We bought a house in Mérida, take 2
After the flurry of offers there was a brief time of relative calm. Angie and I would be taking a road trip in the U.S. for a week in mid-June, 2017. That meant my house hunting would take a back seat. A little time at night in the motels gave me a chance to peek every once in awhile.
During our trip a new house came on the market. I'm going to call it Green House. Half a block away from Santiago Park. It was a tad bit shorter than I would have liked but, again, I was positive we could make it work.
When we got home after the trip I did the usual layout of the house using our yard. Drew it up on Illustrator and did some other comparisons. Another thing I usually do that I forgot to mention is I took a Google Street View tour of the neighborhood. See what's around. Any noisy auto repair stations or bars? No? Then we're good.
It seemed like it would work out well. And the price was already pretty fair and affordable.
I contacted Isaac and he checked it out for us and agreed with my general assessment.
While I was still thinking about making an offer on Green House, Isaac emailed me and said the owner of Blue House was willing to accept my second offer, if I was still willing.
Blue House was more expensive than Green House, by quite a bit, even at my lowest offer. Granted, Blue House was a bit larger and a little better situated in my desired zone. But Green House seemed more than acceptable, considering its much cheaper price and proximity to Santiago. That lower price would let us build sooner and give us more room for any "fancy" options we might want.
I told Isaac that, since I had Green House as an option, I was only willing to go with my initial lower offer for Blue House right now. Because, otherwise, I'd make an offer on Green House.
Blue House wasn't prepared to come down that far, so an offer on Green House it was.
We didn't undercut the price on Green House much. I thought the price was fairly reasonable so I offered what I assumed they would counter and we'd meet in the middle.
They did counter, but not much more, and so I accepted right away. We had bought a house, again.
I tried not to get too excited, waiting for that other shoe to drop.
But everything was running smoothly. Isaac got everything ready with the lawyers. Paperwork was being drawn up for the trust and I sent my pertinent info. Days passed and everything was on track. I finally started letting myself get a little excited.
I downloaded a floorplan app on my iPad and started designing. I mean, ultimately, a professional would be doing the real designing, but what the hell, might as well start dreaming.
We even started trying to come up with clever names for the house. I was still a little nervous about the size, especially not knowing if we'd get permits that would allow us to demolish certain parts of the old house in order to expand it. Or if I could bring myself to even demolish those sections. I mean, the house was not an old one from what I could tell. Maybe built in the 1950s? Whether that made a difference, I don't know. But again that would be up to an architect. They know better than me.
More days passed and then that other dangling shoe dropped.
Angie was laid off from her job in a round of employee cuts.
Now, we had money saved, and no debt, and the loan probably wouldn't be something outrageous I couldn't afford on my paycheck alone. But Angie was understandably nervous.
We've always been people who were averse to debt. With both of us having good jobs, this is something we would have paid off in short order. But now things were more uncertain. It might take me longer to pay off. Sure, Angie will find another job, but will it pay the same? She's a graphic designer and those jobs are harder and harder to find around here. Would she still be comfortable if she took a lower paying job?
I told Isaac, as I tried to stay positive, and asked if we could have the weekend to discuss it. He said absolutely that wasn't a problem.
Angie and I talked about it over the weekend. And yeah, we could probably still afford it, but Angie was having a hard time dealing with being laid off and I didn't feel like it was fair to add in the pressure of buying a house right now on top of her job search.
On the following Monday I told Isaac that, embarrassingly, we'd have to back out. Apologies to the sellers and please let me know what I owed to him and the lawyers for the contracts and other paperwork that was already drawn up.
I was defeated again and felt horrible and lost.
Isaac told me he talked to the lawyers and nobody was going to charge me any fees, which was very kind of them, but I almost wished they had, because then I felt even worse. I hate wasting people's time.
Again I fell into a depression, almost deeper this time than with Blue House. We thought we had bought Blue House for all of an afternoon. We thought we had bought Green House for almost a week.
And what was worse was that I couldn't show it or express it. I had to try to be cheerful and positive so that Angie wouldn't feel bad about it. So she wouldn't feel like it was her fault, because it wasn't. I just wanted her to focus on finding an awesome new job she could be happy with and let her grieve over the sudden loss of the job and people she had enjoyed being around for the last 15 years.
And that became the impetus for this blog. I needed a place to talk and let things go, and since I couldn't talk to Angie about it in unfiltered terms, I came here. Even talking to myself through this blog is better than holding it in.
I told Angie that Green House wasn't the right house anyways. That I wasn't sure we could make it the perfect place we wanted. So, it was all for the best.
And I tried convincing myself of that, too. Sometimes I even believe it, maybe this is for the best.
