Worried about increasing our price cap from $300k to $350-450k

Hey folks, hoping someone can help me understand if I'm worried over nothing on this.

Personal details:

My partner and I are looking for a house around Chicago (burbs, not city). We've been kind of just looking for a while and I have been really adamant about capping our search at $300k but we just aren't really seeing what we want in a house at that price point. When I look at houses closer to $400k, I see stuff that aligns way more closely to what we're looking for.

Household gross income is about $140k (me= $105-110k, her= ~$30k). My base salary is 95k and I get a bonus that pushes my earnings up around 105-110. I finished my MBA last year and have not seen any salary increase for it yet. I would like to look at new jobs where I can earn more. I'm trying to target roles where I could earn ~$140k because there's a high chance that my partner will be going back to school very soon to become a physical therapy assistant or full-on physical therapist. It's possible (probable, I think) that her income will completely evaporate for the next few years while she's in school/we're raising a baby. I don't want to lose any financial ground due to that.

We are planning to start a family within 2 years.

We have been planning to put down 20% ($60k) on a $300k home. We realistically have the ability to stretch this to $80k for 20% down on $400k. I'm really hesitant to go beyond this though.

All loan officers I've spoken with have told me they could probably very easily get us approved for $450k. We are not pre-approved for any loan yet.

We are totally debt free. We spend on credit cards and pay off the full balance each month.

Hopefully that's enough info but let me know if I've left anything out. I'm looking for opinions on my situation. I'm planning to retire early (55 or earlier, currently 29) so I'm trying to be really conscious of spending now and not needlessly over-leverage myself on a house.

Edit to add info:

We have a healthy emergency fund of ~6-8 months of current expenses.

We max out Roth IRAs for both of us. I also max out my 6% 401k match through my employer.