And the beat goes on...

About a week ago, we finally heard back about our counteroffer. Not surprisingly, the news we received was that we would receive an actual answer in...another two weeks. So, imagine our surprise when, over a bowl of ice cream and the local newspaper Saturday night, Husband's father suddenly announced an advertisement he had spied in the classifieds.

An advertisement for a sheriff's sale for the house we want to buy.

The auction will take place on January 15 at 10:00 a.m. I'm so glad the bank was professional enough to tell us what they were doing rather than letting us find out by reading it in the newspaper.

*Heavy sarcasm*

Apparently, our counteroffer is still valid, and we continue to wait to see if they will accept the offer before the auction takes place. I cannot understand why the bank ignores the fact that our offer is far more money than they would probably get if the house does in fact go to auction. Although we *might* get the house for less if we bid on it at the auction, we might also have some stiff competition that could end in a bidding war. Additionally, I discovered that, often in these situations, a check must be written for the full amount of the house on the day of the auction.

Because I have $100,000 just lying around in my bank account.

We would also not have the opportunity to get an inspection of the property (scary) and might have to absorb the cost of any liens that are currently on the house (past work, back taxes, etc.).

When we moved out of our dorm room at Dinky College and (TEMPORARILY) in with Husband's parents, we were excited about the prospect of purchasing our own home and settling in together, really starting our lives, grounded, no longer nomads. Now, over five months later, we are tired of the whole situation and harbor bitter feelings. This just isn't fun anymore, and it's very, very sad.

I can still dream, can't I?

I am thoroughly exasperated by our lack of real estate. Still no word from the bank on our counteroffer as they continue to turn their financial noses up at our hot little pile of money we're just aching to lay at their feet. We have a garage full of furniture and no house, so I dream with the help of potterybarn.com. Join me in my dreams, won't you?


This is a lovely organic, branch-inspired mirror. If I had a house I would possibly hang it in the bedroom (no, not that kind of mirror...) or in the foyer area. You know, if I had a house.


I would get pillows like these for our couch and loveseat. The couch and loveseat are a soft tan color and I absolutely hate the pillows that came with the set. They are stripey and mostly maroon, but not a pretty stripey maroon, and these pillows don't make me want to throw up when I'm taking a nap.


I would hang this chandelier over our dining room table. Again, it is very organically branch-inspired. Plus, SHINY. VERY SHINY. We would enjoy our meals beneath its soft light. You know, if I had a dining room.

Beneath that lovely chandelier, we would eat on plates that look like these. Most of the items in this post I would not actually ever buy because EXPENSIVE. The silver lining, however, is that we already DO have plates that look like these. We got them as a wedding gift. They remain unopened in the box, probably in some dusty corner of my parents' spare bedroom, yet untouched by my majestic culinary creations (...errr...Kraft macaroni and cheese).


We already do have a very nice comforter that is very warm and soft and I love, but it is plain white, and this one is HELLO PRETTY. Plus it is made out of organic cotton. Because I'm a green snob like that. It could always go on the guest bed, right? You know, in that guest bedroom we don't have...

The alarm is ringing. Time to wake up. In my in-laws' house.

Countering the counter

We put in a response to the bank's counteroffer today. In looking through my old posts, I realized that we put in our original offer on September 5. That was eight weeks ago. Let me repeat that again. EIGHT WEEKS. There are now exactly eight weeks until Christmas. Think we have any reason to be hopeful?

That question was kind of rhetorical.

A Counteroffer Haiku

Fifteen thousand more
the bank asks, and we begin
to hemorrhage cash.

We're pretty much professionals now.

The past five months have included a heck of a lot of moving.

First, we enlisted a four-person team of parental movers and one self-sacrificing friend (the dear Diosthocles) to haul all of our worldly belongings out of our one-room abode at Dinky College (thank goodness for the antiquated elevator). These items were then divided between our two sets of parents' houses and stuffed into any available space to collect dust while we looked for a space of our own to purchase and fill.

After that, I trekked to the state capitol with two other sets of parents to load the furniture and belongings of my Dearest Cousin and her husband, Steve, into their newlywed apartment (no elevator this time, just a flight of stairs).

