What has TBag been up to?

I think I'm ready to come back.

"Go to the light Carol-Anne!"

Summer is, sadly, on its way out, and today couldn't be a more perfect milestone in my life to share with the masses and stake my claim back in the blogging world.

Today is my motha f-ing birthday.
And not just any birthday.
A new decade.
Dirty. Thirty.

However, we will be postponing any major festivities for about a month.

Why?

Well....here is what we have been up to in the last couple of months.

Summer started, like any summer does.....weekends filled with warmer days lazily floating down the river on a pontoon, sipping the finest Bud Lights in all the lands.
Day in and day out.
Kind of boring to blog about.

Then one day, after the 4th of July...Bayou starts another tangent about purchasing some sort of cigarette speed boat. I am unimpressed. We still have a car payment. I have grown exhausted listening to all the new boat listings he has found on Ebay Motors. We are not in the movie Miami Vice as much as he would like to think we are. And did I mention I get rather sea-sick? Apparently that doesn't happen when you are slicing through waves at 70mph....but I digress.

I, rationally, blurt out......
WE ARE NOT GETTING ANY MORE EXPENSIVE TOYS UNTIL WE MOVE!!!!

And on that note....the wheels were effectively....in motion.

Week 1: We have officially decided it's time to move. We have enough money in savings for a down payment and I have a stable enough job finally with enough income to actually consider it.
I reach out to my bank to find out what I would be qualified for based on my current debt to income ratio and all that fancy realtor lingo that I have grown accustomed to.

I am very good with numbers and Bayou has crazy ideas....so basically, I am looking at the cheaper homes and he is looking at mansions. I keep telling him what we can actually afford versus what he is looking at is a difference of like $100K and to knock that shit off.

He finds a home. He shows me. The location, I must admit, could not be more perfect for me. We realize this particular home has very, very few neighbors and is gated. Bonus for our dogs.
I email it over to our realtor, who happens be family (thank the LAWD!!!)
He promptly responds with, "It's already under contract"
WHAT!! I mean...I know it's a tad out of our price range, but it was only on the market for a week!

That weekend, we look at 6 other homes, only to realize, we HATE the typical cookie cutter homes. We HATE neighbors on both sides. We NEED space, and apparently a 3 car garage, and I NEED at least 3 bedrooms and I would really, really like them all to be upstairs. Our list narrows quite a bit as does the neighborhoods we are looking at.

We find another home. Price is great for me! 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a nice kitchen that opens to a dining and living room! Fenced in back yard. Large double, corner lot, and within walking distance to the river and to the train I take to the city. We like it enough to put an offer in.
Then the ONE major issue pops up, almost as a warning, that maybe this isn't our dream home after all.
The neighbor releases two large German Shepherds into her back yard.
Now, don't get me wrong, I love all dogs. However, my oldest Frenchie? He loathes all "wolf" looking dogs. Hates them with a passion and I am visualizing constant barking between the small fence that separates these two from ultimately killing each other.
I resolve to tell the neighbors we will have to put up a non-see through barricade and continue with the offer.

I truly believe everything happens for a reason. I even wrote that lame quote on my High School Yearbook under my picture. But I truly believe it's the only way to come to terms with dire or difficult situations.

Then a bit of luck happened in the weirdest way.

We put in our offer the following Monday after viewing homes all weekend.
The seller of that particular home, was unable to be reached for over a week. Turns out he was in Europe on vacation and "had very little technological services" at any given moment. Whatever. I'm pissed....I just want to get down to negotiating and get our home!!
The following Monday we FINALLY hear back from the listing agent that he believes the seller should be home later that week, and countered a few grand below the asking price.
I had the weirdest inkling to check out the first house. The one that was already under contract. The one that we didn't think we could afford or had a shot of even getting because it was too late.
The listing said "Active" instead of "Contingent." I immediately emailed our realtor and he confirmed that indeed, that house had come back on the market that very day.
Financing had fallen through.

Panic sets in. I am currently not approved to purchase a home at a price that nearly doubles what we just put an offer in for. But this offer isn't ever going to come up again. Ever.
We have to jump on it!
And why am I not approved? Because the fancy-ass car that Bayou just HAD TO HAVE is in my name because my credit rocks the house. I beg the loan officer to pre-approve me for the higher amount as technically we are talking about less than 1% of the whole debt to income ratio that would make me ineligible. He finally agrees to as long as I "get rid of the car"....like NOW.

