Well, we officially packed up our apartment on July 31, 2009, sticking all of our goods into 2 storage garages and left what had been our home for this past year behind.
Our scheduled close on the new house was August 10, 2009. Back in early July, when we decided to purchase a house, we approached our apartment complex (400+ units) management and asked to stay for the month of August. Unfortunately, they operate on leases, and wouldn’t accommodate us. Frustrating. Also funny, since there have been some other units vacant for a month or three at a time that they would turn away the cash. Just doesn’t seem like smart business to me. But then again, I think “smart” is dying out in the world – much like common sense not being all that common anymore.
So Melodia and I have mentally prepared ourselves over the last month that we would be homeless and house-hopping for a while as we wait to close on our house. Another issue is that New York is a notoriously slow closing state. We learned this when we moved here 4 years ago and bought our first home. In some states, they close in a week or two. NY is a minimum of 30 days but more like 45 days.
In fact, we went under contract July 10 and set a 30 day close for August 10. About 10 days later, the brother of a friend went under contract in Colorado, they closed yesterday – two weeks later – and moved into their house. Oh to hear the sound of jingling keys right now!
At any rate, the update on us is that our closing date of August 10th will not be made. If you’ve read our Facebook status updates, you’ve seen that the mortgage company’s underwriting has added some obligations on our end. This is all stuff that we believe we could have been told about upfront, but weren’t. Had we been, we could have scheduled it and had it done by now. But it’s the type of thing that takes a week to get someone out to do. So we’re just waiting for them to visit the site, write their report, turn it into us, so we can submit it to the underwriters. All of which will likely really push our closing, and our homelessness off an additional 10 days, doubling the time we’d thought we’d be out of a home.
The whole process has been quite frustrating and reminded us many times how annoying it all can be. Add to that the fact that NY has some of the highest property taxes in the nation. My parents pay less than $500/year on a property assessed at two – three times ours. We pay $2500-3500 here. In other words, we rent from the government to “own” our land for $250-350 per month. Now, as someone who’d love to live off the grid, there’s just no way to escape it all (death and taxes, right?).
So, we’ve been trying to practice some patience and allow God to work it all out. At some point, that’s all we can do. It’s tough waiting for it all to come together because we really want to move into the new place and get settled. Our kids have been very adaptable and enjoying their time, but it’s still not their bed, their toys, etc.
For the last week, we’ve been with our friends the Padd’s in Bemus Point, NY on their 27-acre farm. They have a 6 year-old-son, Zechariah, whom the kids love playing with. They also love running around outside. Today we caught a baby corn snake (about 5-6 inches long, sorry, no pics) and a couple of frogs. There’s always fun stuff to do out in the country. Our plan for the next week is to spend Friday and Saturday night with the Otto’s in Cowlesville, NY (about 12 minutes from our new home) and then Sunday night through Thursday night with the Morgan’s in Chaffee, NY. Also just about 15 minutes from the new house. After that (i.e., after the 15th), we’re not sure what we’ll be doing. Mostly, we’re just counting the days, praying things will move faster with the mortgage company and that we’ll close sooner.
That’s the latest. As I sit writing, my little fruit eaters are munching away. McKinley is chowing down a peach, and will is sharing the chair with me, eating a banana. These kids love fruit. Wil has discovered a love for peaches. Today he ate the whole thing, then sucked the pit dry in his mouth. I looked down and the peach was gone, I said, “where’d it go? Where’s the pit?” And Wil said, “in ry routh” then spit it out to show me. Melodia says that how she used to eat peaches, too.
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