u/Mysterious-Age-1629

We drove over an hour to see a house we’d been so excited about ever since we scheduled the showing a few days ago. On paper, it had almost everything we wanted. It wasn’t too rural, but it still had some space from neighbors. Room for my WFH husband to have an office, enough space for my family. The house itself was a little ugly - definitely needed paint and some remodeling - but it looked totally livable. The kind of place you could move into right away and slowly make your own.

So we pile into the van and make the drive, talking about all the possibilities the whole way there.

Eventually we turn off the highway onto the gravel road that leads to the property… and immediately hit some impressive ruts. The kind that rocks your whole car no matter how slowly you go.

“Well,” we tell ourselves, “that won’t be fun in the winter… but we can figure it out.” Maybe this was just the rough entrance. Maybe there was another way in.

The road continues.

And continues.

And somehow… gets worse.

The house is near a lake — a lot closer to the lake than it appeared on the map — and it becomes pretty clear that sections of this road have been underwater not too long ago. And we haven’t even hit the worst of the rainy season. My husband slows down to under 10 mph as he carefully zigzags around giant divots in the road that would absolutely bottom out our van. The kids are getting tossed around in the back like popcorn while I keep telling them to hold on. We cross an area where a creek seems to just run across the road, rain or shine.

Meanwhile, we’re passing houses that all look… a little rough. Lots of junk in the yards. A few places that seem like they may have been nice once upon a time but are now firmly in their “after” era.

We’re starting to feel a little less optimistic.

But hey - maybe our road is better! Maybe this is just the unfortunate approach road and once we turn off it’ll smooth right out. We keep telling ourselves things like this as we creep along.

Finally, I look at the map and say, “I think our road is just over this hill.”

We slowly climb the hill.

Crest the top.

And are immediately greeted by a giant red sign planted on the roadside that says, in enormous letters:

PEDOPHILE

With a big arrow pointing… somewhere.

Unfortunately, there are two or three different little roads branching off right there, so it’s not entirely clear which direction the sign is referring to. One of those roads are the one leading to the house we’re supposed to see.

That particular road also looks like it recently lost a fight with a flood. There’s a large washed-out section followed by what can only be described as a respectable mud pit.

At that point we all kind of sit there for a moment, looking at the road… looking at the sign… thinking about the van… thinking about the drive home.

And we collectively decide we’ve seen enough.

We called the realtor, apologized for not making it to the showing but we’ve seen enough to know that this isn’t for us, turned the van around as carefully as possible, and headed back down the world’s most aggressive gravel road.

Pretty confident that this one was not our future home.