We get the pre-approval Saturday morning, an hour later view the home, love it, and put in an offer while sitting in the kitchen.
Monday morning rolls around and we now have to figure out how to get this damn car out of my name but still keep it?
Sigh.....selling it is only going to make things worse as the value is less than what we owe.
Plus...he, of course, wants to keep it. It's our "fancy" car.
Bayou must now purchase it from me. I apply, in his name, to at least 10 loan companies.
All denied.
Finally, one approves him. We fax over a million pieces of paper to a million places, accept another shitty 5 year loan at an interest rate that makes me want to punch puppies, he picks up the check. I deposit it into my account. The next day I overnight a cashier's check for the loan amount, paid in full, to my lender.
And we're off.
FUCK. This had better be worth it. We are now basically re-paying for this car again just to get it out of my name.

So, a little background. Since Bayou has our current mortgage in his name, and I have never owned a home. It is much easier for me to get approved, by myself, to purchase a new home. We tried to go in together on the new home loan and were denied because, who the hell has 6 months worth of monthly mortgage payments for two houses in their assets? Not us.

Negotiations continue between us and Seller....we are stuck for about a week with a $10K gap and keep questioning if this is really worth it....it is at the very top of our price range. I am second guessing interior renovations, Bayou is second guessing moving in general. And then a second, rather terrible, act of karma gives us just enough of a kick in the ass get out.

I am coming in for a walk around the block of our current home and am rounding the corner, in my own yard, to the front door......when I see a neighbor's Pitbull from down the road, with no leash, no collar, and no owners...sniffing a tree less than five feet from me.
My eyes get wide. SHHHHIIIIITTTTTT....I scream as the dog comes lunging at my dogs.
He is in full on attack mode and here I am, screaming for Bayou, screaming for ANYONE to come help me as I attempt to break up three dogs in a full on war IN MY OWN FUCKING YARD.
The owners of the dog come out, Bayou comes flying out of the house and eventually all three of them are separated. I am crying and exasperated and having an asthma attack and outright livid.
Now....these people....these people are just outright trash. They live in a rental down the road from me, and (luckily) have moved out in the last week. None of them have any teeth....all meth heads. And there were rumors swirling in our neighborhood that someone had to be evacuated from the home recently via morgue stretcher for an overdose. That fucking Pitbull is a total terror. It's completely the owners fault that it is so mean and loud. The barking never stops. Ever. I feel so bad because you look into the dogs eyes and you can just tell it's a good dog, that deserves a good chance at life...but has these terrible people as owners.

And with that fun little evening. We committed, wholeheartedly, to move.

Within three days, we have agreed to a price on this house. The seller accepts our offer and we are under contract. We close September 12th and this, my friends, will be the new G Compound....as Bayou likes to call it. A nice, private slice of Heaven that we can soon call home. The mortgage loan seems to be moving along swimmingly so there should be no other hangups at this point.

The inside will need a bit of updating in terms of finishes, but structurally, this house couldn't be better.
The space above the garage could be built out as an "in-law suite"...but since that is NOT appealing to me, we will just leave it unfinished for a bit.

I am sure you are asking what are we doing with our current place?
Originally, we assumed we would have to be renting as the marketplace at the time was overrun with Foreclosures and we were told we would have to pay someone around $40K to get out.
Um.....ah no thank you.

Two weeks ago, the realtor has changed his mind and says....."Yes...actually, I believe you could break even or even make few bucks if you wanted to list."
That, my friends, means we get to fork over all closing costs with our own money. No equity.
However, the leisure and lack of stress of potential bad renters, or double mortgage payments, or other issues is giving Bayou a stroke and making him a real joy to be around.....so we agree to list.

Now, trying to get a home "show ready" in exactly one weekend is damn near impossible.
But we did it.

Scraped and refinished a bathroom ceiling.
Painted the kitchen from wasabi green to white.
Painted a bathroom from sunflower yellow to white.
Patched 3 wall holes.
Added a necessary handrail and painted a staircase.
Emptied our mud/utility room of random exposed insulation.
Moved out 50% of our belongings to storage.
Deep cleaned the entire home, top to bottom.

Photos happened two days later and we were up and listed by last Thursday.
As luck would have it, we had three weekend showings and got our first offer, which we accepted, in four days. That's got to be some kind of record!!
This guy is essentially getting his "deal of a lifetime" with our loss. But I have to keep reminding myself of the treasure we are getting in the process as well.
Assuming the inspection, that is happening tomorrow, goes smoothly and we don't have to say "fuck off" to ridiculous repairs, and his financing doesn't fall through....we close with him on October 4th.

And of course, here is our current home. It has been a labor of love and I can honestly say we dumped close to $40K worth up necessary and aesthetic upgrades into the place over the last 10 years, only to sell for less than we originally paid for. But so is everyone else these days.
We all lose together.