A Great Find

I really wanted a changing table, but I didn't want to spend the money and I wanted it to have drawers. I did a lot of garage sale and craigslist shopping and finally found this little gem. Not bad for 10 bucks?

Before.....

It needed lots of sanding.

Primer and more sanding. Then, painting. (Papa put some elbow grease into it too.)

And.........


Here you have it!

Don't you love it? I sure do. Can't wait to change a little newborn bum on here :)

I should mention that I won't get to use this for Madisyn. We are officially potty training right now. It's been two days and that is a whole other post to come.

Here's the before and after. Oh and the white handles came on it originally. Didn't even have to buy those. I'd say our repurposing project was a success.

There's one more project I can't wait to post about. Unfortunately the before pictures are still on David's phone. It's all coming soon though.

Pretty much all of our furniture was purchased on craigslist or a garage sale. Watch for a post with all the great things we got.

Conclusion..The House Saga

After all was said and done, we decided to forgo buying the home.

The final decision was made about 2 weeks ago. At the time we had 2 solid reasons to say no. Since then, I have discovered a handful of more reasons that our decision was the right one.

Hindsight really is 20/20. Especially right now.

The night before we had to make our final decision, David and I did the math. We included living expenses as well as "house expenses" (all the fixing and TLC the house needs). It just was not looking so great. The down payment was high and the numbers weren't where we wanted them to be. So, we said no and I almost waited for that "oh we should have just done it" feeling. It never came.

In fact, I couldn't be more thankful to be where I am right now.

During these past few months, David's job has not been as stable as we'd like it to be. It would not be wise to take out a loan for a house, without the reassurance that we will be able to make the payments on it, right?

There are many more reasons which are in the works as we speak. Without spilling our financial guts out on this blog, lets just say, if we would have purchased that house, we would be in a very sticky situation right now. But, even just a few weeks ago we would not have known that.

So, the new plan?

Find a place to rent, and move out sometime this summer. Pay other things off and buy a house in a year or so. Oh boy does that plan feel wonderful. I am so at peace :)

One more wonderful thing that came from all of this...

David and I have had in the back of our minds the fact that we need a car with room for 2 car seats by September. Quite frankly, I just thought we'd have to get really squishy in our current car and make it work somehow, because I couldn't see any way that we could afford to get a decent, inexpensive car right now (or anytime soon for that matter) without taking out a loan. That's the last thing we need right now. I HATE dealerships and buying cars. There's just too many unknowns and its just more debt!

Well, I'm very happy to say that the money we put aside for the down payment will now be used to purchase a vehicle fit for a family of 4! What a blessing. We would not have had that money set aside had it not been for the house. Heavenly Father is really carrying David and I through this tough financial time in our lives and it really shows. I am so grateful that I can look back and really see that. The whole house situation was very stressful and many tears were shed over making the right decision. How wonderful it is to look back and see that it was all for a reason. Each time David and I are faced with a life changing decision we turn it over to the Lord and it not only brings us closer to Him, but it also brings us closer to each other.

And so the next chapter isn't all that certain, but I know that we'll have a car, a place to live, a family of 4, and the rest will all fall into place as it always does.

Answers

You know how I said we put an offer on a house in this post? Well, it's been a long windy road of ups and downs since then.

Get ready for a long one........

We made the offer and it was accepted by the seller, who happens to be a bank in this case. It's a short sale, which by the way does not mean that it will sell in a short amount of time or anything. That would make sense, but it's actually the opposite. If you really want to know what a short sale is click here. Otherwise, it's pretty much an alternative to foreclosure. The bank is getting shorted on money and therefore, they are not very willing to do many negotiations as far as closing costs and all that stuff goes.

Ok, with that said, our offer was accepted by the bank and the next step was for us to get all our financials together and get the loan approved. The only problem was the amount we would need to put down for closing costs. It was a couple thousand more than we had the means for. So, our realtor drew up another document asking the seller for that extra money toward the closing costs. That's where everything got stuck. The bank didn't reply, and they may never reply as far as we know.

