It really happened! We actually bought a house! I still cannot believe it...I don't know if I will ever believe it.
The story is long and I want to tell it. So buckle up. Or just skip this post all together.
Last July (2015). I started working at Complete Solar for Will. My job was to compile a series of reports for the executive team every day. It was fairly straight forward and I was able to take a few hours every day to put together the reports and answer questions for the executive team about how different parts of the company were preforming. I took the job in hopes of using whatever income I did to pay off our credit cards. There were several times in our marriage where we needed to live off credit cards or use them to supplement our income. When Will was in business school, when Will was starting one company or another...or that whole year he had no job and was trying to start Complete Solar. Times like those... While we didn't have an unmanageable amount of debt we were slow to pay it off. We knew it would take a concentrated effort to get the cards payed off and just have student load debt to deal with. We were also confident that by paying off our credit cards we would be able to buy a house.
FOR REAL!
We had saved some money and Will's income was sufficient. So I started working and we started paying off credit cards. Some months we used my extra income for fun things...like Christmas. But for the most part, we paid off debt. For a year, we watched our credit debt shrink and got hopeful. In April, we heard one of our "normal" friends bought a house. By "normal" I mean, a one income family where they didn't have a large gift of money or an employer who offered home buying support. They just worked hard, saved money and bought a house. We were floored! As far as we knew, the only way to buy a house around here was to get an incredibly generous gift from family or work with your employer to secure permanent housing. (Or hit the workplace lottery and cash out when your company went public...but we don't personally know many people who did that). After talking with these friends we were even more encouraged.
WE COULD REALLY BUY A HOUSE!
We continued to save and pay off debt over the summer and by the end of the summer we started looking at houses to buy. We contacted our neighbor across the street and asked her to be our realtor. She was pretty great. She showed us a few houses and we tried our best to continue to be hopeful. The closest we came was just as school was starting (back in the middle of August). We walked through a house that was in the best location and big enough for our family...it just needed a lot of work. We put an offer in but lost out. So the search continued. We worked with our lender to finalize loan details and kept looking.
All this time I kept a secret flame for a house that had come on the market way back in April. The house had been bought by a flipper from an origional owner. The flipper had gutted the whole house and put it on the market. The house went pending pretty quickly in May. Over the summer, I think it was in July, the house came back on the market. Apparently, the first buyers were from out of state and got cold feet about buying a house that didn't have the most cutting edge earthquake technology. I walked through the house in July and asked the agent to keep me posted on what happened with the house. We still hadn't even started the lending process so I knew we weren't really in the running. Sure enough, the house went pending again. I was bummed but knew there wasn't much I could do.
Two weeks later, the house fell out of escrow and was back on the market. It sat on the market all summer long. I think it went pending one more time but fell out quickly. Finally, in September, we had all of our financing in place and were ready to put an offer in. As our agent was working on the offer she found out the seller had just accepted another offer and the house wasn't available any more. I was super bummed this time! I thought for sure the house was meant for us.
So we kept looking. There weren't a lot of houses on the market and even fewer that would fit our family and were in our price range. I'm not going to mention what our price range was because it is ludicrous to think about spending that much money on a house that doesn't come with a butler. We considered a house that was too small but in our price range but it sold quickly. We got really serious about the two houses: a big house that needed a ton of work and a tiny house that didn't need much work with a great yard but backed onto the freeway. During this period of time our lender tried to change the terms of our loan that would have effectively made it impossible to buy a house. My husband, the super negotiator, got them to change the terms back. At one point when I was freaking out he said: "Don't worry this is only the fourth of fifth most stressful deal I've ever had to put together." He is a pro.
So October rolled around and I noticed that the for sale sign was still out at the flipped house. I kept looking on Zillow and Redfin a houses that we missed out on to find out how much we were out bid by. This flipped house was not showing up as sold. So I finally called the listing agent. I also called the listing agent on the really big house that needed a ton of work because it wasn't showing up as sold on Zillow either. That house was sold...
The agent for the flipped house said: "Funny you should call today. The house has fallen out of escrow again and the seller is really frustrated. He isn't sure if he is going to put it back up for sale, rent it or trade it to another seller." We talked for a few minutes about what it would take for Will and I to buy the home and I said I would have our agent call him later.
I had loved this house from the very beginning. It was beautifully renovated inside and with it sitting unsold for so long the price had come down quite a bit. The biggest selling feature for me was a gigantic soaking tub in the master bathroom. It looked quite luxurious. The location, while on a busier street, would be an easy walk for middle school kids. We also would be right down the street from some of Lorien's friends from her home school year. The price, while lower, was still a little out of our reach. We walked through the house one more time and then looked at two other houses in the same price range. One was big, close to the freeway and had a big back yard...but it needed a lot of work. It had been an ill-used rental and showed it. Kitchen cupboards were ripped off, one toilet had an out of order sign on it. The back yard was a wreck. The other house was old but charming. It had been cared for by original owners. It needed work but was in livable condition. It was at the end of a cul de sac and had a gigantic yard. The biggest draw back...it only had three small bedrooms. Really, too small for our family of seven. The flipped house really was the very best choice and I LOVED that house. So we put in an offer Thursday night.
Friday, no word. Saturday, no word. Sunday...nothing! We were kind of going crazy. This house had been on the market for six months. Why weren't they jumping at the offer? We did hear from the seller's agent on Sunday, apologizing that the seller was hard to get a hold of on the weekend. We weren't really buying it. It felt like maybe the seller's agent was shopping our offer around. Contacting other people who had showed an interest and seeing if he could get another offer. Sure enough, Monday we heard: Sorry, we have another offer for full price (our offer was 20 grand lower). If you can come up above asking price it's yours.
I was so mad! No, we couldn't come up above asking! We were paying the maximum we could! We were out. After crying really hard for the umteenth time during this whole price I shook it off. I had always felt confident that when we were ready to buy a house, there would be a house for us to buy. It just wasn't this one...or any of the other houses we had tried to get and lost out on.
Two days later, I think it was a Wednesday, I got a call from our realtor. "You are not going to believe this...the other buyer backed out again." I was floored! This house really was meant for us?! I talked to Will and our agent. The seller wanted us to come up by a 10 thousand dollars. Will negotiated with our lender (again) and was able to come up to the price the seller would take. We resubmitted our offer and waited.
Meanwhile, life was in full swing for our family. It was homecoming week for Lorien at the high school. Wyatt had cross country practice and meets. Clare and Adell started ShowBiz. Life was crazy. On Saturday the 15th I took Lorien out dress shopping for her homecoming dress. Then I took Adell out shopping for halloween costume stuff. While Adell and I were driving down to the thrift store, I got the text from our realtor: our offer was officially accepted! IT WAS HAPPENING!
Naturally, I burst into tears again. It was unbelievable. The next few weeks were also crazy. Not only did life continue at a frenzied pace but we were doing all of the crud we needed to close on our house. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. The "never mind, you cannot buy this house" shoe. It never happened. We signed all of the closing documents on Tuesday and the loan and title posted on November 10th.
WE ARE HOMEOWNERS!
With the help of friends and family we moved on Saturday. We are in our new, lovely, fantastic house. It is a mess of boxes and stuff but it is ours and we love it!
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