So . . . We Have a House

The offer has been accepted! We close next Wednesday.

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For a fuller understanding of the rather unlikely confluence of events that led to this, here’s the story:

Amy’s Grandma Carol (her late dad’s mom) passed away the first week of June. She had been in pretty bad shape in the 6 months or so prior, letting her tiny house go to Hell in a Handbasket, going into a nursing home and suffering bouts of dementia, along with lots of physical ailments. Amy happens to be her only living descendent (well . . . her and Zoë), and thus her sole heir. Well, apparently Grandma Carol had been living well beneath her means, because we have received a sizable chunk of change from her bank accounts, with more coming from investments and insurance policies, along with the sale of her house. We’ve been using it to pay off our debts here and there, and we felt good about starting to look for a home of our own.

A few months prior to our moving here, the house next door to Amy’s mom (where we’re staying now) went up for sale, and was quickly bid upon by a potential buyer. We had joked here and there that “it’s too bad someone’s already bought the house next door.” Well, as of last week, the “In Contract” sign was still on top of the “For Sale” sign in the yard (most contracts are closed within a month . . . this one had been “in contract” for at least six). This past Friday, as Amy and her mom were leaving to go somewhere, they noticed that the realtor’s van was in the driveway of the house next door, so they decided to pop their heads in and ask him if it was still in contract. He said that technically, it wasn’t, since it’d gone way past the 21-day timeframe, and he gave us (I had showed up by then) an impromptu showing.

The house was perfect . . . the perfect size, the perfect amenities (comes with a deck, and with an outdoor playset for Zoë, for example), and the price was already $10K below the initial asking price . . . everything is perfect. We talked and prayed about it, met with the realtor on Sunday and had him show us a couple of other houses, and finally took a deep breath and said “we think the first one is the winner”. We made an offer, signed the contracts right there in the kitchen, and got a call on Monday morning that our offer had been accepted by the sellers!

We met with the realtor earlier this evening to put down our “earnest money” (kind of like a deposit), and will be drawing the cashier’s check next week to pay the rest. No mortgaging!

So . . . provided we have no issues (there are none forseeable), we’ll be homeowners one week from today. We never could have imagined this, considering the dire straits that necessitated our moving up here in the first place. Our God is so good!

(And for those of you wondering, living next door to Amy’s mom really won’t be a problem. She already gives us plenty of space under the same roof.)

Here are some clickable pics of “our” place (with the current owners’ stuff, of course).