The Vision

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Our "test pilot's" life patterns surfaced as poetry:

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We spent years in motion – Living as travelers, learning through places, people, and change. After the birth of our daughter, we imagined a life of proximity, not just to land, but to people that matter. Parents nearby. Or friends from the world coming through. We imagined a home does not separate from community - it's part of a larger fabric of family, food, ritual, and support.

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Our home shouldn't be just for us – it's for the ones growing alongside us. We imagine adventures on the land, music in the air, and questions at the table. We are not separated from the children's world; we are building it with them, step by step. We are nourished by the land, light, and the meanings of life around us. Whether it's hosting, writing, parenting, or recovering from adventures, we want to feel close to nature without being overtaken by it. We want our energy to flow best when our house opens gently to the world; filtered, framed, protected, and alive.

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We need a place to step away – Not to leave each other, but to return to ourselves. My wife needs a truly quiet writing place – a place that does not echo with footsteps or calls from the next room. My rhythm needs movement, heat, and reflection. We want a home that breathes easily, made of honest materials in quiet air where filtered water pours from every faucet and cotton touches skin, where plants clean the air while we sleep. A space that helps our bodies rest, regulate, and feel safe.

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From Vision to Life Patterns to Manifest

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This was the vision Jon and Erin shared with me when they first came to HODL House. They'd spent years living out patterns that we could help them discover through our HODL House process, and we'd successfully translated the patterns into their personal Manifest. But now they faced the next challenge: How do you find the perfect place to land?

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Were they going to consider a place where they started from and then circled the world only to come back to? Strangely, they always thought the place would be a bit more tropical. Still, with the life changes and children being nomads who live a month at a time, somewhere fun was no longer as cool as it was before we had a family and knew how to check a car seat through airport security.

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Now they were leaning toward the support that extended family could provide on their terms. "Could we find a place near where we came from and our parents who raised us, as we raise our children?"

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From Manifest to a sacred place

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Their Manifest had become more than a conclusion—it was their compass for the journey ahead. Armed with this tangible representation that captured their ideal home, they now had the clarity to evaluate any opportunity that came their way. Should they choose a move-in-ready home that already embodied their patterns? Should they find a renovation project with potential? Was there an empty lot or raw property to build their home from the ground up? Their manifest would serve as their guide.

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This is where the alchemy comes in. What does it take to find the perfect place to HODL your life? The answer lies in understanding that the components of a house worth HODLing are not just the building itself, but the individual (you), the combination of design patterns tailored to your needs, and how those patterns integrate with the land on which it all sits. The alchemy of these three elements creates your sacred place where you can live, work, and thrive in harmony with the land and the community.

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But alchemy requires more than hope – it requires method. It requires a systematic approach to evaluate whether a piece of land or an existing house can support your Manifest, whether the existing conditions align with your life patterns, and whether investing your hard-earned Bitcoin will enhance your quality of life rather than exacerbate your stress.

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This is the art and science of SiteFitting.

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Developing Our Methodology

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Just as we'd developed a systematic approach to Life Pattern Discovery in Essay 11 and Manifest Creation in Essay 12, SiteFitting required its own methodology. You can't evaluate whether a property supports your life patterns by walking around and "getting a feel for the place." Your gut feelings can be accurate, but there needs to be a way to evaluate multiple properties to help combine analysis with intuition.

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Over the years of helping clients evaluate properties and making the mistakes personally, from raw land to existing homes to renovation projects, I've developed a method that cuts through emotional attachment and marketing spin to reveal whether a property can deliver on your Manifest's promises. We analyze two steps: first, pre-contract, which occurs before making an offer, and then, pre-close, which takes place during your due diligence period before closing.

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Pre-contract is a quicker way to evaluate multiple properties to determine how they compare their potential to satisfy your manifest with some comparable cost scoring. The process allows you to view numerous properties and then recall what you saw with additional detail, but the listing might not provide the whole picture.

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Testing the Method: Jon and Erin’s subject house

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Jon and Erin found an existing home in the place they wanted to live. They shared the MLS listing and address with me to get started with our Site Fit analysis.

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PRE-CONTRACT

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Site Analysis: Understanding the Opportunities and Constraints

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I've never been to this property's city, but you can learn a lot from Google Earth and zoning ordinances available online. The property featured an existing home, and I wanted to help Jon and Erin evaluate if this was the right fit for their Manifest.

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This site was interesting due to its T-shaped layout, with a long driveway providing access between two existing homes. The subject property sat adjacent to the yards of other properties, making it visually appear as if there was more space. The back of the house faced south, which provided good orientation for a sunlit interior. Considering the available buildable area, there is additional capacity for outbuildings, both now and in the future.