I don't know how to write a post about this. Our whole home-ownership story is filled with chaos and bad decisions, starting with the day we signed the purchase papers almost five years ago. We have learned a lot about ourselves as people, learned a lot about the goals we have for our life and learned many, many hard lessons about finances. We love the house, but for us it was a bad choice.
Bottom line is that we will be paying off the house debt for about three years even though we sold it two weeks ago.
When we bought the house we knew we were going to make things tight. Then we continued to pay for infertility treatments and finally were blessed by having a child. I can not tell you how quickly our comfort of finances went out the window and we had to borrow even more money to deal with that. Not a good feeling, and that is honestly when we really investigated a move to somewhere we could afford to be.
The good news is that we have now put ourselves into a place, both physically and mentally, that we can afford to pay off that debt now, and still live very comfortably here in St Louis. We are not naive enough to think we will not have hiccups, but we are smart enough to know that we need to set ourselves up for success in the future, not failure.
It has been several hard lessons to learn, but we are stronger people now. Stronger in the long run for our finances. Stronger in our relationship.
I do not know if we will ever buy a home again. We have talked through and around it. We have found a great apartment to live in in a wonderful location that is more-than-affordable. The people who live here, it seems, live here for many years at a time. One of our neighbors has been here for more than 15 years.
So, with signatures across two days and hundreds of miles, as of this two weeks ago, we are no longer homeowners. And we could not be happier.
A very poignant post, but congratulations to all of you. I know that had to be really hard, but am so glad you're in a place that you love, in a neighborhood that you love. We lived in a really great apartment before we bought our house, and a lot of our neighbors had lived there for ages, too. Actually, the previous tenant of our apartment had been there for 45 years!!! Staggering. Anyway, congrats again. :-)
ReplyDeleteIn addition to everything else, apartment living is also much greener. But what I really meant to say was that:
ReplyDeletea) we're so glad you're here, and
b) very diplomatically written!
I'm glad you're out from under the house. It could've been worse. You got stuck selling in a really crummy market (and it sounds like you bought at the wrong moment, too, when prices were artificially high). Better luck next time, if there is one.
ReplyDelete"Diplomatically written"? Anything we should be talking about? I'm unsure what that meant and it has me concerned.
ReplyDeleteCan I tell you about how I hate dealing with finances? We talk all the time about what we could do or could have done with the money it cost us to buy this house in some other location. Unfortunately we don't really have a good alternative for a place to go. Well, we do but we don't you know? I'm glad that you got a piece of the puzzle sorted out anyway.
ReplyDeleteMany families are now considering living in apartments, instead of houses. Come to think of it, wouldn't it be better if you own a house? But I'm glad that you're contented with your new house. =)
ReplyDeleteWe’re placed in a difficult situation when putting an end to our debts means having to sell our most important properties. But finally paying off our debts is more important compared to sitting around and allowing it to grow in interest. Most people wouldn’t think to do what you did, but at least you have that weight off your shoulder now.
ReplyDelete