Our future move to Grand Forks, North Dakota is yet a few months away, and we're starting to get into higher gear with house hunting out there. Alycias' Mom (aka The House Hunting Fairy) is going out again this weekend, and we've contacted a few loan people with questions. We're also just about settled on a real estate agent we like are narrowing down the list of houses we've found on the internet (with the help of the House Hunting Fairy of course) to a handful that we'd like to see in person.
One small problem is the whole flooding thing. Apparently Eastern North Dakota had a record year for snowfall in the month of December, and the rest of the winter, though not record breaking, was also quite heavily precipitated, which raises the specter of flooding. You can read about Grand Forks and its tendency to flood on Wikipedia. Let's just say that regardless of the source of information the phrase "flood prone" is usually used at some point in the description of the city. Hmm.....
In 1997 they had a huge flood in Grand Forks (picture above), in which much of the town promptly burned after flooding, and have since spent millions of dollar on flood control, large earthen dikes, etc. Well this is the first year that they anticipate the water level being high enough that this system actually gets tested. Will they pass? Who knows, but hopefully they will. You can see the flood forecast in the Grand Forks Herald newspaper.
Needless to say that we won't be putting a bid in, or even seriously looking at, any houses until after the first week in April, when they expect the river to crest. It's not exactly the best housewarming present to find you have a pool in the basement - and I thought the house didn't have a pool? - YAY!!!!
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