At Last!

It almost didn’t seem like it would happen. Our initial lender fell through at the last moment, and our mortgage company stepped up and scrambled trying to get a replacement. The replacement lenders didn’t offer the nice slim interest rate of the first lender (the later was half a percent higher), and demanded that we carry more insurance on our property – but we ended up getting things done in the long run.
On what was supposed to be closing day, we discovered that, due to a miscommunication between the lenders and our escrow company, a single document hadn’t been signed! That held closing up for a day, which meant that we had to close and move pretty much on the same day. We had to wait until 3:30 before we could get the keys and step foot inside our own house. Oh – and note to self – never rent a U-Haul from the location on Ranier. The people there are very poorly trained, and the “manager” has a major attitude problem.
But I digressed. It took us six hours over two trips to move out of our old place and into our new one. We’re still unpacking and cleaning to this day, but it’s well worth it. We have a beautiful place that we are in the process of truly making our own.

Signing day

Carrie and I signed a bunch of documents yesterday - about half an hour in, our hands were getting tired, and we were still looking at three inches of paperwork still to go - at the very end, we had to sign a piece of paper attesting to the fact that we had just signed a bunch of other pieces of paper. How meta!  Anyway, the deal's not quite done yet, as we  now have to wait for the VA, Lender  and King County to bless the union between humans and house.  We'll know (and possibly) celebrate by the end of the business day today!

It ain't real until the keys are in your hands...

...which may be today!

It ain't real until you sign the paperwork!

Well hell,  another snag...

The thing about going through a mortgage company - even though they may underwrite the loan themselves, they will still (generaly)  go to another company to actually provide  the funds. That is what happened to us - we were approved for financing from one source at 5%. However, that source is in danger of failing, so, as a backup, our man at the mortgage company went to another source to secure funding in the event that the first one failed.  Thing is - that second company approved us at 5.5%, and they are requiring us to bump the dwelling coverage amount on our insurance policy. So, not only do we get to pay about $10 / month more for our insurance, we also get to pay $100 / month more for our mortgage payment as well, which, this being Seattle and all, is pretty substantial.

Everyone is working to make it so that in the case of our having to go with the second company (there is still hope that the first will pull through), enough money will be available so as to pay down the percentage points of our loan, from 5.5% to 5.25%.  Just shaving off that extra quarter of a percent will save us $50 / month in loan payments.  What really sucks, though, is that we may not be able to move into the place on our original date - and you know how much planning goes into that!

All this is why I always say - It ain't real until you sign the paperwork!

Part Tres

Well - the time is almost upon us!

We agreed to a price, had the appraisal, had an inspection, gotten all of the major issues taken care of - now, we just have to wait to sign papers.

This has been a trying process for the two of us.  Very emotional - from the high that we first had when we saw the place together, to the lows of the negotiation, to the almost endless waiting for the appraisal to take place (and be approved by the VA), to getting the inspection - and issues found as a result of such fixed. Now, on Wednesday, we get to sign papers, walk through the new house  - and next weekend, we get to move!

Much fun, heartache, and (almost) tears.  But I've faith that it will be worth it!

Part dos

So, our Realtor (who also happens to be our current landlord) put in an offer that was about $25k below the seller's asking price. The seller "countered" with their original asking price, plus some concessions on our part. Carrie and I were thinking "WTF?"

It turns out that the seller's agent was one of these discount brokers who was on vacation in some remote area in Oregon, and wasn't really giving them any meaningful input - we were (and still are) dealing directly with the sellers themselves. So it was up to our agents to walk the sellers through the process, and show them why our offer was a fair one. In the end, we agreed on a price that was twenty grand less than what they were asking, and our agents provided the sellers with a market analysis to back up our offer - sort of like a mini-appraisal.

Which brings me to the next hurdle that we had to get through - the appraisal itself! The sellers bought the house during the height of the Seattle housing boom about three years ago, when it was a seller's market, and it was the people who were selling the houses who were pretty much providing the appraised values for the land. Flash forward three years to our present economy, and, while there are bargains to be had, if a seller wants to sell their house without taking too much of a loss, they will have a hard time doing so (and they buyer will have a hard time getting financing) if the property does not appraise for the agreed-upon price!

*sigh* More to come.

House Hunting, part one

Carrie and I are in the process of buying our first house (first together and as individuals).

First, we did the Redfin thing - looking up houses, then going out to the various locations and giving them a rather cursory visual inspection. We had done this with a couple of places in West Seattle, Beacon Hill, Seward Park, Madison Valley and the Central District. We ended that day at a condo in Columbia City.

Then, I had gone out with our realtors by myself looking for a place, since her work schedule is a bit less flexible than mine. We looked at a place that Carrie and I had looked at in Seward Park, but went inside this time. Wow - this place, which looked charming from the outside, was a bit depressing on the inside. We then went to Beacon Hill and found an Extremelly Nice Place which I thought that Carrie would fall in love with. We then ventured to view two blah townhouses, one in Beacon Hill and one in the Central District. There was also another house in the CD as well, but that one was tiny with no yard to speak of.

Carrie and I went out next to view a place in Judkins. Nope - too close to Ranier.

We then went out with our realator to Greenwood ( one really nice place, but too close to power lines, and one blah place), Maple Leaf (yikes! I mean the house, not the neighborhood), West Seattle (one in Arbor Heights - a bit too far from the action for me, one closer to Westwood - too small, and one around Gatewood - too small, and a couple of hoodlooms ruined the neighborhood experiance by yelping like dogs as we got out of the car), and Beacon Hill.

My instincts were right - Carrie loved the place!

Next up - the offer!