Ashley T's Blog

1 down, 2 to go

Ashley T — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 14:30:00 GMT

I just got a call from our mortgage broker.... our financing is approved and we got a great rate! I was scared because the type of mortgage we were applying for usually adds a couple of points to make up for the 0% down. Well, that didn't happen!!! Yay! I hope we can lock in for a while at this rate because it's really good.

She said she was sending me the paperwork while we were on the phone, but I still haven't received it. I just called her and left a voicemail with my work email so that I'll know right away when the email arrives, but I'm still waiting. Grrrr. I just want to look at the fine print, the term, the payment details etc.

So that's 1 of our 3 conditions met. We have the home inspection tonight (condition # 2) and then I have to call the insurance broker to make sure we can get good home insurance (condition # 3). Once those things are done, we can firm up our sale and then we just have to wait until closing. I hope that the home inspection goes well and that he doesn't find a lot of big problems.

I'm feeling better about the whole thing now. I'm still really nervous, but not in such a negative way as before. It's now starting to become an excited nervous. However, I will be happy when all of this is OVER! It's the most stressful thing I have ever been through.

I'm going to be a homeowner

Ashley T — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 15:39:00 GMT

They officially accepted our offer yesterday. We went in last night to sign-off and give the deposit ($1000 gone already). We now have 5 days to get our financing and insurance solidified as well as have an acceptable home inspection. This is proving to be a frustrating process, so I will be happy one way or the other when these 5 days are over. If any of that doesn't work out to our benefit, we can walk away... the cool part is, they can't! I'm still freaking out but it's getting a little bit better. What I can tell you 100% for sure that I am ready to be done dealing with our real-estate agent. I really liked her in the beginning but there's just something about her now that drives me crazy. I shouldn't be that way because she kicked in $1000 towards our house (off of her commission) because we wouldn't go any higher and the seller wouldn't come any lower. She didn't have to do this so it was really nice of her to do just because she "really wanted us to get this great house" (right- I know the real-estate game) but I still have a sour taste in my mouth about her for some reason. DH thinks I'm nuts and likes her, but my intuition says there is just something. I won't be recommending her to anyone... but I wouldn't say not to use her either. I'll just keep quiet about her.

After we signed the paperwork, we went for our anniversary dinner at The Keg. We were going to go somewhere fancy pants, but we love The Keg so that's where we ened up. I thought I wasn't hungry (still feeling nauseous over this house decision) but man did I eat once we got there!! I had 2 pieces of bread, half a ceasar salad (we shared), the insides of a baked potatoe with butter and salt (I couldn't eat the skin) and steak with Chipotle sauce, herbed cream cheese and onions!! DH said "hmmmm... you did ok for someone who wasn't hungry when we got here". I wanted dessert too, but knew that I shouldn't. Dinner made me feel better because we talked about what we were most excited about with the house. DH is excited about the garage (why I'm not sure because he's not one of THOSE guys) and the yard. I'm excited about having a library/office, the yard, the fireplace/mantle and about having a dishwasher!!!!! We're both most excited to get out of his mom's house. 2 months have been more than enough. It will be 3 by the time closing comes. We miss our little apartment desperately.

So.... I'm feeling ok today, just trying to get appointments made for mortgage, inspection etc. It's frustrating, but it's keeping me busy. If all goes through we close on our first house on Sept. 26. Fingers crossed that everything works out!

I have the greatest husband ever!

Ashley T — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 16:42:00 GMT

I just got a dozen beautiful antique roses delivered to me at work. The card is for an anniversary (which we are celebrating our 2nd today) but DH added "everything WILL work out fine. I love you baby."

He knows how stressed I am about the house and I know he hates it when I'm feeling like this because he never knows what to say or how to fix it.

This is perfect. I feel better already.

Rollercoaster Baby Baby!

Ashley T — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 12:43:00 GMT

No, I'm not having a baby :) I see how the title could be misleading.

