(gentle instrumental music) (gulls cawing)
- If you wanna watch the sunset
over the Gulf of Mexico every night,
Destin, Florida is the place for you.
It’s an hour east of Pensacola,
and Destin was once a small fishing village
but has grown into a beach lover’s dream come true
and a premier vacation spot.
I mean, look at this.
Hire a boat for the day and go shark fishing right here.
Or if you’re up for a different type of adventure,
run a motorized party hut for you and your friends.
Bring your own margaritas and kick right back in the shade
of your own private tiki bar
as you float along the Emerald Coast.
Okay, that is not a bad way to spend an afternoon.
Am I right?
Dan and Sarah love it here,
And that’s why they’ve got their hearts
set on moving to Destin.
But this isn’t the sleepy fishing town it once was.
Destin has grown, and so has its real estate market.
Homes here sell for an average of 750,000
with many going for two million and over.
Prices are up, get this,
almost 30% versus just three years ago.
Still, Sarah and Dan know this is exactly
where they wanna live.
(gentle music) (gulls cawing)
(upbeat guitar music)
- Sure is pretty out.
Let’s walk out there and see if we can see any sea life.
That’ll be fun, huh?
- I’m Dan.
- And I’m Sarah.
- And we’re looking for our dream home in Destin, Florida.
Look at that view.
That’s beautiful.
- Wow.
We are looking to find our dream home on the water somewhere
that we can raise our family and welcome our guests
and have the total outdoor Florida lifestyle.
- In this market, Destin is a small town,
but it’s starting to get discovered
for all that it has to offer on the water,
so prices are continuing to go up,
and so I think we gotta just make that leap.
- Yeah.
- We’ve been looking for it for a long time
and I think now’s the time, guys.
- [Sarah] Yep.
We’re gonna go find our dream home.
- [Harrison] And I’m the leader.
- [Dan] All right, here we go.
- So, this one is in Miramar Beach.
Kind of back to where we lived
originally in our first house,
but of course, this is on the water,
so that changes everything.
- That’s a big change. (chuckles)
- This house is listed at 2.19 million.
- Wow, that’s over budget.
- [Sarah] Way over budget.
- Yeah.
- I mean, we definitely want to look at it.
It’s also, it’s been on the market for a while,
so maybe they’re ready to make a good deal.
- And if it’s the perfect house
and the dream home we’ve been looking for,
might be worth stretching the budget a little bit.
- Yeah, but I think we’re not at the right place.
- I think we passed it.
(both laugh)
So, I met Sarah on a dating site,
and we just hit off right off the spot.
And I remember after our first date,
I remember Sarah smiling back at me and saying,
"I really want to see you again."
(both laugh)
- And I’m still seeing him.
(both laugh)
- I’m an electrical engineer.
At that time,
I was just a few years into the job,
and now I’m a part owner.
- It wasn’t too long after we got married
that I was expecting our first son, Harrison,
and I was working as a public information officer
for the Florida Department of Health,
so we decided at that point
that I would stay home with Harrison.
And after I had Hadley,
I really kind of started feeling like
I wanted to do a little something more.
About a year or two ago,
I ended up starting my own PR and marketing agency.
We always understood the importance
of working hard to get what you need
and to get where you wanna be in life.
- Yeah.
- Here we are.
Wow.
- [Dan] It’s cool.
- [Sarah] This is a huge property.
- Wow, this yard.
This is great.
Oh, man.
It’s beautiful.
- It really is.
Okay.
This is- - Look at that.
- Really interesting.
I guess this is a dining room, and then what’s this?
- [Dan] Could be good for your office.
- [Sarah] Yeah, or a sitting area.
- Yeah. - Tall ceilings.
That’s nice.
- [Dan] And I like these wood floors, too.
- [Sarah] Yeah, I like that a lot.
That’s a nice feature.
I like the arch, too.
That’s kind of different.
- [Dan] Okay, this looks like the living room.
- [Sarah] Yes, and I like the fireplace.
And then of course you have this great view from here.
- [Dan] Yeah, that’s beautiful.
- [Sarah] You know, this is a little cramped, though.
If you think about having bar stools right here.
- Yeah, where would you put a couch?
- Right, and then you’re kind of like
right up on the fireplace, so.
- [Dan] And we need space for us and the kids.
- Right, and we definitely want to have a place
where there’s plenty of space for people
to come and hang out.
- [Dan] Yeah.
- But it is a nice open kitchen.
