So, the house thing. God, where do I start? Ok, I mentioned this earlier, but basically, our down payment is coming from the UK. Dave, his mom and his brother own a couple of vacation cottages in Scotland. They’re taking out a business loan against the value of the properties, and our portion of that loan will be our down payment. Which is awesome, because when it’s all said and done, we’ll own a house here in North Carolina, plus we’ll be part owners of a couple of vacation cottages in Scotland.

Speaking of the cottages in Scotland, want to see them? Here’s one and here’s the other. I know, the view is totally hideous, right? Gah. I can’t wait to go visit there, but someone *cough*Dave*cough* needs to get his passport renewed before we can go anywhere.

So, yeah. The loan. It seems that the bureaucracy involved in getting a loan is just as tedious in the UK as it is here. So there’s a couple of little things that need to be done before the loan funds can be released, but those little things are expected to take at least two to four weeks. Why? I really couldn’t say.

Meanwhile, our closing date was supposed to be on July 21st. As in six days from now. Obviously that won’t be happening. The sellers have agreed to an extension, but if we don’t have the money by August 31st, they can walk from the deal. Hopefully it won’t come to that, we should have our loan money long before that date.

BUT. Our lease expires on July 31st. So what happens if we don’t have our loan funds by then? There are a few possible scenarios:

1. The sellers could let us go ahead and move into the house and rent it for the month of August. That was our hope, and it would’ve been ideal, as it would’ve meant that we only had to move once. But they said no – I’m not really sure why, I think they’re just being overly cautious about any potential risk for them. (Or it could be the way our realtor called it, which was, “They’re just being turds.” I love her.)

2. We could extend our lease by a month on this house (or even just a couple of weeks), which would give us enough time to secure our funds, close, and move. Again, that would be mean that we only have to move once, so yay, right? I called our landlady to ask for an extension. She said that while nobody has rented this place yet, “if somebody wants the house, I gotta give ’em the house.” Um, thanks for the loyalty to your current tenants, bitch.

The thing is, I totally get her reasoning: in this type of neighborhood, most likely the new tenants will be a family with kids, and they’ll want to move in August so they’ll be in the district before the school year starts. So she’s worried that if she extends the lease for us, it might cause her to lose a potential new tenant. But does she have to be so rude about it? Everything is such a headache with that woman.

Anyway, we won’t know whether or not we can stay here until a couple of days before our lease expires. And since I’m a chronic planner, the idea of putting it off that long (and then possibly having to scramble to find movers at the last minute, which will be impossible at the end of the month) makes my stomach cramp with anxiety.

3. We move out on July 31st, load all of our stuff up into PODs, board the cats, and find temporary housing. Maybe we shack up with Cat and Tony, maybe we find a short-term furnished apartment or an extended-stay hotel. This is seriously the least desirable outcome for me, since it means two moving days rather than one, plus dealing with the aftermath of a seriously stressed-out toddler. Catie doesn’t do well sleeping in new places, and the transition to a new house was going to be bad enough. But if we’re staying someplace for a couple of weeks and then moving to the new house? God. She’s going to be sleeping in our bed every night until her 3rd birthday. Ugh.

So yeah, I’m stressed. And I’m pretty horrible when I’m like this, I feel so irritable and mad all the time, and I’ve been snapping at both Dave and Catie. (Twice now I’ve yelled at Catie to just be quiet when all she wanted was my attention. And I made her cry. Mommy FAIL.) I just don’t know what to do, and not having a solid plan in place makes me feel like I’m going crazy. I hate it. But I continue to pack boxes anyway, because what else can I do?