In Orlando, Looking for a Move-In Ready House Near All the Fun

Even before the pandemic brought waves of Northerners to Florida, Anne and Linus Chow knew they wanted to leave the cold weather and constant rat race of the Washington, D.C., area.

Seeking a new place with abundant sunshine, where someone’s proximity to power was not their only commodity, the couple immediately homed in on Florida, where they had enjoyed vacationing. Ms. Chow, 41, a mental-health therapist, loves theme parks, so in late 2020 she and Mr. Chow, now 51, moved to Celebration, Fla., a suburb of Orlando.

But after two years in the master-planned community, which was developed by the Walt Disney Company, they soured on it. Celebration wasn’t close enough to anything but Disney World and the satellite theme parks, and a daytime burglary had left a bad feeling.

“It was just very touristy, too, once you left the Celebration bubble,” Ms. Chow said.

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Last year they went on the hunt again, determined to find the right fit.

They wanted to be close to amusement parks — that part, Ms. Chow said, was “nonnegotiable.”

But the couple also wanted some of what they had missed about Northern Virginia: good Asian restaurants, gourmet food and nearby movie theaters. They yearned for a walkable neighborhood, but they knew that could be tough to find in Central Florida, where gated communities without sidewalks abound.

“We wanted a newer home, one that had been updated,” Ms. Chow said. “We were on the fence about a pool, because we didn’t know about the maintenance, since we had never had a pool before.”

They also needed a yard for their dogs, a Pomeranian named Bella and a Chihuahua named Vito. (The couple, who married in 2013, don’t have children but plan to start a family.) Both work from home (Mr. Chow is an enterprise architect), and they wanted dedicated office space. They figured they would need at least three bedrooms, if not four, and considered the pros and cons of the local gated communities.

Factoring in the sale of their Celebration home and their savings, the couple decided on a budget of roughly $1 million, with about half of that earmarked for a down payment to avoid too big a mortgage.

“I broke it up into three different things,” Mr. Chow said. “One was, how good is the house, meaning is it move-in ready? Another category was location overall, meaning location to stores, etc. And then the third was location, meaning the local commute.”

Among their options:
 

No. 1

Four-Bedroom in Windermere

This four-bedroom, four-bathroom, 4,052-square-foot house was in Windermere, a gated community about 10 miles north of Disney. There was an office as well as a “bonus room” upstairs, and a primary bedroom downstairs with access to a lovely swimming pool and a half-acre fenced yard. But the house had a bit of a late-’90s vibe, and the kitchen was small. The location was close to downtown Windermere, although there weren’t a lot of great amenities nearby. The asking price was $1.2 million, with a $266 monthly homeowner association fee and about $10,064 in annual taxes.

No. 2

Six-Bedroom in Orlando

This 3,717-square-foot house was in a gated community in Orlando, two miles south of the Windermere house. With six bedrooms and five bathrooms, as well as a pool, spa and deck, it offered plenty of space for working and entertaining guests. And while the house needed updating, the roof was new. The property was close to stores and restaurants, but getting there on foot involved walking along high-traffic streets. Also, there was a middle school a couple of blocks away, and the children’s voices carried. The asking price was $995,000, with a monthly homeowner association fee of $125 and $8,837 in annual taxes.
 

No. 3

Three-Bedroom in Bay Hill
 

This three-bedroom, two-and-a-half-bathroom house was in the Bay Hill development, about five miles south of Windermere. The 3,086-square-foot house had been renovated with a modern aesthetic and had ample closet space, but the bedrooms were very close to one another. The yard wasn’t fenced, but there was a swimming pool with a table inside, creating all kinds of remote-work possibilities. The seller, who was flipping the house after installing a new roof and plumbing, had doubled the price he paid six months earlier and was asking $1.298 million. The monthly homeowner association fee was $75 and the annual taxes were $6,720.