F*ed Up

Well, it started out as a nice day anyway. Very sunny, warm, ideal Summer Saturday. I had my lovely massage this morning, then ran to Target, stopped at a local farm stand and then was driving down the road back to my house when a little light rain started hitting my windshield. It was still completely sunny out, so as strange as it was, I figured that it was just passing through. Nope. Since then the weather has gone from a light Summer sun shower, to thunderstorms, to severe thunderstorms to now (about three hours later) the latest development, HAIL. Big freaking ice rocks of hail! And normally weather wouldn't freak me out all that much (I actually enjoy a good occasional thunderstorm) but hail makes me worry about tornados -- TORNADOS! Which is my ultimate big irrational fear -- I have crazy recurring nightmares about tornados. Freak. Me. OUT! I need chocolate! Hold me.

Oh and ...

Today was also a bad hair day and (this just in) I've somehow developed a pimple on my chin. A pimple! I never get pimples. Well, practically never. Sheesh.

WTF?

A very strange thing happened today. During one of the brief stints of time where I was actually awake and sitting in my living room, my door bell rang. Once I was able to get the dogs calmed down and squeezed myself out the door to see what was going on, I saw this huge delivery truck backed up to my garage with two guys hauling at this enormous box. The one guy came over with a yellow delivery slip with my name and address on it and told me that he had a furniture delivery for me from Target. What??? I also saw on the slip instructions to leave the ginormous box if no one was home. I told them that I had not ordered any furniture and that I was going to refuse delivery. He then asked if anyone else could have ordered it, and I pointed to the dogs pressed against the glass storm door and said, "not unless you think one of those four dogs could have." So they rolled their big cargo door closed and drove away. I can't even imagine what I would have done had I been asleep or something when they came. They would have left that humongous, and no doubt extremely heavy, box in front of my garage and I wouldn't have been able to move it at all, being two days post-surgery and all. My God.

You Think You're Having a Bad Day ...

When, on a Monday morning you are stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic (on a road where that rarely happens). Until you pass: first a guy pulled over to the side of the road changing a tire. Then a car pulled over to the side of the road after an apparent fender bender. And, finally, an SUV that had flipped, finally coming to a rest on its side in the fast lane of the highway going the other direction. After all that, you somehow have to concede that there are people out there who are having a far worse start to their week.

Life in the "Country"

As much as I really have been enjoying living in the "country" (well, I'm not exactly rural, but where I live is not the type of suburban as one would encounter in metro NYC), once in a while I am reminded that perhaps I had lived in the City for far too long. I can handle the moose & bear sightings and sitting out on the deck at dusk and watching the bats come out and fritter above eating mosquitoes (I actually find all of that pretty cool). But last night when Fitz wasn't waiting right at the back door with the other dogs after a pee break, I knew that something was up. I went into the yard with a flashlight calling him and there he came shooting out from under the deck looking guilty and carrying something in his mouth that I immediately knew he shouldn't be carrying. As I chased him and got closer I realized that it was a dead chipmunk -- ewwwwwww! So there I stood in my backyard screaming & yelling at him and swinging the flashlight as I freaked out (the neighbors must think I'm insane). I finally managed to grab a hold of the dog and carry him struggling inside. I then had the lovely job of going back out into the yard with a papertowel so that I could pick up the corpse and deposit it over the fence -- ICK!

It Never Freaking Ends

So, I went to the dentist on Monday and apparently I have a number of problems going on in my mouth. In addition to the needed root canal and abscess, I apparently have some major decay around the tooth adjacent where I had a root canal about two years ago. They're not even sure if they're going to be able to save this second tooth. All of these problems stem from this ill-advised bridge my former dentist talked me into getting years ago and I am finding myself quite bitter about it right now.

Anyway, the root canal doctor managed to get me in this afternoon which really ended up being a good thing because once she opened up my tooth, she said that the decay and infection was more extensive than it had appeared on the x-ray. She seemed to think if I had waited much longer, I could have lost that tooth too. So, I had the root canal today, but am still finding myself in pain which I hope is not an indication of the problems with the other tooth. I have to go back to the first dentist in a week or two to have him finish the work on the RC tooth and to evaluate what we're going to do about this other one. I am so ... I don't know, depressed, overwhelmed, stressed about all of this. And of course my out-of-pocket costs for all of this work is going to be in the 1,000s. TG for insurance (at least they'll be paying for some of this) and TG that I'm debt free! If this had happened two years ago I would be screaming and crying and completely freaking out & panicking -- at least I can pay for this. I'm not happy about it and some of my home improvement plans will have to be put on hold this year, but at least I don't have to go into debt to do this. At least it's not going to completely wipe me out.

