sales contract for more than the list price came through on the first day on the market. But it involved a loan through Wells Fargo, and the sale ultimately fell through, over what the lender considered inadequate condominium insurance (following condo disasters in California and Florida that prompted more onerous requirements). Our contentious condominium association would not cough up another $2,200 for what in this circumstance was superfluous coverage, for double the cost of our normal policy. But the realtor had kept the contact information of another party who had come to the first-day open house, and they put a cash contract on it the first day it went back on the market. This time, after an excruciating double escrow, the sale ultimately closed, releasing the funds I needed to get into the house in Albuquerque.
A neighbor.
What a great sigh of relief came of that, and I found myself sitting with my pre-dawn thermos of coffee gazing into a sheltered meadow of the Candelaria Nature Preserve – my own back yard. Right away, I had close up visits from a number of skinny coyotes and a fat porcupine and felt down to my bones as though I had arrived home.
