Growing Up?

Family or Career? Which one has the higher priority? This seems like an obvious answer to most people and I would agree that most people's priority should be the family. But I can also see it from the other side, otherwise known as the Dark Side.

This past Labor Day weekend while my parents were visiting, my parents encouraged Sean and I to look at houses around the Phoenix Metropolitian area. This boggled my mind since just a couple days before I had my mind set that I would be moving myself and Sean back to the Midwest to be closer to them. I entertained my parent's idea by going and house hunting thinking the whole time that on one side of the scale I had my family in Iowa. And on the other side I have my career, which would be most profitable in Arizona (I came to this conclusion with much help from my manager Joe - one of the biggest surprises of my career yet - a heart-felt conversation with a senior level manager).

So, what do I do? I figured that Sean and I had been looking for a house for a long time and have not found anything yet so it would not hurt to look again this time. Our real estate agent took us out to a new development close to where I work - bad news - Sean and I fell in love with the houses out there. The deal home buyers are getting on that land is unbelieveable! We found a floor plan of a house that we want to build and customize:

• 3700 sq. ft.
• 5 bedrooms
• 3.5 bathrooms
• 3 car garage
• A game room and den/office
• And a HUGE kitchen and masterbedroom!!

Sean and I did not know what to think except my parents saw how excited and zealous we were so they encouraged us to buy the land and start building. The house will not be done until next October, but it will definitely be a house that we can start a family in and then possibly sell it in a couple of years when the value has doubled and move back to the Midwest - think of the size of house we can buy in the Midwest with our profit from our house down here??

So the question of the day is - do we continue with the home buying process in Arizona and stay in AZ for the next 5-10 years and keep going with my career OR do we move back to the Midwest in the next year or so to be closer to family??