To add insult to injury, tonight my cell phone was ringing. I could hear it and I realized that it was still in my jacket pocket. So, instead of just letting it ring, I jumped up and ran for it, vaulting over something on the floor and catching my toe on the corner of a chair in the process. Now I'm afraid I've broken my toe! Oh and that phone call was my father. I have no doubt he was calling about having me send him more money out of our trust account, I've already had to do that twice in the past week and that seems to be the only reason he ever calls me lately.

But I'm not bitter, no, not at all.

It's Always Something

Spent the weekend in pain as it seems that I have another abscess in the area where I need a root canal. I've been putting it off and I guess I've just put it off too long. I called the root canal dentist and the soonest they can get me in is April 6th. ACK! In the meantime, I've made an appointment for this afternoon with another local dentist as I really don't feel comfortable going back to the "Super Cuts-esque" place that I went to the last time. I'm hoping this new dentist will maybe be able to get me in someplace sooner, or at the very least will have some good drugs to prescribe. UGH!

Wake Up, It's Monday Morning

Nothing like almost waltzing into the Men's Room to realize that I am not really fully awake this Monday morning. Sheesh!

How Not To Start Off The New Year

* Have crappy sleep the night before the first business day of the year.
* Wake up late and run around the house like a maniac.
* Leave dirty dishes in the sink and an unmade bed (hate coming home to a mess).
* Leave for work late and realize you need gas.
* Stop and get gas, pull too far away from pump and stand down wind of nozzle on a windy day.
* Pull spraying, drippy nozzle out of car and spew gas all over the legs of your pants.
* Continue to spew gas all over yourself as you try to maneuver over to the upwind side of the nozzle.
* Continue on to work (you're running late after all) with car windows rolled down so as not to pass out from the fumes in transit.
* Sit in your open cubicle and stink up the joint.

I hope this is not an indication of how the year is going to go ...

The Drama That Was My Un-Closing

So, after all this waiting around, today was finally the day. I had been completely stressed about everything for about a week or so because the Good Faith Estimate (GFE) kept increasing (by like $2,000, at final count!) and I was worried about where that was going to end. I had my approved HUD statement by Wednesday of this week, where my mortgage broker pointed out that the settlement company had not accounted for any credit of closing funds from the relocation company (hello? We're talking over $8,000 here!) Anyway, my relocation contact and my mortgage broker were able to work that out and so I had the revised HUD that afternoon and it was a relief to see that I had plenty of money for closing with reserves, so all my worrying in that regard was for naught.

We had the walk-through scheduled for this morning before the closing. Everything was fine, except that I noticed that they had taken this second, big water heater that had been in place when we did the home inspection. This was obviously one that they had added because they are a family of seven and need the extra capacity, but still the exclusion of the water heater had never been in any document related to the sale at any time. Additionally, the house had been inspected with this in place and with the assumption that this was part of the water heating system. I just felt that it was kind of crappy to not have a notation about it on the contract. I think if you're buying a house, it is assumed that the water heater as part of the core plumbing. Anyway, I think it was a bit shitty. The bottom line is really not such a big deal, having the smaller unit will actually be cheaper for me (since I won't have to constantly pay to heat all that water), but still, I really feel like it should have been noted from the beginning. I was, however, happy that all of their stuff was completely gone. The house also looked a lot bigger without all their crap, but I really could see how the whole place really needs to be painted and the carpeting replaced, and the thought of it all exhausts me. It's not even the expense of it, I would gladly pay for having all of this done, it's just the thought of moving in and trying to deal with this around all my stuff ... I just want to unpack and be done with it all by now, UGH!

Well, okay. Then we had the closing. Oi Vey. First, when the settlement rep was going over the HUD with the seller, there was dead silence. Turns out that the money stated there that he was to receive was far less than he was expecting (by like over $8,000). And it also turns out that he needed every penny of this money to fund the closing on the house he was buying (the closing of which was meant to happen right after our's). It came to light a little later into our meeting that there was a pre-payment penalty with his mortgage. How can you have a mortgage with this clause and not know about that? Anyway, not my problem.

But the bigger problem turned out to be on my end. The settlement company confirmed that there had been no wire of funds for my loan! In other words, the money was not in place. My lender is in California (I got a really great rate) and apparently my loan was not one of the wire transfers they had sent out the night before (even though they knew we were closing in the morning on the East coast). Add that to a three hour time difference and we had a real problem. We had an approved HUD, we had verbal confirmation from the lender, but we didn't have the actual funds. In the meantime the seller's lender blew in to deal with his problems with the other closing. Yet, instead of setting him up in another conference room, he sets up shop at the end of our table! So, not only am I now privy to private info about how the sellers don't have enough money to close on their house, but he felt that it was his place to throw out sarcastic and snide comments from time to time about my lenders and the situation I'm in. I was stressed out enough and this guy really got on my last nerve. When we were leaving the closing, he took out a pile of his business cards and literally threw them at me with some comment about the next time I needed a lender. What a jerk! I just looked at him without comment and didnot take one of his cards.