Last night we got a verbal acceptance on our offer for the house. Their lowest was 2k more than the absolute highest we wanted to spend. Our agent and their agent made up the difference. I am on such a rollercoaster of emotions right now. I'm super excited one minute and totally panicking the next minute. I also go back and forth between thinking what a great deal it is for the lot, house condition, area etc. and then thinking we should have held out longer because eventually the would have had to come down more (but we were afraid to lose it and they were really sticking to their guns). However, we still have to get their signed acceptance and then we have 5 days to get a home inspection and firm up our financing. If either of those things are unacceptable to us, we can walk away from the deal. I think that is the only thing keeping me totally sane now is that we're not necessarily stuck in this if we find something we don't like. It's just really hard to deal with being literally at the very tip top of your price range.

We went over our budget again and again last night. Paying the bills shouldn't be an issue, it will just means there won't be a whole lot left over for a while. We just know that this house is a really good buy and will get better resale than any of the others we looked at but I'm still freaking out.

We've wanted to buy since a year before the wedding and now that it's actually happening I'm unsure about it. I called my mom this morning (who has been super excited for us over this whole process) and told her they had verbally accepted and all she said was "oh... interesting. Well, good!". This did not instill a lot of confidence in me and our decision. Especially since this was coming from my mom who is alway super supportive.

All this and it's our 2nd Anniversary today. I wish I could just be 100% happy about it, because it's a pretty awesome anniversary gift to give eachother. But, I'm just too nervous to be happy.

DH left me a card on the bed side table this morning... it said something to the effect of "Someday we'll look back on this crazy time in our life and wonder how we did it. But we'll know that if we had to do it over again, we wouldn't change a thing because we can do it together". It's so appropiate for what's going on right now and it made me smile. I just wish I didn't feel so nauseous.

I guess I better go and get ready for a crazy few weeks.

Holy crap... is this what it's supposed to feel like?

Ashley T — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 13:47:00 GMT

On Saturday we found the perfect house. Good size, huge yard for being in town, all the specs we wanted, awesome area, decorated nicely etc. However, it's about 10k above the max we are willing (and able) to spend and it's going to need a new roof in the next couple of years. But, we instantly fell in love with this house. It's the only one I have walked into and said "yes... this is it." It's also the only one that I don't really have any complaints about or that I see us living in long-term. All the other properties are either not in a great location or there is something rather major I don't like about them so I find myself saying "it's ok... we can make it work for a few years". With this one, we were saying "I want to live there and it could be long-term".

Here's what we considered when talking price for our first offer

-The house is 18 years old and therefore, although they look like they are in great condition now, windows are going to have to start being replaced and the furnace is original so we have to think about that too.

-These people didn't landscape. It's not totally horrible, but the yard needs to be cut, weeded, trimmed, edged, seeded and the back yard will probably need a couple of loads of earth to make it level.

-It will need shingle, probably within the next year

-Pricing of similar housing sold in the last 3 months

We put an offer in yesterday at about 12k below asking. We knew the wouldn't accept it, but we wanted to get the ball rolling to negotiate. They responding with an counter-offer later last night of 1K below asking! Our agent said there is a lot of interest in the house and therefore they aren't budging much on their asking price yet because they want to see what other offers they get.

I was so excited to get the offer in yesterday, but once we were in the process of drafting it etc. I started to panic. I kept thinking that it was out of our price range and we were really going to struggle, that we probably can't buy any house, never mind this one and that I am nuts to be doing this. I kept thinking of ways to get out of it and was relieved when we added the conditional on inspection clause thinking "that's it, that's our out". Everyone keeps saying, its worth the extra money if you love it and see yourself there long-term. "You don't want to lose it for the sake of a couple grand". But what if we can't afford the extra money? PANIC PANIC PANIC We also had to sign a bunch of other paperwork with our agent that I am now thinking we were stupid to sign without asking more questions... but that's a whole other story.