The months following were relatively move-free, aside from the rotation of various items we decided we needed immediate use of or needed to be rid of, until this weekend. We spent Saturday moving very large and heavy pieces of furniture from Husband's grandfather's house. We received a full bedroom suit, a dining room table with six chairs, and a hutch (pictured, yeay!) for next to nothing. (Really, I'm not completely convinced we didn't, in fact, rob him blind. Uhm. No pun intended.) These items we shuttled to Husband's parent's garage, the last available bit of space left to our pack-rat tendencies.

But, of course, the weekend was not over. We then spent more time flexing our muscles and throwing out our backs Sunday moving the furniture out of my parents' home office to prepare for new carpet installation. And this coming Friday we will have the treat of moving everything back in (although I really don't mind. We did, after all, turn their home into a temporary storage facility.)

I hope that within the next few months we will be moving one final time (for a few years, at least). I don't think we could be any more prepared. We have a down payment, we have a loan lined up, we have the house picked out, and now we have enough furniture to fill the house. Now, I guess, we just need THE HOUSE!

Frustration

We have confirmation that we won't be hearing about the offer we put in on the house for another two to three weeks. Something to do with the appraisal not coming in, additional finagling required with a third financial party, and the discovery that the former owners have the common sense of a pile of rocks.

Here is the question I pose to you: Who takes out a second mortgage on their current house to buy another, larger, much more expensive house in another state completely, in which only one member of the family will live? Whatever they got out of the first house didn't even meet the regular twenty percent down payment on the new house. It must be a palace...

Soooo...two to three more weeks. Until we even hear anything. That doesn't count the possibility of an escrow time period if they even actually accept our offer straight away or the additional time it will take if they're looking to negotiate for more money. I'm thinking we should put in another offer equivalent to our first offer, which was pretty much a joke. Just because I'm that bitter.

Maybe we'll have a lovely new house as a Christmas present. I hope the former owners get coal.

Excitement...

Well, it was an exciting weekend.

We didn't get another call from the bank after that last house update *falls over with shock.* However, although we aren't anywhere near getting into OUR house, plenty of other people are getting into OUR house. I say OUR house because, staring at the house next door day after day, I've become a bit possessive even though the real estate gods that be haven't yet granted the request of our fervent prayer.

Anyways. We got "home" well after dark Friday evening at the same time some unknown people were parking their giant white truck in OUR house's driveway and heading on in. Like they OWNED the place. We called our realtor (with whom the house is listed), and, by the time he called us back to say he wasn't aware of anyone supposed to be in the house, the local police arrived. Of course, the white truck had already sped away only moments before, but we told the officers what we had seen and then received orders to just call them right away if we see any more suspicious behavior. Will do.

Of course, this isn't the first time something like this has happened. The former owners keep coming back and loading up truckfuls of their junk (and, yes, I do qualify wooden snowmen and various other hideous crafts as junk) even though the house is in foreclosure and they aren't supposed to be there (they still have a garage door opener and that's what they use to get in, crafty buggars). It isn't the first time the police have been called, either. There's lots of bad karma going on right now that we're going to have to rectify later. It will probably have to involve some New Age woman named Serena and lots of incense. Along with a ton of heavy new locks.

After that eventful Friday evening, I spent a lovely Saturday with three of my best gal pals in Terre Haute. I don't get to see enough of them, and it was a definite treat to chat live and in person as opposed to e-mail, IM, or phone. They make me all smiley inside.

And the excitement continues. Husband began his brand spakin' new job today. I know he will be wonderful! Life is falling into place. Now, if only we had somewhere to live...

An Update

In the past few days, four people have asked how our house hunt is going. This leads me to believe every single person who reads this blog is dying to know whether or not we will still be homeless and dejected this winter. The masses deserve an update! Here we go:

Four weeks ago tomorrow Husband and I put in an offer on the house. It wasn't like our first offer a few months ago on the same house, which was so low that it was kind of an insult and we really hadn't expected anything to come of it. No, this was a real, honest-to-goodness, cold hard cash offer. And we were excited. We'd discussed our needs vs. wants at length and had finally spoken our true priorities out loud to one another. We had made a decision about our future and where we wanted that future to take place.

Unfortunately (but semi-fortunately), since putting in that offer, the house went into full foreclosure. In truth, our offer should be null and void because the expiration date has long since...well...expired. But in the convoluted system of communication that currently stands, we spoke with our realtor, who spoke with the loan officer (at the same bank that owns the house and pre-approved our loan), who spoke with the foreclosure department, and said "It's okay! The offer is still valid! Still take it into consideration!"