We thought, ok maybe this is our answer. Lets look at other places and see if there's something else out there for us. Yet, we had both felt that this home was meant for us. Sometimes the Lord wants us to prayerfully make a decision, and move forward with that decision even if there isn't a huge flashing sign that says "go this way!". David and I searched and found a few different possibilities. We even went out to the properties to with our realtor to take a look at them, but none of them felt right for one reason or another. Keep in mind, this whole time, we still have that offer on the table for this other house.

So, yesterday we went to check out a nice little condo on the water. It was in great condition, great price, very close to the hospital where the baby will be born, and the neighborhood was a bit run down, but that didn't bother me very much. David and I pulled up next to the place I thought would end up being our next home.

It had been about 10 minutes of waiting in the car (we were waiting for our realtor). We were just taking the opportunity to watch the activity that goes on around that area for those 10 minutes, when this ruff looking guy walked past our car, with a very curious look on his face that almost made me feel uncomfortable. He just kept walking until we couldn't see him anymore. The feeling of unsafety soon passed and we continued to observe and discuss what we saw and how we felt. Nothing too alarming that told us to leave and not consider living there. Well, about 3 minutes later this same guy comes walking straight towards our car. The funny thing is, I never felt afraid, but a little uneasy. He walked up to David's window and looked us right in the eye. David opened the door and the guy said "why are you guys just sitting here?". We proceeded to tell him that we were looking to live around here and we're waiting for our realtor. The guy took one look in the back seat and said "with that little one (meaning Madisyn) you don't want to live here." He was very soft spoken and was a voice of warning. David then proceeded with the conversation and said "oh really, is this not a safe place to live?" The guy just simply shook his head "NO". David thanked him and told him to have a nice day and he simply turned around and walked away.

Right at that moment, the realtor pulled up. Wow! Should we even go inside to look? Well, we got out of the car and went in with our realtor. It was a very nice condo. Much nicer (meaning it didn't need very much tlc at all) than the house we originally put an offer on. Yet, all of that didn't matter much. We did our walk through and as we were walking back to our cars, I asked the realtor "what's the best way to see how a neighborhood is? Is there a website or what?" He said that the best way is to just simply ask someone who is outside their home on that street. David and I both look at each other and David replied, "well, we're 0 for 1 on that one". We told that realtor about our conversation with the ruff looking guy earlier. He reassured us that he's sold many condos over there recently and had no complaints. As soon as he was finished talking, David asked "so, is the other house totally out of the picture now?" The realtor responded absolutely not. All we have to do is come up with that extra money toward closing costs and it's ours pretty much.

At that moment I felt a rush of peace flow through me like nothing I had felt up to this point (there are tears running down my face as I type this). This was our answer. We did what we thought was best and exhausted pretty much all other options. Now, here we are back to where we started, but this time we know without a doubt it's right. It's more money up front, but it's a home with property and our return in a few years will be much greater. It's the best choice financially for the future, but it needs a lot of TLC. It needs appliances, paint, flooring in some parts, we have to rip out an addition that wasn't built to code, and I could go on and on really. Despite all of that, I know it's right and that with some work (ok a lot of work), it will be beautiful.

What a journey it's been so far, and yet through all of it we got our answer. I am so thankful for the understanding David and I have come to in these 4 years of marriage that when you have a decision to make, big or small, you do all you can to live righteously. You make a decision and move forward with it, all the while being very prayerful even if it seems like there's no answer coming any time soon. The Lord will stop you in some way or another if it's not right. This is not the first time we've made a decision and gotten a HUGE stop sign after all of the effort made to make that decision work. Remember this? Which ended up with this. Which is why we are where we are right now.

It sure is hard while it's happening because you just want a flashing light answer, but it's so wonderful to look back and see the Lord's hand nudging you in the right direction every time.

So, we're back to our original offer and we'll see how it goes! We're going to do a walk through of the house one more time tonight so we can take notes on exactly what needs to be fixed before we move in. We have to work it all into our budget somehow for the next couple of months. It will all work out and we'll have what we need.

As far as I'm concerned, we have till the baby is born to make it liveable, which is totally doable. Especially, with the help of family and friends close by. It will be a fun project and it will be ours!

Stay tuned because this is just the beginning of this story....I'm sure of it.

ps. this picture is from easter weekend (which i have yet to post about) and i figured if you read that whole post then you deserve to at least see a picture at the end.

We're happy :)