Finally, after about two and a half hours of this Hell, there was nothing much more we could do and we left the sellers to the conference room to deal with their problems with their other closing. All the paperwork for mine was signed and I gave the settlement rep my check for my downpayment and share of closing costs, it's just not officially completed until my loan funds are physically in place. I had an email from my mortgage broker late this afternoon that he had confirmation that the funds have been wired, so I guess everything is okay, but tonight has not turned out to the celebration of relief that I had hoped it would be. I'm pretty disappointed. Well, it's not tragic, I have the keys, the house is empty. I'm supposed to move first thing on Monday and had hoped to start moving some stuff over myself this weekend, I guess I can still do that, I feel a little weird about it though. On the other hand, it's not like someone will think I'm going to abscond to South America with the house or something, so I'm not really sure what to do, honestly.

Anyway, so that is my story of woe. Nothing is the end of the World, but it adds just another layer of stress to this process that I had not counted on. Luckily I have all of next week off from work to deal with things, so that should help. I'll probably come up to the house tomorrow and will take a few pictures and post them here at some point.

You realize that it's not likely to be a good week ...

... when you start it off by wearing the wrong color shoes to work! (black shoes with brown pants, for those who are interested). Argh!

The Drama

I finally had a response from the sellers to my request for some credit and repairs on the house (based upon the findings of the home inspection). Basically, the only thing they are willing to do is replace a toilet seat that is broken. Most, if not all, of the windows in the house have some kind of permanent damage (fogging) so the panes will have to be replaced. I requested that these be repaired or, if they prefer, they could leave their washing machine & dryer in lieu of the repairs. There is a piece of sheetrock missing from the garage that my home inspector said is a big safety issue. With it missing, it leaves the house vulnerable to fire (a fire in the garage could now easily & immediately spread into the rafters of the house). This is a small cut-out and shouldn't be too hard to replace. The fence around the property is rotting and falling down. It is stated in the condo bylaws that any structure like this that is unsound and/or unsightly is subject to removal or replacement by the HOA, at the owner's expense. Lastly, the roof is 20 years old and the home inspector seemed to think it would need to be fixed soon. Depending on who I've spoken to, it seems I can expect this to cost anywhere from 5K - 10K+.

The realtor's response on the behalf of the owners was:
* There is nothing wrong with that roof.
* There is nothing wrong with that fence.
* They were never led to believe from their inspection on the house 7 months ago (oh yeah, have I mentioned that they've only lived there 7 months?) that there was any safety issue with the missing sheetrock -- and this is my problem, because?
* They are keeping their washer & dryer because they are new.
* The sellers have put 10K into the house since they moved there.
* They need the entire selling price out of it.
(they said nothing at all about the damaged windows)

When my realtor asked what they spent the 10K on, the response was, oh new counter tops and flooring, new carpeting and some other stuff. Well, that granite counter top in the kitchen is beautiful, I'll give them that. But who in their right mind would install an expensive slab granite counter on top of
formica cabinets??? To me that's insane. It will now be extremely tricky and difficult, if not impossible, to upgrade those lower cabinets without damaging or destroying the nice counter. Or you can maybe do some bastardization project of replacing the doors and doing some kind of laminate on the rest, but it's F*ed up as far as I'm concerned. The flooring in the kitchen is nice, but it's pergo, not hardwood. And the carpets already look worn and soiled (with 5 kids and a dog, that's no surprise).

I guess I'm maybe being petty about my requests, but this house was not listed as a fixer-upper, I'm paying their full asking price and there are some things that are damaged or in need of pretty much immediate repair. I didn't really feel like my requests were that out of line, but I feel that the seller's refusal to even negotiate for any compromise is a gesture of bad faith. It's leaving a bad taste in my mouth.

In the meantime, because I was pissed, I asked my realtor to bring me to see this condo for which I had seen a online listing:

http://www.beangroup.com/real_estate/listings/Condos/NH/Merrimack/513618

I really liked the condo and it's also a lot cheaper (and it is a little bit bigger). However, it doesn't have a garage, a screened porch, or a yard. The kitchen is considerably smaller, as is the deck. But still, it was in perfect condition and in a very nice condo complex with lots of walking trails, etc.

So, I think I am now even more confused, but I have to make a decision soon about what I'm going to do. Like in the next 24 hours.

On a good note, I ended up talking to a local moving company and it looks like the move isn't going to cost me nearly as much as I had feared (my expectations of prices for everything around here are so skewed by my experience with NYC costs). So that is a huge relief.