When Tom Callahan, a Vermont-born lawyer dwelling in Moscow, agreed to be the Bachelor of the Week for a Russian gossip web site in 2016, he figured it might be a innocent, if not foolish, pursuit.
Dana Callahan, who was born in Kazakhstan and grew up in Russia after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, spied a behind-the-scenes picture of Mr. Callahan on Instagram and clicked “like.” The DMs flew, and earlier than lengthy they had been an merchandise.
“Dana by no means noticed the article,” Mr. Callahan, 39, recalled. “I didn’t even let her see it till we’d been collectively for years, it was so embarrassing.”
They spent the subsequent two years dwelling collectively in Moscow. After Mr. Callahan’s contract along with his legislation agency ended, the couple decamped to New York Metropolis, the place Mr. Callahan had lived on and off since 2003, and married. Ms. Callahan, now 32, realized English and acquired her grasp’s diploma in trend historical past and textile research from the Vogue Institute of Expertise.
The one-bedroom, rent-stabilized condominium they shared in an Higher West Facet brownstone was the stuff of New York actual property desires, with its proximity to Central Park, hovering ceilings and ornamental fire. After six years, although, they realized that in the event that they needed to start out a household, lofting their full-size mattress and tucking a crib beneath wouldn’t lower it.
[Did you recently buy a home? We want to hear from you. Email: thehunt@nytimes.com]
To purchase a bigger, comparable house in Manhattan, Mr. Callahan, who works at a finance-focused legislation agency, figured they must spend north of $1 million and save for at the least one other 5 years. “I’m not from some huge cash,” he stated. “The widespread data I at all times heard was that for under $800,000 in Manhattan, you’re not going to search out something.”
So that they had been shocked after they started perusing actual property websites and located listings for nicely under $800,000. “It was sort of a eureka second,” Mr. Callahan stated.
When Ms. Callahan came upon she was pregnant final winter, the epiphany morphed right into a deadline.
The couple needed a spacious two-bedroom condominium — a spot that didn’t really feel like a downgrade from their rental, however at a value that wouldn’t cramp their life-style. To seek out it, they knew they must take their $700,000 finances past the Higher West Facet.
“I needed to have greater home windows,” Ms. Callahan stated. “I needed to have a good-sized front room” — issues she didn’t have rising up.
She added: “However my dream was simply to have a king-size mattress.”
For assist, they contacted Sargis Mosyan, a dealer with Core Actual Property. “If you happen to go slightly bit larger above Central Park — Morningside Heights, South Harlem space — the costs change so much,” he stated. “And for a similar value, you will get so much higher area than, let’s say, on the Higher West Facet.”
Amongst their choices:
Discover out what occurred subsequent by answering these two questions:
