Good news vs. Bad news

Good news: It was confirmed that I have a job here in CT. Yay!

Bad news: I hate my job. I still hate how they treated me, putting me in limbo for the past couple of weeks. And I still will be screwed out of the promotion. Needless to say, I will be trying to get another job.

Good news: My friend from law school has a semi-law job that he is leaving in mid-August. I will be giving him my resume, writing samples, etc. and hopefully I can move to that job with his recommendation.

Bad news: I have to be careful as to when I start the new job as I can’t leave my current job until we close on a house.

Good news: Our two favorite houses from this last weekend are still on the market.

Bad news: The four houses that we visited last night were not added to our favorites list.

Good news: We have made a decision between our two favorite houses. We asked for advice from our parents, our realtor and our lender in trying to make a decision. We literally changed our minds daily as we truly would be happy in either place. There is a price difference of $73K between the two places and even with a 30 year mortgage, that is still a bunch of money a month.

· House A (the less expensive house): Smaller square footage. Updated kitchen. Three bedrooms, one and half bathrooms. No family room/den, just a living room. Finished basement. Windows are as old as the house (60+ yrs), so we would need to install energy efficient windows. Older roof. Oil heating. Great backyard for kids, the dog AND a large garden. Cute neighborhood and within walking distance of both the elementary school and the middle school.
· House B (the more expensive house): More square footage. Updated kitchen. Three bedrooms, two and half bathrooms (no master bathroom, just a full bath downstairs in the basement???). Large family room/den with a beautiful fireplace. Finished basement. New windows, roof and furnace. Natural gas heating. Backyard is okay, but too shady for a garden. Nice neighborhood.

Most of the advice we received was to go with the bigger/more expensive house. We will probably grow out of the smaller house in 5-7 years and have to move again or put an addition on the house.

After dismissing the other houses in our price range, CP and I took a drive through the two different neighborhoods around 6:30pm. In the more expensive house’s neighborhood, it was quiet. No one walking around or outside. In the less expensive house’s neighborhood there were people walking with their kids, people walking dogs, neighbors crossing the street to talk to other neighbors and even a sign for an upcoming block party. The short drive through the neighborhoods was what sold it for us. We WANT a neighborhood. We don’t want to be closed off from our neighbors. Neither house was perfect, so we are going with the better neighborhood and the lower mortgage.

Bad news: So while it is great that we finally made a decision and we are excited about it, there is a potential snag. The less expensive house has a Hubbard clause on it. Meaning that the sellers already have a buyer, but the buyers need to have a contract on their current place before a closing date can be set. The clause allows the sellers to continue to market the property (they just dropped the price another $10K last week) which is how we were able to see it. So when we put an offer in, the buyers can try to get a contract on their current house within the offer timeframe (which I think is usually 3 days?) OR try to get extra financing in order to get two mortgages. My money is on the buyers not being able to obtain financing for a second mortgage- especially in today’s credit climate. However, maybe they have received an offer on their other house recently?

My stomach is tightening up just thinking about not getting the house. I know that I SAY that we would be fine in either house, but after seeing people out and about on a random Tuesday night I’m getting all excited about the smaller house.

Stay tuned!