Oh, and I guess so there’s two islands,
and maybe then you don’t have to put chairs over there,
and that kind of helps it not feel so cramped.
- Yeah, this would be a good seating area,
and I can see my parents and your parents coming here
and sitting at the bar, drinking some coffee,
looking out at that beautiful water.
My dad grew up wanting to be on the water,
so it’d be awesome to share this with him.
We lived in Dothan, Alabama,
and we came down and vacationed in Destin quite a bit,
and with my dad and mom and my brothers and sisters,
we would ride around on a boat that we rented
and look at the houses from the water,
and my dad always dreamed of getting a waterfront property.
That was kind of instilled in me from my dad.
Sarah reminded me that I started a spreadsheet of our goals,
and after maybe a year or two being married,
that was our goal was to eventually be on the water.
- Yeah, I mean, I grew up in Florida,
and so I’ve always kind of felt like
I wanted to have a house on the water,
but I honestly never thought it would happen,
and certainly not as quickly as it has for us now.
Probably thanks to Dan and his goal sheets.
(both laugh)
Okay, let’s see what else there is.
This must be the master bedroom.
- This looks like the master.
- A nice entrance in here. - I like that arch.
- [Sarah] And it has the nice modern floor.
Oh wow.
Look. - That’s cool.
You would love that. - There’s a fireplace in here.
- In the bedroom, and look,
it looks through to the bathroom, as well.
- Wow, this is really a big bathroom,
and this is a nice big tub.
Just hang out in here and enjoy the fire.
- And talk through the fireplace.
Hey, bring me some toilet paper.
(laughs) - Yeah.
More like bring me some wine.
- There you go.
- And then this is a pretty good size vanity.
It’s not really my taste.
- Do you remember the clamshell sink
that we had at our first house?
- I do, so you know what?
I would love this compared to that.
- This is an upgrade.
My first house was a very basic
1200-square-foot starter home.
Very small, very outdated.
- And that was our first home together,
and he started out by just doing some renovations,
and I remember when we were first dating,
he was pulling up the floor and doing different projects.
- We’ve bought and sold several houses,
just trying to get some sweat equity
jumping from house to house when the market was right.
It helped us take advantage and-
- [Sarah] Move up.
- So, we started inching closer and closer to that goal of
being on the waterfront.
- And now we’re ready to just make that final move.
I do like the idea of having the master
split away from the kids’ rooms.
- Yeah, It’s kind of broken apart
and give the kids their space and give us our space.
- Absolutely.
Okay, this is interesting.
What’s happening with the floor over here?
- [Dan] There’s no floor.
- I mean, at this price point, I’d like to have a floor.
- You know, we could maybe negotiate that into the deal.
- Yeah, that’s a good thought.
It would be nice to be able to pick whatever we wanted.
This is really a big room.
- [Dan] This is much bigger than their current rooms.
- A lot bigger.
It’s probably bigger than our current room.
(both laugh)
- And you know,
Harrison could do his homework here at this desk.
- Right, that’s kind of a nice feature.
Okay, I guess this would be Hadley’s room,
and it’s not as big as the other room,
but it does have the water view.
And you know, she loves watching the water
and looking for dolphins.
- Yeah, she could look for dolphins
from her bedroom window.
This would be Hadley’s bathroom.
- Right.
But where does this door go?
- That’s interesting.
Oh, it goes outside.
- It goes is right outside.
That’s nice, I guess.
- Yeah, I think we’d have to put a camera on there
so Hadley doesn’t sneak out.
- Yeah. - Oh man,
look at that view, though.
- [Sarah] This is so pretty.
- [Dan] You can see the whole bay from here.
That’s a huge view.
- [Sarah] I know.
I love that, and I really like the pool.
- [Dan] This is a great dock.
Look how long it is.
- [Sarah] It is nice to get out farther,
and you have a better view.
- It’s got a lift there already.
And I wonder if the boat would come with the house.
- [Sarah] I mean, at this price, it should.
(both laugh)
- [Dan] This would be a great space to entertain.
- Yeah, I mean,
I could see the kids fishing from the dock from here.
- Yeah.
To be honest, this is what we’ve been dreaming of.
I mean, look at this.
Being out on the water,
this is what we’ve been wanting.
- [Sarah] This is the outdoor lifestyle
that we’re looking for right here.
- [Dan] Well, this house has all the things we want.
It’s got the water view, it’s got a dock, a pool.
- The inside, you know,
there are a few things that were kind of weird
and it doesn’t have quite as much space as we want,
but the outdoor living here, you really can’t beat it.