I haz…

New windows!!

This is such a huge deal to me. See we bought this house almost three years ago now. We had been trying to buy my sister-in-law’s house, which was newer. We lived there for two years, paying their mortgage and keeping up the house under an informal “rent-to-own” contract. Three years ago in July we were set to close, and the day before the closing they pulled out of the agreement to pay the down payment for us. Suddenly forced to come up with $3500 and fast we panicked, searched all over, had an appointment to meet with a place that gives lower income people down payment assistance. A few days before the appointment the very nice loan underwriter called us.

“I have to tell you something,” she said. “You need to know it, but I’m not supposed to tell you.”

“Okay.” I was scared at this point, who wouldn’t be when facing all the stress of a mortgage?

“The current owners of your residence owe significantly more on it than they are trying to sell it for and to buy it you have to take on the full debt, or they have to pay it down to the price they want to sell you the house for before the mortgage goes through.”

“How much more?”

“There’s more.”

I don’t remember being able to speak at that point. The house was obviously being yanked out from beneath us since the asking price was pretty much at the limit of what we knew we could afford (despite what other people said we could afford).

“The house is also currently in foreclosure.”

So for two years we paid on a house, kept it up, for close relatives, and to this day we 1) cannot say how much of the money we gave them actually got paid on the mortgage (my aunt who has managed rentals now and then in Vegas said that it took 5 to six months at least for them to just start the paperwork on a foreclosure, and my father was foreclosed on and it took them three years from when he defaulted to when he was evicted. 2) The relatives badmouth us behind our backs and blame us for them losing their house.

After what was quite possibly the most harrowing time in our lives (two kids, a dog, no car, and relatives who had just dicked us over threatening us because they still were trying to get us to buy the house and we couldn’t) we found a four bedroom two bath with a big yard right across from the school. By the skin of our teeth we bought it and moved in… and were promptly broke. We’d spent so much time and money on the other house, and on moving that financially and emotionally once it was ours we pretty much collapsed.

This house was built in 1900 and was last renovated in the late 80s some time. It’s not unlivable by far, but it does need work, a lot of little work and a few big things, like getting the roof redone. The walls are permanently dirty, there’s next to no insulation (common in old houses), the linoleum needs replacing and the carpet is stained, among other similar things.

But it was everything we wanted, hell it came with a basketball hoop in the backyard and dog house nicely sized for our dog. It had the garage Jason wanted, the yard space for a garden and the windows that I wanted (as an aside, Jason and I are both prone to bouts of depression which are reduced by our house having good sunlight and us having outdoor activity space). And it has character. I cannot picture myself any other place.

But we also didn’t have money to do anything about the condition of it either. So after almost three years we replaced two windows, which three years ago seemed absolutely impossible. One of the windows is 118 inches wide, so when I say “two windows” the actual space of those two windows is more like five windows.

We’ve reached a point when we want to do something with the house, or we need to fix a leaky faucet (speaking of which, we do) we actually can do it. Maybe not immediately, but paint, floors, faucets, and yes, even windows, are possible. And it feels so good.