I immediately got a headache and felt extremely nauseous and instead of going to the bbq for my BIL's b-day, I went home and tried to sleep. On the way, I ran over a snake on a back country road and in the rear-view mirror I saw it coil up and then flail into the air in pain and it totally gave me the creeps. I literally shivered. P.S. I'm absolutely 100% terrified of snakes. When I got home I cried and panicked some more and I didn't know what to do. When the seller responded to our offer, I was disappointed (by the low amount they were willling to drop) and relieved at the same time. Everyone says this is a normal way of feeling once you've put in a offer on a house, but I don't like it. I never want to feel like this again. I called Brad and he wanted to respond right away with our own counter-offer, but I told him I needed to sleep on it. He agreed that was ok since they hadn't received any other offers yet. I fought a headache all night and had to force myself to eat. I fell asleep surprisingly easily. I woke up this morning at 5am and took Brad to work. Then I came back home and tried to go back to sleep for a couple hours but my mind was running overtime. I don't know what to do. We have to respond soon and all Brad can say is "what are we going to do?" or "have you decided if/how we're going to respond yet?". I'm gonna punch him pretty soon. Does he have any idea the kind of pressure that puts me under? He's half of this too and I need his input. It pisses me off more than I can explain and it's only getting worse.

Oh, on that note, tomorrow is our 2nd anniversary. Hopefully it's a happy one but with the way I feel right now, I don't know how I'll be able to pull off a romantic dinner when I feel like I could vomit at any second and am furious with the person sitting across from me. I'll guess we'll see how the rest of today day plays out.

This sucks.

A little soul searching...

Ashley T — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 17:32:00 GMT

1. Name 3 things in your life that you can't live without.

2. Name 3 things in your life that you wish you could change/eliminate.

3. What's your favorite ficitonal love story of all time (movie, tv, book)?

4. Complete this sentence: "I'd die a happy person if..."

5. Complete this sentence: "My biggest goal in life is..."

6. What is your favorite thing that you do just for you?

7. Do you have a secret guilty pleasure.

:) Have fun!

YAY! The ball is rolling!

Ashley T — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 13:34:00 GMT

We met with a broker yesterday and got our questions answered and got a preapproval done. We we preapproved for 50k more than we thought we would be, but we won't be spending that much. We're going to stick with our original budget unless we find a property that has a basement apartment (or similar) and therefore is an income property. Then we can spend a little bit more.

It was such a relieft to have a solid preapproval so we know for sure what we can spend. It's also a relieft to have our questions answered, but of course, as soon as we left, I thought of about 20 more questions. I think I am still going to talk with one more broker and see what the differences are, but I was happy with the guy we talked to yesterday. My mum and uncle both have mortgage with him and are confident about him and his company, so that makes me feel good about it.

We're going to go to lots of open houses this weekend and try to get in to two different properties that we have our eyes on. I'm so excited now and feeling much more confident about the whole process. Still... I can't wait until it's over and we're getting the keys for our first house! :)

Have a great weekend everyone!!!

p.s. I'm loving looking at all your facebook profiles... it will keep me busy today!

Now we're getting somewhere!

Ashley T — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 12:48:00 GMT

We FINALLY have an appointment to actually go and see a human being about a mortgage this afternoon. I have to leave work early, but my boss is cool with it. She knows we've been having trouble with this so when I said I could come back when I was done if necessary to make-up the time she just told me not to worry about it and to do what I need to. I'm excited that the ball is finally rolling, but I'm nervous too. What if they won't give us a mortgage? Then what? I've only be at MIL's for two months and I'm going nuts... I need privacy and space and I need DH to myself! I can't stay there long-term. I shouldn't borrow trouble. We'll cross that bridge if we come to it.

It's time to start looking for a second job too. I told myself I would pick up a part time gig (which is easy to do because my full-time gig is monday-friday 8-430 and doesn't change) this fall for the winter. Just to get ahead of some credit card debt and help out for the first couple of months we're in a house. It's not fun, but I've done it before and the extra cash is really nice. I'm actually kind-of looking forward to it. I hope I find something cool... like at a book store or something! hmmm... maybe I better not, because I might spend everything I make before I make it home! :)

I'm so excited... I have a good feeling about this afternoon. I hope I can go in and ask intelligent questions so we can make an informed decision about the biggest purchase we'll ever make! Wish me luck!