So yeah, I am still here…

Just been a lot going on. Specifically, WE CLOSED ON A HOUSE!

The actual closing date was September 29, but as I put it elsewhere, it’d been in the works for a while. We have a pretty big family, but the rents for something like a 4-bedroom house were…out of the question, let’s just put it like that. So, Sabra’s best friend Mark and his husband built a house last year and he made it his mission to get us into a house also. Mark put us into contact with a friend of his who works at Gold Financial, and the process was on…

ZOMG. ALL THE DOCUMENTATION. Some of it I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able to get because of my work’s HR policies. And every time I thought I had gotten everything, they would come back and say, “we need this, this, and this.” I do understand why it’s that way, but to me that was probably the most exhausting part of it all.

That’s not to say finding a house itself wasn’t a real pain in the ass though. We looked at several houses in different parts of the city before making an offer on one back in March, on the city’s east side just off Roland Road & Rigsby Avenue…

…and then the house inspection came back. Foundation issues, wiring, and other stuff. It was so bad that the inspector offered to refund our money or hold it for another inspection. So, back to square one it was.

(Sucked too, because we could literally have WALKED to Whataburger from that house.)

So from there, stealing from Sabra:

Mark has a friend, Kimberly, who works for the city. She is administering a program with a certain local developer who is buying and renovating houses on the East Side. They had a house that needed to go to a low income family, the developer had no idea how to market it, but Mark had made sure everyone knew we were looking. So we got referred.
The developer was nice enough to take my input on the house. We bonded over the awesome tile in the bathrooms and the wood paneling in the family room. A LOT of work needed to be done–plumbing, wiring, roofing, etc. So it was a long wait. But it enabled Erik to build up some credit, and we worked with the city for down payment assistance.

So, to make a long story a little shorter:

We got all the docs, threw all the money, and signed all the papers, and we now have what might as well be a brand-freaking-new house tailor-made for us. And we got a screaming good deal on it in several different ways. I am so happy I could scream. Once upon a time I thought I’d be making $10 an hour and that we’d be renting until we croaked.

I am ever so thankful. God is good.

Now, back to your scheduled bitching commentary…