And then three weeks went by. The bank FINALLY told us that they were planning a current market value appraisal of the home, and this appraisal would be compared to our offer, and then we would have an answer!

Sure.

Our realtor called us after he found out the appraisal actually had more in common with a drive-by shooting (how you can appraise a house without actually entering the house is incomprehensible to me). The appraisor would come up with a magic number by comparing the house to other houses for sale in the area (as a fun sidenote, a house two blocks away has been for sale for months; not one single buyer has even looked at this house yet). And so, we waited. And waited. And waited some more. And we're still waiting. Our loan officer, the only person with the actual ability to communicate with the foreclosure department, has called and sent numerous e-mails, with no response. "The legalities take time," she keeps saying.

All I know is, the warm days filled with productive renovation potential are slipping by faster than a teenage boy into his girlfriend's panties. The longer the house sits without inhabitants, the more renovation it will need. I shudder to think if the house sits for the entire winter.

The economy sucks. The foreclosure department is overloaded. Maybe the bank itself will go under, who knows? All I know is that we have a hot pile of money we're just aching to hand over and no one wants it.

We'll make our weekly Friday phone call to the bank yet again tomorrow. Don't expect any news. We aren't.

Plans...or lack thereof

I am a serial planner.

It's kind of like being a serial murderer, only I ritualistically execute plans instead of people, and there is little chance of being jailed unless an unforeseen snafu makes my plans null and void and I go on a flame thrower-charged killing spree.

Perhaps my greatest planning accomplishment was our wedding day (including all of the events leading up to and following said day, down to the quarter hour). However, as I mentioned before, when my carefully thought-out plans are interrupted by some conniving outside interference, I get completely thrown off kilter and go in search of something large and metal that shoots fire at my command. For example, when we were scheduled to have access to Thomas Duncan Community Hall at 2:00 p.m. for the wedding ceremony (we arrived fifteen minutes early and waited patiently before ringing the doorbell), the caretaker decided to take a nap and sleep through our continuous (and later desperate) doorbell ringing, knocking on every door and window, and hysterical crying. In case you were wondering, it was me having the tear-filled meltdown. My plans had been thwarted! Thrown off by half an hour! Instead of the leisurely dressing and make-up preparation with pre-ceremony photographs of the bridal party members I had envisioned, we raced around like mad women (the guys weren't quite as worried as it took them five minutes to prepare). And we were sweating. Because the air conditioning wasn't turned on until we entered the building half an hour late. In July. I finally pulled it together without any significant casualties (the caretaker*** hid away behind a closed office door), but it was an unpleasant deviation on a day that I'd planned to a T.

Now, my planning obsession has come to a sudden halt. The outcome of our housing situation is not in our hands anymore; I cannot be in control of the situation. I feel impotent. Until Husband and I receive an all-important phone call and (hopefully) persevere through some additional negotiations, I don't feel as though I can confront the plans that are already swirling in my mind: what color should we paint the cabinets and walls; what kind of carpeting and kitchen tile should we buy; should I ask my mother to make us curtains or should I just purchase them ready-made; should we switch the gas stove to electric now or not make the switch at all; where should we purchase a dining room table and chairs and pots and pans and plates; what would be the best approach to unpacking and organizing; where will this knick-knack go; how will I hang this picture; should we repaint the garage door and shutters and complete a landscaping overhaul or wait until after winter; and on, and on, and on.

You're sure that phone is on, right?

***I suppose you could call the caretaker a casualty after all. I wrote a letter of disappointment in his performance to the director of Duncan Hall. The caretaker was fired (I believe his MIA act on our wedding day was not his first screw up) and I got a partial refund. Ah, the power of righteous anger (and a bitchy bride).

Approval...

"We're approved."

Those are the words Husband uttered to me last night after ending his phone conversation with a bank employee we've been working with for several weeks. Approved, of course, meaning pre-qualified for a home loan.

Approval on a home loan is probably going to be the easy part. Thanks to Husband's foresight, we've built up a respectable credit rating. Thanks to the foresight of my parents, they generated a healthy amount of college savings for me since birth. Consequently, thanks to me, I graduated from college a year early, so the leftover college savings will help with a handsome down payment for such young bucks as Husband and myself. Don't get me wrong, both Husband and I also have handsome college loans, but I don't lose sleep over those. They will get paid off eventually, as will the home loan we will inevitably sign our firstborn away for.