This is the 15th post in the blog, and the last one that is historical in nature. You're all caught up with me now. What happens after this, even I don't know anymore. I am no less determined than I was before, though. And I still think my future awaits in Mérida.
During our trip a new house came on the market. I'm going to call it Green House. Half a block away from Santiago Park. It was a tad bit shorter than I would have liked but, again, I was positive we could make it work.
When we got home after the trip I did the usual layout of the house using our yard. Drew it up on Illustrator and did some other comparisons. Another thing I usually do that I forgot to mention is I took a Google Street View tour of the neighborhood. See what's around. Any noisy auto repair stations or bars? No? Then we're good.
It seemed like it would work out well. And the price was already pretty fair and affordable.
I contacted Isaac and he checked it out for us and agreed with my general assessment.
While I was still thinking about making an offer on Green House, Isaac emailed me and said the owner of Blue House was willing to accept my second offer, if I was still willing.
Blue House was more expensive than Green House, by quite a bit, even at my lowest offer. Granted, Blue House was a bit larger and a little better situated in my desired zone. But Green House seemed more than acceptable, considering its much cheaper price and proximity to Santiago. That lower price would let us build sooner and give us more room for any "fancy" options we might want.
I told Isaac that, since I had Green House as an option, I was only willing to go with my initial lower offer for Blue House right now. Because, otherwise, I'd make an offer on Green House.
Blue House wasn't prepared to come down that far, so an offer on Green House it was.
We didn't undercut the price on Green House much. I thought the price was fairly reasonable so I offered what I assumed they would counter and we'd meet in the middle.
They did counter, but not much more, and so I accepted right away. We had bought a house, again.
I tried not to get too excited, waiting for that other shoe to drop.
But everything was running smoothly. Isaac got everything ready with the lawyers. Paperwork was being drawn up for the trust and I sent my pertinent info. Days passed and everything was on track. I finally started letting myself get a little excited.
I downloaded a floorplan app on my iPad and started designing. I mean, ultimately, a professional would be doing the real designing, but what the hell, might as well start dreaming.
We even started trying to come up with clever names for the house. I was still a little nervous about the size, especially not knowing if we'd get permits that would allow us to demolish certain parts of the old house in order to expand it. Or if I could bring myself to even demolish those sections. I mean, the house was not an old one from what I could tell. Maybe built in the 1950s? Whether that made a difference, I don't know. But again that would be up to an architect. They know better than me.
More days passed and then that other dangling shoe dropped.
Angie was laid off from her job in a round of employee cuts.
Now, we had money saved, and no debt, and the loan probably wouldn't be something outrageous I couldn't afford on my paycheck alone. But Angie was understandably nervous.
We've always been people who were averse to debt. With both of us having good jobs, this is something we would have paid off in short order. But now things were more uncertain. It might take me longer to pay off. Sure, Angie will find another job, but will it pay the same? She's a graphic designer and those jobs are harder and harder to find around here. Would she still be comfortable if she took a lower paying job?
I told Isaac, as I tried to stay positive, and asked if we could have the weekend to discuss it. He said absolutely that wasn't a problem.
Angie and I talked about it over the weekend. And yeah, we could probably still afford it, but Angie was having a hard time dealing with being laid off and I didn't feel like it was fair to add in the pressure of buying a house right now on top of her job search.
On the following Monday I told Isaac that, embarrassingly, we'd have to back out. Apologies to the sellers and please let me know what I owed to him and the lawyers for the contracts and other paperwork that was already drawn up.
I was defeated again and felt horrible and lost.
Isaac told me he talked to the lawyers and nobody was going to charge me any fees, which was very kind of them, but I almost wished they had, because then I felt even worse. I hate wasting people's time.
Again I fell into a depression, almost deeper this time than with Blue House. We thought we had bought Blue House for all of an afternoon. We thought we had bought Green House for almost a week.
And what was worse was that I couldn't show it or express it. I had to try to be cheerful and positive so that Angie wouldn't feel bad about it. So she wouldn't feel like it was her fault, because it wasn't. I just wanted her to focus on finding an awesome new job she could be happy with and let her grieve over the sudden loss of the job and people she had enjoyed being around for the last 15 years.
And that became the impetus for this blog. I needed a place to talk and let things go, and since I couldn't talk to Angie about it in unfiltered terms, I came here. Even talking to myself through this blog is better than holding it in.
I told Angie that Green House wasn't the right house anyways. That I wasn't sure we could make it the perfect place we wanted. So, it was all for the best.
And I tried convincing myself of that, too. Sometimes I even believe it, maybe this is for the best.
This is the 15th post in the blog, and the last one that is historical in nature. You're all caught up with me now. What happens after this, even I don't know anymore. I am no less determined than I was before, though. And I still think my future awaits in Mérida.
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