YIKES!!! Adventures in Home Inspection & Other Mishaps

OK, so I've been missing again for about a month. I can only say that I've been horribly busy, stressed, & crazed.  I was warned.  Moving is a bitch.  But in our case when I talk about the peaks & valleys, all I can say is that this has been a super-duper-looper.  Xing Fu commented that I haven't written in a while & my response was, "what exactly could I write about other than the house situation." Actually there is a TON to write about--for example, sailing has begun once again & I'm on a new boat with a new skipper & all new crew--we're the initial team--I'm not subbing in for someone else.  Someone else is subbing in for me....and I've got a new position.  Which I'm hugely happy about because I get to learn even more & become more valuable as crew.  But I digress, another post.  Back to this house thing.  

So settlement on my house is May 15th & the date is drawing near.  I already miss my house!  I sit at my dining room table & look around thinking that it is one of the last times that I'll eat in this dining room or when I pull up in the drive way I think that this is one of the last times I'll park here, etc., etc.  Don't get me wrong, another great adventure is waiting for me around the corner but I'm a nostalgic kinda gal & this house has been mine & has protected me for 11 years--I will miss it.  

While the selling of my house has been relatively straightforward (not trying to jinx myself here)--the house appraised at the right amount, the home inspection went well. The buying of a house has been anything but.  We put an offer in on a house way back in late March when my house sold & well, the sellers didn't like the settlement date & took an offer for LESS money!!  OMG--crazy!  I didn't like my settlement date--I would have preferred early June, but the buyers offered me very close to list & who am I to turn down money because the date isn't quite what I'd envisioned....anyway, we panicked after that because everything we wanted in the area we wanted began to get snatched up faster than we could put in an offer & now I was out of a house & nowhere to go. Problem being the zip code--we needed to be close to schools for our children & close to Xing Fu's children's house.  So we found another house which on the surface looked perfect: 4 bedrooms, 3.5 baths, clean & vacant so settlement date could be the same as the settlement date on my current house.  Until, bom, bom, bom, the home inspection...ACK! Essentially, the house, built 15 years ago, mind you, isn't worth the ground it's built on.  After following the home inspector around the property, I looked at Xing Fu & I knew what he was thinking--he wanted to walk.  And so began our ordeal to get released from our contract.  We sent our list of what we wanted completed or a $20K credit--that's how much was wrong with this place!  And we waited, and waited, & waited for a response.  And during that time we panicked even more because 1) it was now mid-April & my settlement date was fast approaching, 2) we had no other prospects for a house with 4 bedrooms, 3.5 baths in our price range, & 3) these sellers were taking their sweet time in responding.  But we went ahead & expanded our search to include a different zip code.  Low & behold there it was: cheaper, bigger, & much, much nicer.  We decided that three's the charm & went forward in making an offer on the house with the understanding that we'd be released from the money pit. And so, after waiting the entire time for a response the current owners offered us $2500. Seriously? Really? And such ended that contract.  We are purchasing the third house--the home inspection went relatively well (anything's better than the money pit we walked from) & that current owner is fixing everything on our list. My son & I will live for a week with Xing Fu until the settlement on our new house on May 25th.  Woohoo!  Not so fast--onto thee next adventure--packing & moving--for real!