Long Time No Share Lots of Personal Information on the Internet..

The dogs are walked.

Augie is fascinated by his Baby Einstein movie in his bouncy seat.

Haddie is still at her Daddy's house. 

Who knew that having a 4 year old out of daycare could be so exhausting? 

If any mom's want to set up a play date before we leave... I will fall over trying to get there.

Laundry is started and folded.

Dishes are done. 

Hopefully now I can sit down and catch everybody up.

Some information I have learned recently:

*Do not Use Quicken Loans as a mortgage lender

*No matter how much you prepare for something, 

educate yourself and organize your life, home 

purchases have too many variables, they will never

be simple.

*I have an incredibly high tolerance for stress.

No nervous breakdown as of yet.

When we first called Quicken Loans the day we made an offer on our home, Nigel Levy (yes I'm calling him out. I don't like the man much) told us that Andy's alimony would not be counted against him when buying the home because he and his ex-wife had agreed to end it as soon as she moved in with her fiancé (co-habitation=no alimony), which would be 2-3 months. No big deal. 

We made an offer. We paid the earnest money deposit. We asked for a VA inspection as soon as possible because we wanted to know that everything was going to be fine with the home. We got it. We paid $400. The inspection came back great. Three simple fixes... windows had to be scraped and painted, some power washing, and the door to the crawl space had to be replaced...

No more than $1000 worth of work if the seller paid someone to do everything. We are perfectly willing to accept a counter offer for slightly more to compensate for that. The appraisal came back at 58k which means if we purchased the home we would have 8k in equity to make aesthetic changes. 

We got the email back around 9pm, Monday. I cried I was so happy.

Andy put in his two weeks last Friday. He accepted a job in Greensboro making what he's making now but he will be driving 2 hours less per day for his commute. I am so excited to establish something tighter with his boys. Everything was going so good. 

The underwriters for Quicken called us 2 days ago. The home that Andy's name is still on is going into foreclosure and they wanted to know what he had to say about it. He had a divorce decree that relieved him of all responsibility. In that divorce decree, was an alimony statement. They told us that we have to have legal proof of the ending of alimony by closing for them to give us the house. 

I feel.... cheated. We have been nothing but honest about our financial situation with these people. We made life decisions based on their word. We're uprooting our family September 21st and moving in with Andy's parents with Haddie and Augie until we can straighten this whole mess out. 

Two adults+Two elderly adults+Two kids under 5+2 dogs+2 dogs= Oh. MY. God.

His parents are being insanely cool about it. 

We got our U-haul from Colonial Heights,VA for $305 for the initial rental. .40/mile over 261 miles which is what it takes to get from Colonial Heights to High Point. With a 20 foot truck rental, we were given a 10 x15ft storage unit for free. After the first month it will be 100/month which means we will be looking for something to rent in Greensboro as a back up. We found a 3 br town house for more than twice what we would be paying for the mortgage at Denny St. 

I'm heartbroken. 

I'm overwhelmed. 

I'm confused. 

I'm tired. Augie got up at 4 am. 

What on earth do you do when you put all of your eggs in one basket and some douche bag decides to come step on them? Make some french toast and pray they haven't stepped in dog poop recently.

Speaking of dog poop. I promised a blog about Buttercup's health issues and what I've been doing to combat them until we can get her to a vet.. I'll have to do that tomorrow. 

We have a date to talk to the Underwriter from Quicken today. He offered us an FHA loan with more down at closing but we've been budgeting for the VA so we're unsure that we can afford it. Andy is going to make it a three-way call and if he decides to be nice about things, I have plans to give the man a piece of my mind. If Evil Underwriter is unwilling to discuss it, I will file a formal complaint with the company. 

I have a big mouth, but I'm usually all bark and no bite. Not in this case. We have made promises to sellers. To back out because we can't get the financing gives others cause to question our integrity.

 I do not appreciate that in the least. 

I'll keep you posted.

The Good the Bad and the.... What in the Heck?

Looked at a few houses today and decided to make an offer.

Before I tell you about the one we chose, I have to tell you about the ones we didn't.... because where's the fun in getting the good stuff first? 

So we saw the two homes in High Point. The first I already showed you, the second.... looked like this:

  

Check out that wallpaper. Circa 1950

Cute right?? It's a foreclosure. 70k downtown High Point... Cute neighborhood. Then we saw this:

That's right folks. It says DO NOT ENTER. Talk about a selling deterrent.  At 70k we felt that with the work that was going to be needed, it wasn't a good investment. If we had about 50k extra, it would have been great. 

Our realtor is from Winston. She is GREAT. Viola player for the Greensboro symphony. Totally eclectic. Totally cute. If you like suits... Maureen Michels is not for you. I like genuine people that are a little bit messy.. and she's perfect. A artsy dreamer with a realistic side. I think those make the best realtors. If you're moving to the Winston area shoot her an email at mmichels77@gmail.com or call her at 336-577-9245. 

Maureen knows the Winston area well and drove us around showing us home in some more "up and coming" neighborhoods. This usually means, semi ghetto with low crime. A few other homes in the area have usually been purchased by upper middle class families with vision. One home was in progress. A man was remodeling it with the intention of eventually selling. 70k with 3 bedrooms, adorable crown moulding.... but it's not finished yet. Sad face.

Finally Sink Street. A home we found on Realtor.com  4 bedrooms. 1 bath upstairs, one in the basement. The basement had a large workshop, a laundry room and bath with shower as well as what could be turned into a small loft-style apartment. 

  

(Left to right: "Apartment space" Bathroom and Laundry Room)

The bedrooms were huge and storage was everywhere. Complete with real wood paneling, the "den" had a build in desk and gas logs. Built in's everywhere. Andy.. was in love. 

Best part? The basement. Worst part? The neighborhood. Section 8 housing two homes down and across the street. The home directly across the street was currently housing approximately 10 people. Essentially? Sketchy-town. 

So? What did we decide? 

We saw 507 Derry St.  this morning at 9am. It was love at first analysis. 

Three bedrooms technically. There is a possibility for a fourth. Built in 1910. 

                        

(Left to Right: Upstairs bath with access to very large attic space, Upstairs BR, Massive Laundry Room)

(Left to Right: Fenced in backyard w/shed, Large kitchen--all that you see with that ugly floor is kitchen. It's much deeper than it looks, Staircase <3)

(Left to Right: Cary.. praying we buy the house... in the Living Room complete with built in and double sided fireplace, Dining room aka the other side of the double sided fireplace. Also with built-in. Can you say double sided gas logs?)

A bit of a story is tied to this house. We called John McCormick (Seller's Realtor- Great guy- See link for contact info if you'd like it) last week with the intention of seeing the home. He told the seller but there was a tenant inside and we couldn't get more images until Friday. John called me Thursday confirming an appointment for this morning and made mention that there had already been an offer. The seller is an investor with the desire for a family to purchase the home, not another investor. Because we had scheduled an appointment, the seller decided to hold off on accepting any offers until after we had seen it. That immediately gave me some serious respect for the man. 

It worked in his favor. We decided not to lowball him. The house is in great condition. HVAC is seven years old and the roof is two years old. Electrical work is up code. New plumbing. Bathrooms have been totally redone. 

Listing price is 49,900. We offered 49k and asked that he pay half of closing costs. 

His realtor believes that he will accept so essentially, we're waiting on the VA inspectors to tell us they will give us a loan for the house. We made a note that if the repairs required by the VA weren't too substantial, we would consider a counter offer that considered the cost of the repairs.

Ok. Now it's time for a nap.