House Drama!

Buying a house is a lot different when you don't just have it built.

Middle of last month we found out that we qualify to buy a home even with our other one not sold because we have renters in there. So I looked on the mls online, found tons of possibilities, and one that we absolutely loved. I tried calling the agent listed, he gave me the number of the owner. I tried calling them, there was no answer, and their weird answering machine didn't work right (it never beeped!). So finally we just decided to drive buy it and see if we could find out more about it.

So I'm walking around the front yard, trying to figure out if we can get into the back or something, and a car pulls up. The guy rolls down his window and says "Do you want to see that house?" He lives just down the road, and was on his way out with his family, and is a real estate agent!

He couldn't get us in that day, but was able to the next. We liked it. We thought about it, and had Grandpa Smith come out and check it out with his perspective from working in construction. He liked it. So that night we made an offer.

That was June 15th. It was a short sale (which is anything but short!), so we set a "reply by" date of July 6th. There are multiple levels that need to approve a short sale, and it made it through 2 of the 3. One of the banks wanted a higher percentage or something. Rude.

So last weekend we thought it was time to start looking again, so we'd be ready to make another offer shortly after the short sale one ran out. We drove buy a bunch, and sent Aaron (who is now our agent, serendipitously) 4 mls numbers. All turned out to be short sales, and there were offers on 3 of the 4 already. The other one he took us to, and it had a ridiculous backyard. There was a trampoline, and I swear it was touching the house and the back fence at the same time. So that was out.

He drove us to a horrible one with 70s everything, and we started to think he must not think very much of us!

Then he took us here:

It doesn't look like much (although it's way way better than the same house on street view, before being newly painted!), but it has new: paint, carpet, travertine tile, hardwood floors, cabinets, granite counter tops (kitchen and bathrooms), appliances, septic system, grass, and really beautiful deck. We took a couple days to think about it (mostly me, not being sure about the area after thinking we were going to live in a new neighborhood), and made an offer on it.

So did two other people, and they offered more. But Aaron knows the guy, so he convinced him to give us first crack at it. He countered at $20K more than we had offered ($5K more than the listing price), and we said no. So he came back and asked what was the most we'd be able to do. We told him honestly what we were approved for, and said we really would like/need some closing costs. So he answered that with our full approval amount, no sellers concessions.

That would maybe be possible, but not without selling Dan's tuba and/or getting "gifts." And it just felt rude, that he was trying to get the absolute most he possibly could. I guess that's always the idea, but it just seemed rude. So we went and saw it again, and decided we liked it, but not THAT much.

In the meantime, we've driven all over Vancouver and Camas to scout out possible houses. And we've found that most of the time there's a pretty house that we can afford, it's two streets over from a mobile home park or something like that. Aaron showed us 4 yesterday, and there was only one was wasn't kinda awful. It should be a clue to us that something is wrong when they only have pictures of the outside and the kitchen...

So then Aaron gets back to us that the first home, the short sale, has officially foreclosed. So now the bank owns it. And they've ordered the appraisal, then will put it back on the market, most likely "aggressively priced." And - this is awesome! - their new agent will be one of the other agents in Aaron's office! She will give us first crack at it!

So now we sit and twiddle our thumbs for about a week and pray that the bank decides to price it where we can afford it. If they do, yay! If not, well, back to the drawing board. Fun, fun!