Now the true process of negotiations will begin, which I'm expecting to be the hard part. The entire ordeal is a special situation, the convoluted details of which I am not ready to disclose, but I definitely have my fingers and toes crossed that everything will work out and the bank will fly us a deed on a magic carpet for exactly what we want to pay with an interest rate that amounts to the change in my coin purse. This house would be a wonderful place to raise a few children and remain close to family and friends with a marginal carpooled commute to work. Go, ahead, get your hopes up with me.

At least we won't have to get too attached to our firstborn.

A warning in advance...

Here is a warning in advance: This post is going to be about our continuing house hunt. If you are thoroughly disgusted with our obvious lack of skills and/or luck in finding a place to live that doesn't involve the kind charity of my in-laws, then stop reading now. It's only going to get worse.

Well, perhaps we have had a bit of luck come our way. We went house hunting once again with our Realtor last night and actually found two houses that are completely tolerable inside with no rat droppings to be seen, have finished basements that never used to be meth labs, and are in neighborhoods where you can wear red or blue at your discretion without fear!

The problem?

Just the overflowing fount of unanswered questions that we probably should have thought of a month ago. For example, childcare...you know, for those children we don't even have. Paying another human being to tolerate your smelly, whining brats for eight to ten hours a day...sounds expensive. And what about when we have the good fortune to send said smelly, whining brats to blessedly "free" public school, but they get sick or fall off the monkey bars or get run over by a big, yellow bus? Would we be able to leave work at a moment's notice to rescue the little darlings? And would living "closer" to work actually save us any time or fuel? After fighting the urban traffic and wasting precious gasoline at stoplight after stoplight, would we actually save anything at all? We've been carpooling with a friend of Husband's for the past few weeks, and that seems to be working out well, assuming said friend plans to continue his employment at Big, Fancy University.

My head hurts.

At this rate, I'm voting for a cardboard refrigerator box underneath a bridge and a speedy vasectomy for Husband.

Where's Ed McMahon when you need him?

I keep waiting for Ed McMahon to show up on my doorstep with a giant Publishers Clearing House check.

I choose to ignore the fact that I don't actually have my own doorstep and also haven't spent a single moment signing up to win a giant Publishers Clearing House check. Still, I really think Ed should seriously contemplate dropping by. I know that people say money won't solve all your problems...but I just really think that a large amount of money would solve all of our problems right now.

If someone would just magically hand us an extra $100,000 or so, we could stop weighing the pros and cons of throwing up our hands and buying a mold-covered, rat dropping encased former meth lab in our current price range or admitting to the world that we are indefinitely living with my in-laws.

If you couldn't tell, I am becoming increasingly exasperated with the whole house hunt business. If everyone else can go into extreme debt after buying a house tolerable enough to live in but way out of their price range, why can't we? Husband keeps whining about something called a "credit rating." I don't think we'll be truly happy until our credit rating and combined IQ scores are equal...

However, if you've followed celebrity news at all in the past few weeks, you may have heard that Ed's got his own problems. He broke his neck which seriously cut down on his employment availability and his own home is now being foreclosed upon. Maybe Ed isn't the right person to ask for help at the moment.

Wait, did you hear a doorbell?

And the search continues...

Husband and I did more house hunting last night - and there were some doozies. It's so interesting and almost voyeuristic to go into someone's home and open their closets, creep into their basements, and judge their abode and style of living. It seems, even though the housing market has taken a downturn and buyers are a precious commodity, some people put very little effort into giving their house any kind of customer appeal. For example, I was particularly interested in a white home in the Hedgewood Subdivision. It had everything we wanted: 3-bedrooms, 2-bathrooms, a basement, closer to work. While the pictures did indicate the house would need some new carpeting, kitchen flooring, and possibly a cover-up on some wood paneling, the house looked roomy, sophisticated, and comfortable.

Then we saw it in person.

Husband has noted a trend with the houses we've seen thus far - if the garage door is jacked up in any significant way, he doesn't end up liking the house itself. This garage door, up close, had chipped paint and a wonky basketball net attached that was not identifiable to me from the photograph. The carpeting and wood paneling was much worse than I'd envisioned (orange/brown fuzz - was the house's flooring growing mold? - with barn siding for walls). The exceedingly rustic "family room" was actually a converted porch - they even left the sliding glass door as a divider between this room and the kitchen! The rest of the house was more of the same, and when we stepped outside, we were greeted with a half-cocked baby swing with an extraordinarily large dog bone sitting in it. No, not a baby in the baby swing, a slobbery dog bone in the baby swing.

