An auspicious phone call from their CPA found them in a RV park in Front Royal, Virginia, the following November. "He said," recalls John, "well, I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is that you finally sold your last piece of property in California. The bad news is that you only have forty-five days to roll it over into another rental property or lose a substantial amount in taxes."

       Not one for sitting around, John visited the Front Royal Chamber of Commerce that very afternoon to inquire about properties for sale in the area. Though John and Susan had never come to a concrete decision about what they would do when it was time to settle down, they had identified Virginia as a place they wanted to live, and Front Royal had everything they wanted. It is just the right distance from a major metropolitan area and its cultural activities, close to an international airport, but well out of the rat race of city life. Added Virginia attractions were the return to four seasons, in contrast to the one or two in Southern California, and its natural beauty.

       Another visitor in the chamber office offered to show John around town. Reluctant at first, he finally agreed. In a short two hours, he saw the whole town and nothing caught his eye, so he was floored when she said "Mr. Lang, I think you're going to buy the next place you see."

       As they drove up 15th Street, John got his first glimpse of Killahevlin on the top of the hill. Disheveled from years of negligence, the stately Edwardian limestone mansion looked like, as Susan laughingly puts it now, the Bates Motel. But during a quick tour through the house, John's engineering background helped him see that, despite the mess, the house was structurally sound and "full of potential."