Parental Opinions Count

Well, on Monday we went out again with D after a 3 week break from house hunting. We had really been hoping to hear something from the banks during that time so that we wouldn't have to make the decision whether or not to start looking at houses again, but since there has been no work from the listing agent on our offer after D has been trying to call him for 3 days, L and I decided that we should start looking again while we wait on our LYH. We saw three houses that day and walked away thinking that we had possibly found one that would get us to revoke our offer on the LYH, but that we needed to see them back to back. D is very accommodating, so he was able to set up a second showing of the new house and what I believe was now our 4th showing of the LYH for last night, and we were able to bring 3/4ths of our parental units along with us for additional opinions.

Both houses are very nice, and we could see ourselves living in either one, there is just so much more that the LYH has to offer to us, and after looking at them again (and finally being able to make it into the LYH's garage) we all agreed that the LYH is still the one and that we should continue to have patience and wait to hear what the bank has to say on our offer. While there are a lot of things that we liked better in the new house (i.e., better basement, 2nd bathroom, deck off the back), overall the LYH has more of what we want in a house, and L and I can see ourselves living in it for at least the next 10 years. It was a pretty good feeling when D had each of us put a number behind out back (1= LYH, 2= New House) for which house we preferred and every single one of us had picked the LYH as his or her favorite!

D thinks that we have about a 70% chance of getting a positive response from both banks (the seller has two mortgages) after our initial offer, and he said that he'll continue to bug them as much as possible, because for as long as it takes for Short Sale homes to go through, half of the time it's just paper work that sits on someone's desk until they get around to looking at and completing it.

Until then, L and I will continue to stalk the MLS listings in search for something we might like better than the LYH, but are going to continue to wish, hope, pray, etc. for a positive answer from the banks pretty soon!

Still Waiting

We still haven't heard anything about our offer. D had told us that we would hopefully get some sort of information from the listing agent, but no luck so far. If we don't hear anything by tomorrow evening, L and I have decided to continue our house hunting early next week just in case our offer isn't accepted by the bank and we aren't left with any other options. Who knows, maybe we'll find an even better house in the weeks to come (provided that we haven't heard about our offer on the Little Yellow House- I think I may start to refer to it as the LYH), and we'll pull our original offer off the table? While we knew that we were going to have as much patience as we can muster during this process, it's hard not to be getting antsy after two weeks of nothing.

Keep sending good vibes our way as we try to find our home!

Bookworm

Now, I've always been one to read through a ridiculously large stack of books in a fairly short period of time, but over this last year of grad school and working towards my Masters in Education, I haven't had as much time to read my "for fun" books. My life was full of textbooks and rereading novels and short stories to make sure I knew exactly what I was talking about as I taught them to my 9th graders. Since finishing my student teaching in June, I have more than made up for my lack of fun books, and last night was no exception. While this blog is intended for me to be able to look back on our first year of marriage and keep our friends and family updated on our house search, etc., I realize that reading is such a huge part of what L and I do together that it wouldn't be fair to me not to blog about the books I finish. Hopefully I can find some way to keep track of the books I've read since June on the side of this blog, and then I'll write about the ones that I feel deserve some attention.

P.S. While my veins weren't ripped apart during my first time giving blood, I did come out with a nasty bruise all down my forearm. Even though it was uncomfortable, giving blood is something that I can continue doing and feel good about!

The Big 2-3

I've finally caught up to L for the next month and a half, and am typing here at the ripe-old age of twenty-three. Glad to say that it doesn't feel much older than twenty-two, but then again, I've had nearly a year to get used to the idea of all of my friends being twenty-three that I'd basically convinced myself that I was the same age as everyone else.

Today, I was able to spend the morning sleeping in (same old, same old for the last couple weeks of near-unemployment), and then Z (my younger sister, who also happens to be a hobo-bum during the day until she starts up with Aveda in December, and is now conveniently living a whole five-minute drive away from L and me) and I went shopping at MOA, and while I went in with the full intention of spending too much money on a dress I won't wear often enough, I walked out with only spending $18 at Ragstock. I just couldn't justify spending the money while we're attempting to buy a house, even if it was my fun money. Maybe I was too overwhelmed today, and need to take a breath and try again tomorrow? I really want some canisters for the kitchen, so perhaps I'll go get some of those? I don't know; we'll see. When L got home, he gave me flowers, a loving card, and two DVDs that I had been wanting to add to my collection for awhile. Saturday, he's taking me out to a surprise restaurant for dinner before we meet up with friends at Gasthof's, and then at RenFest on Sunday, I get to pick something fun from there for my "real" present. Dinner with my parents at the Old Spaghetti Factory was as tasty as ever, and I enjoyed the numerous framed pictures from the wedding that my mom put together for me. She even started a scrapbook and made a photo slide show DVD with music with wedding pics.

Overall, the transition from twenty-two to twenty-three has been a smooth one, and I'm hoping the rest of this year goes as well as the last one!

Tomorrow, I'll be donating blood for the first time in my life with L and B... tune in next week to see if I made it out of the Memorial Blood Drive Center will all my veins intact!

Purchase Offer? Check!

Exciting news: We put in an offer on a house!

After Monday's excursion around East St. Paul, which included going from house to house, and finding ourselves in neighborhoods that we could never imagine letting our future children run around by themselves, we decided that the Hawthorne house is definitely the house for us. D took us to look at the Hawthorne first and then we proceeded to see about 6 more houses afterward, and still nothing compared to the feeling that we got in the cute yellow house. After sleeping on it overnight, and thousands of calories consumed at the Great MN get together, we decided to officially take the plunge and meet up with D to write up the purchase offer. We got there are about 7:30, and didn't leave until after 10pm (about 30 minutes of our time there included D's 6 and 3 year old sons showing us some of their favorite music videos and rocking out to them. According to D's wife, the 3 year old has got quite the crush on me!). In the end, we decided that we would offer $10,000 less than the asking price and for the seller to cover the closing costs. Since only L's name is going to be on the loan, I wasn't required to sign anything on the purchase offer, so I listened closely and made sure that L dotted his Is and crossed his Ts while signing his life away. One of the benefits of not having me on the loan is that if, for some reason, we ever had to foreclose on the house, my credit will still stay intact and we could walk away from it and still be able to buy a new house. Or if we were to ever get divorced, my name will still be on the deed and I would still get half- bwahaha.

Now that the offer has been put on the table, we just need to wait to hear back from the bank (the house is a short sale) to see if they accept. This whole process is going to require a lot of patience from us, and we need to be prepared that this might not work out in the end, but keep your fingers crossed for us!

While we are far from being homeowners, it felt really good to take this important step.