It was actually quite disturbing. And they wanted over $130,000. But was the dog bone baby swing included?!

We saw two houses that we would actually dare to live in, but one was a bit out of our price range (I will be keeping my eye on it!) and the other had a very dangerous driveway leading onto 9th Street, forcing the homeowner to back out into traffic. *Sighs*

So if you happen across a listing for a 3-bedroom, 2-bath house with a basement and cable access, let us know; we remain, essentially, homeless.

Stuff

I've been contemplating what to write about in a new post, and something that has been a running theme in the past week or so in my life is: STUFF. Recently, George Carlin passed away, and the radio station that we listen to in the mornings played one of his jokes to help remind everyone of the treasure that has been lost. His comedy was hilarious, yet startlingly true and simple. He spoke about all of the "stuff" that humans collect over a lifetime and how our entire lives are simply based on getting more "stuff" to pile in our stuff receptacles (i.e. houses). Many people, it seems, just can't get enough "stuff" to satisfy their happiness or justify their existence.

Meanwhile, my mother has finally decided, exasperated and concerned for my grandmother's sanity, that she will spend the remainder of this summer cleaning up the land surrounding my grandparents' home. Over his lifetime, my grandfather has accumulated an incomprehensible amount of "stuff" and the piles grow daily - only to sit forgotten, rotting and rusting, under a collapsing barn roof. He has so much "stuff" he can't even remember what he owns or where anything is located. The majority of the "stuff" has fallen into disrepair: cars that no longer run and are infested by mice, tractors that have rusted into one solid block of metal with trees growing through the crevices, lumber, tools, the list goes on and on. According to him, he'll get around to fixing it soon. He's 80-years-old. Not going to happen. For some reason, unknown also to myself, I have offered to help my mother clear out this "stuff," tote it to the nearest junk dealer, and eradicate the thigh-high grass and weeds that probably haven't been cut in decades. It's going to be a hoot.

Finally, Kyle and I have been diligently searching for a home in which to store and showcase all of our "stuff" - clothes, books, electronics, and wedding gifts currently spread between our two sets of parents' houses. Don't get me wrong, I'm excited about having a "stuff receptacle" of our very own, but I shudder to think how long it will take us to unpack, sort, and file away all of our "stuff," although I know that it will be done...someday. Then, I suppose, we will begin the accumulating process anew. *Sighs*

I know that some "stuff" is essential to life, but so many of us have such an abundance of "stuff" that everything feels like a necessity: the newest high-resolution television set, the best leather handbag to match an outfit, the most up-to-date car with just-released technology. I can't say I know exactly where I'm going with this post - perhaps I'm simply tired of thinking about all of the "stuff" clouding our lives and need a mental break. You take one too.

Houses, Houses Everywhere

It's a buyer's market. Everyone keeps repeating this as more and more houses come available with a smaller pool of buyers interested and able to take on 15-30 years worth of debt. My husband and I have been out looking at a variety of homes for the past several weeks, but have yet to find anything that meets all of our needs. We wouldn't mind flipping a place (aside from the fact that neither of us have any tangible - or imagined - home improvement skills). However, as we shuffle through subdivision after dying subdivision, I have noticed that all of the contemporary houses are low-quality and low-character.

"Stick built homes," as my mother would call them, at least 70-years-old, or older, have ample character, but we are wary of the wear-and-tear of time. One of the nicest homes we have seen thus far was built in 1897 and successfully flipped - with slate in the shower and stainless steel appliances - all of the conveniences of a modern home with the turn of the century charm still intact. However, the (nicely finished) basement ceiling barely cleared my husband's head and he thought the neighborhood appeared dubious. So we passed.

Perhaps my expectations are too high and my budget too low. Perhaps, instead of continuing the search for a new home, I should instead start my search for a second job (as my husband so kindly suggested I do when I complained about the cookie-cutter houses we were inspecting). I am still keeping my fingers crossed that we will run across a home that is comfortable, conveniently located, and meets all (or most!) of our needs. Maybe even one with just a little bit of character. Because, really, is that too much to ask?