My New Home: Memphian finds security in new home
What Karen Hinds saw in her 1,550-square-foot East Memphis house was, literally, her childhood home. She painted her living room a fresh and bright shade of yellow and added vibrant accent colors.
Like any buyer, she had a list of must-haves. But when it came down to it, all Karen Hinds wanted in a new house was a place that felt like home.
“It’s funny, your wish list starts off with specifics, but it’s never quite the wish list that sells you,” Hinds said. “It’s the feeling. You walk in and go, ‘This is my house.’ And the person next to you may go, ‘Really? What are you looking at that I don’t see?’”
“My feeling was, I’m home,” she said. “This is it, I’m home,” said Karen Hinds of her new house near Quince and White Station.
Hinds repainted the cabinets and added new hardware to freshen up the kitchen in her new home.
A small cabinet is a functional piece of art, helping to brighten the kitchen. The cabinets were stripped and repainted.
Hinds converted a former living room into a dining room, so she can host family holidays.
Hinds painted the walls of her master bedroom green to contrast with her red curtains and bedding. The canopy bed is 16-years-old, but the bedding is a recent Craigslist score.
What Hinds saw in her 1,550-square-foot East Memphis house was, literally, her childhood home.
“This is the plan I grew up in, almost identical,” said Hinds, a lifelong Memphian. “It didn’t have the fireplace or a bar between the den and kitchen, but it had everything else.”
Hinds, who teaches eighth-grade English, started her search in the fall after a divorce led to five years of renting apartments and houses in Germantown and Midtown.
“The divorce left me financially devastated,” she said. “I had to start over.”
Once she was back on her feet, Hinds didn’t look long before she ran into Realtor Melody Bourell of Marx-Bensdorf, Realtors. The two hit it off, and in December, Hinds and Bourell began an intense search, viewing as many as 30 houses.
Hinds remembers distinctly the day she found not just her house, but her home.
“It was Jan. 9, the day it snowed,” she said. “I called (Bourell) and said, ‘Find me a house on White Death 2011,’ and she said, ‘Let’s do it.’ We were the only crazy people out looking at houses in 8 inches of snow.”
Hinds had seen the listing for “her” house many times, but she hadn’t gone to the trouble to view it because the online photos didn’t appeal to her. On that particular day, though, its sellers had an open house.
“It was open, so I thought we weren’t going to waste anybody’s time,” she said.
When she and Bourell got inside, they learned that the house came with all appliances and had a new roof and a nearly new HVAC system and water heater. Those things were important, she thought, but not nearly as important as the fact that she knew, just knew, that it was the place for her.
“My feeling was, I’m home,” she said. “This is it, I’m home.”
In the car, she told Bourell she wanted to sleep on it before making a decision. She called and told her mom, her friends the same thing.
“I was calling everybody and saying, ‘Let me sleep on it,’” she said. “Then within 3 minutes I was calling (Bourell) saying, ‘Come on over. Let’s write a contract.’”
Hinds purchased the three-bedroom, two-bath house near Quince and White Station roads in late February for $105,000.
Although “every surface of the house needed painting,” Hinds said, she was up for the challenge. As soon as she moved in, she got to work on the main living areas. The den’s paneled walls were painted a soft tan. Hinds replaced it with butter yellow, pulling the color into the kitchen and uniting the two spaces with a rich palette of red, green and gold.
She stripped the kitchen cabinets down to the original wood, repainted them white and replaced all the hardware. She bought a new refrigerator and washing machine, but chose to keep the existing range and dishwasher, which not only worked but had a vintage look she loves.
“I had so much fun in these two rooms,” she said. “I love that they go together, and I love the original countertops; they’re so vintage, and they’re green. Green, red and yellow are my favorite colors.”
In the den, Hinds anchored the space with her existing sofa, which she had reupholstered along with two antique chairs — one given to her by her aunt and one scored through Craigslist.
“I’m a believer in good pieces, like main pieces of furniture should be good and well-made,” she said. “If you’ve got your three or four main, good pieces, all the other stuff is gravy. You can find things on the curb and repurpose them. You can go to Craigslist and estate sales. I love a deal and I love to save money, and I can usually look at something and figure out what I can do with it.”
A wicker chair at one end of her living room was a Craigslist find. A tole painted cabinet that sits between the kitchen and den cost $20 and ties together the two rooms’ color schemes. And a painting of a beach scene that rests atop the yellow-painted mantel was a $10 happy accident.
“I bought it just for the frame,” Hinds said. “I was going to antique the frame and put crosses inside it and get rid of the painting. But it worked in here.”
So far, Hinds has only applied her talents to the den, kitchen and master bedroom. Eventually, she plans to strip wallpaper in several rooms and repaint every room in the house. She also plans to hire her two sons — Rocky Wisley, who owns Serenity Hardscapes, and Jesse Wisley, who owns Mid-South Irrigation-Landscape — to help her plan and execute her landscaping.
But for now, the house perfectly suits the needs of Hinds, her 3-year-old American dingo rescue dog, Jack, and her cat, Baby Cat.
In the small front room, Hinds’ childhood piano sits on the same wall it occupied in its original house. Across the terra cotta terrazzo entry hall, a room intended as the formal living room instead serves as a dining room.
“I have huge dining room furniture and I knew I needed a room to accommodate it, and what my mother had done when I was growing up in this plan was make the formal living room a dining room,” Hinds said. “So I walked in and said, ‘Oh, I can do what Mama did.’”
Down the hall, one bedroom serves as a home office and another will serve as a guest room. Hinds has a black, white and teal scheme planned for the teal-tiled guest bath.
In the master suite, red and white curtains pop against soft green walls. Hinds bought the metal queen-sized canopy bed 16 years ago, but its Laura Ashley bedding set was a recent $60 Craigslist score.
The house — and Hinds’ financial situation — have come together in a way that five years ago she couldn’t imagine. She pays less for her mortgage each month than she did for her last two rentals.
“I’m a Christian and I do believe in divine guidance,” she said. “I know the Lord is looking out for me. He’s written all over this.”
