Photograph by Angela Jackson
BUYING A HOUSE is already a stressful experience. Now, imagine making that enormous decision based solely on video tours while living more than a thousand miles away. Such was the case for Jeff and Eliza Widelski. The Colorado residents of eight years decided last winter that the time had come for them to stop renting. They wanted to purchase a home, but they felt the Centennial State wasn’t a good fit. “Colorado real estate had skyrocketed,” Jeff says. “That led our circle of friends to leave, and we were left there alone. We found that familiarity and people we knew were very important to us.”
Landing on Indy as their new home wasn’t totally random. Jeff was born in Northern Indiana, and he had lived downtown in the late ’90s. With Eliza’s family north of Chicago, Indy made sense. The comparatively low Hoosier home prices and cost of living were also appealing. Conducting the home search from so far away, they put a lot of trust in their Realtor, Natalie Clayton of Maywright Property Co., who went above and beyond by capturing detailed videos of prospective homes and sending them to the Widelskis back in Colorado.
And then they saw it—a 1910 Holy Cross beauty with tasteful updates, a great front porch, and classic curb appeal. The couple share an affinity for older homes, so “it popped off the page to us,” Jeff says. They spent hours “touring” the neighborhood on Google Maps and falling in love via Street View. The stress was worth it, according to Eliza. “It all came together perfectly,” she says. “Holy Cross feels much more suburban and closeknit, and it has good walkability.” And compared to Colorado? “People are a lot more friendly here,” Eliza says.
FAVORITE FEATURE
The front porch
PURCHASE DATE
February 2024
NEIGHBORHOOD
Holy Cross
SQUARE FOOTAGE
2,526
