Thursday: Home

Thursday

After turning in our Young Person cards long ago, Tim & I decided it was time to buy a house. Mainly, we decided before Rain was born that we wanted to buy a house when she was a year old. At one point we thought we might buy a home when I was pregnant, but that ridiculous idea was quickly tabled. I'm glad we didn't, now that I know all the work that's involved.

The home-buying process is filled with procedures, forms, and protocol--none of which was covered in school (but, hey, as long as we memorized the Pythagorean Theorem, it's all good). If you have loads of money, the process is simple, because no doubt you hardly care if you're ripped off. We, however, researched and researched as much as we could about homes, and we still feel like we are at the mercy of those that play the game every day (realtors, inspectors, contractors, and the like).

Thankfully, we've met our share of good guys. Alas, we've also encountered slick salesmen at every turn.

Home security system salesman (clearly reading from script): "You know, 16 million Americans dealt with a home break-in last year."

Me: "Actually, I was asking if you guys offer a guarantee of some sort. I mean, if we use your system & our house gets broken into & you don't send out police or follow-up, what kind of compensation will there be? Do you guarantee your work?"

Salesman: "Well, the study I have here that was released just last week shows that 16 million Americans ..."

Anyway, so we researched every company/person we hired before we contacted them. Honestly, as psycho as it sounds, we were able to tell some people more about the service they were offering than they were. We were on top of stuff. Our realtor (good guy, very professional ... www.daviddevries.com), I think, was surprised by our stay-on-it attitude.

We made sure the home inspector was ASHI certified, that our realtor came highly recommended, and loan provider had a great rate with no fees. Yep, all that research, planning, and punctuality ... and yet ...

Out of all the things we could possibly have let slip through the cracks, well, there was one thing. One LARGE thing. Like thousands of dollars thing. For whatever reason, we had forgotten to transfer money from our savings account (not in a local bank) to our checking account. This transaction takes several days, and on Tuesday night we realized, "Hey, we're closing at noon on Thursday, and we have no money."

Thus began a mad dash for cash. This wasn't like, "Hey, Ma, can I borrow fifty bucks?" it was like, "So ... anybody have 7 grand they're not using today?" After exasperating all our resources, we realized we simply had to bite the bullet and borrow from family members. To the credit (no pun intended) of my family, they came through. Thanks, guys, for covering us in our serious oversight.

It happened that on Thursday morning the money we needed had transferred to our account in time (in record time, in fact) after all, so we didn't have to trouble others further. We beat ourselves up over the whole thing, until we talked to our realtor (25+ years of experience). After explaining to him the disaster we had avoided, he shrugged & said, "You guys wouldn't have been the first."