Yesterday, our realtor friend came over to give us the report that she’d done on our house – market analysis, comparing our house to others nearby that have sold, and a whole slew of other information. And oh hey, did you know that we’re currently in a housing market slump? Did you know that it’s mentioned on like every frigging news report? Yeah. Well, the upshot is that with the price she thinks we could get for our house, we’d have enough money left over (after closing costs, realtor fees, etc.) to pay for our move, but that’s about it. We won’t have squat to use as a down payment on a new house.
I’m trying to look at this from a glass half-full perspective. I could easily turn into the Witchy Wife and blame Dave for this, because if he had let me sell the house when I wanted to, before the market crapped out, we probably would’ve gotten a lot more money for this place. But if we had done that, we would’ve ended up buying a house in a different part of Seattle, because that was before we knew about the option to move to North Carolina. And honestly, even if we do have to finance 100% of the mortgage on our next place, it’ll still be a heck of a lot cheaper than what we’re paying for our house right now. So, you know, que sera sera. I’m putting my faith in the idea that we’ll end up where we’re supposed to be, when we’re supposed to be there.
The part that I’m freaking about is that Dave casually mentioned to Renee (our realtor friend) that he wants to get our house on the market “by the end of February.” What-what-WHAT??? So now I’m bouncing back and forth between:
a. “Yay! He’s on board with moving! Let’s strike while the iron is hot and get the H-E-double-hockey-sticks outta here!”
and
b. “Wait, does he have any idea how much work we have to do before we can sell this place? February is a short month, there’s no way it’ll be ready in time! PANIC!!!”
My brain sort of went into hyper-spin trying to think of all the dozens of little things that we have to do before we can move, and I started to seriously wig out. I ended up creating a Word document where I listed out all of my to-do tasks, and I saved it as “Feb08 Freak Out.” It helped to have it all written down so I could relax, go to sleep, and know that I wouldn’t magically forget anything important overnight. (Hey, it’s happened before.) And if it’s saved on my computer, it’s safer than being written on a sheet of paper which could disappear to lord-knows-where at any time.
So far, I’ve left messages for three different contractors for three different projects, and I have four people scheduled to come here to give me estimates on various other home improvement-y and/or move-y things. So it’s definitely coming along, which is good.
But if at some point in the next month or so, you hear a faraway-sounding high-pitched squeal followed by a popping noise, that very well might be my head exploding. Just so you know.
I feel your pain, no really. We are thinking about renting out our place in San Diego. You know, the one that has been on the market since, gosh, June. Yep, housing slump. At least you can get something close to what you need. Someone sold a house around the corner from ours for 200K less than we paid. Yep, finding a renter looks really good. Might be a thought for you as well.. Good luck in any case!
Or maybe end of March…
Wow! Crazy! So y’all are definitely North Carolina-bound?
It looks that way, yeah. We’re both pretty sold on the idea. Unless we get there and decide that we hate it (unlikely), in which case we’ll have to come up with some sort of Plan B. But I think we’re definitely ready to move out of Washington.
HOORAY! Oops- I mean– FREEEAK OUT! (and hooray! since I’m on the NC end of things). Middle or end of March is probably a good target. That way, even if you get an offer right away (also unlikely), you can close in May when your penatly period is over and you’ll still have a little time to get those contractors’ hammers swinging. Still, I do not envy you at all. I hate hate hate moving and try to do it as infrequently as possible.
when i saw this post’s title, i thought it was going to be about wig-shopping! so for those who are interested, we found mama a pretty little wig that basically looks like her normal hair last weekend — so she’ll be all set for chemo (which starts tomorrow).
and re: end of feb or march — either one! i’m with cat — hooray! get that baby on over here to the east coast!
umm, actually that was T on the last post. . . i think maybe cindy used my computer for blogging, so now i’m showing up as cindy w?? not sure how to fix this!!
I fixed it on my end – check your email and I’ll tell you how to fix it on yours.
The word on the street is that sellers shouldn’t mess around too much with fixing their places up for sale. You won’t get any of the money back. I think it was an article in the Seattle Times that pointed this out, actually. Just clean it fairly well and take care of the important stuff.
Maybe when you show the house you should bake two pies instead of just one. Double the pleasant pie smell, double the interest?
Carl: nice idea, but there are things (like our deck) that won’t pass inspection, so we sort of have to get those fixed. And sadly, the cleaning is probably the biggest job of all.