To Build or Not To Build

Shakespeare's version was a bit more profound, but I am sure he never wrestled with such a complex issue as this!  :)

As you know, when we first moved here, my husband snatched a house out of the hands of another potential buyer before I could even see it and give my approval. 

Daring, right?

Finding a decent house for a decent price in this small town had proved difficult, but we were not ready to commit to building until we had saved some money and figured out what we were doing.

So, we lived in the house for 2 years until the timing was better for making another move.  We originally put the house on the market ourselves in November.  Well, let me rephrase that.  My husband put the house on the market while he was home "sick" and I was at work one day. 

Again daring, right?

We were hoping to catch a first-time home buyer that was looking for a good little house for a good deal, especially with the new buyer incentives being offered.  We had nary a nibble until January when we had 3 people look at it within a 3-day period.  Nothing.  My husband was getting antsy to get it sold and move forward on our potential plans, but no sell meant no plans so he called in an agent. 

I hate wasting money.

Luckily, our agent worked in the same office as one of the top agents in town.  She had us a buyer within 2 weeks. 

And we were left shocked.  We were not prepared for that! 

So, our life went into overdrive.  Gathering boxes, packing, figuring out what needed to go with us and what needed to stay in boxes, the garage sale, managing our everyday normal life activities while living in chaos. 

I might have been a little overwhelmed and stressed.

A little.

Maybe.

Maybe a lot!

We completed the transaction the last full week of March but she did not take possession until March 31st so we could have time to move and clean.

And it almost went through without a hitch.

We set the movers for the last Saturday of March.  And I set myself and the kids for an out-of-town trip that weekend to go see family.  And be out of the way.  I actually needed to be home, but my brother and his family were in from out of state and I had not seen them in a few years so we needed to be there more. 

I took care of transferring all of our services so my husband could move our stuff in and manage the two houses before I returned on Sunday.  We had located a small rental house that would do while we were building a house.

Unfortunately, we had miscommunication with the electric company.  You know the truth is that they messed up but they won't admit that!  My husband had no electricity at the new house until Saturday morning before the movers were set to load our stuff up.  The plot began thickening on Friday afternoon when my husband discovered that the property had not been cleaned before we were to move in.  He was willing do it himself, but no electricity made that job difficult.  He cleaned as much as he could sans electricity and hoped to be able to vacuum the carpets the next morning.  Luckily, his buddy arrived early the next day and he cleaned the carpet while my husband met the movers over at our house.

I am going to use the term "clean" loosely because the "clean" version was far below my acceptable standard of living.  Not to their fault, they had tried to get it clean.  It was just way dirtier than I had hoped.  It needed Merry Maids to come clean for about 3 days, but we were out of luck there.  With the house as clean as the boys could manage, stuff got moved in.

In lieu of the intensity of the problems with our move-in, our landlord lowered our May rent by $200 and offered to have new carpet installed.

Both wonderful concepts!

Lower rent is great.  The time and energy it took to clean (and not even clean it as much as it really needs) was not great.  New carpet (and tile in the bathrooms) is great.  The week-long process of living in limbo, moving furniture around each night, and having our family out of sorts for a week was not great.

The gentleman that does her carpet/tile work for her was really great.  He came everyday after work and worked for 4-5 hours to get the job done.  It looks great and I feel so much better about walking around AND allowing my children, especially the baby, to be in the house.

But I will be honest.  That entire week was incredibly stressful and basically stunk.  That is putting it nicely!

Moving on.....

We start construction on a new house today, in hopes of moving that bus by the end of July.

I have more to say about that, but need to save it for another day.

Stacey