And Now For the Bad News

So, there must always be balance in the world, right?

And you take the good with the bad.

Just as we had feared, the owners of the house we rent have decided they would like us to move when our lease expires at the beginning of April so they can more vigorously sell the house.

Not that we blame them. They bought this house as a way to earn some extra income. But they bought it at just the wrong-est time EVER! Then, after they kicked out the not-so-swell first tenants, they decided to do some work on the place. One day, a workman turned on the tub to wash up something, and realized the water had been turned off, and just walked away without turning off the spigot. A couple days later the owners called to have the water turned on but didn't come over to the house for about 5 days. By the time they got here, the tub had filled, spilled over and half of the upstairs was now in the downstairs.

So, they had to sink a bit more money into the place.

Then their mortgage payments went up... higher than our rent was. And finally, they owed more than the house was worth. According to zillow.com (an awesome website, check out how much YOUR house is worth! Or anyone's for that matter!!) our house's value dropped $17,000 in the last 30 days. We have been allowing them to show the house to prospective buyers once a week for a little while now. But with all the garage sale furniture, it ain't exactly anyone's dream home. So I can't blame them for wanting us out.

Now, moving is one thing, but we are headed to Hawaii in about 3 weeks, and we have to be out of this house three weeks after that. We thought the best possible method would be to set something up before we go to Hawaii, and then maybe overlap rent for a week when we get back, maybe two weeks, so we can pack up and take loads over there every evening instead of trying to do it with toddlers underfoot (and limited friends in this city) in one weekend.

When we first had inklings that this could happen, we checked and there were multiple houses for rent in this very neighborhood. Now, there is one. And it's smaller than the tiny house we are currently in. And it costs more.

Other options are the condos that cost a couple hundred over the highest we are willing to pay, or the apartment that costs 50 bucks more than we are paying now but is really shabby. We are going to go see that one next weekend.

And I am getting panicky. Panicky because I feel we are going to be forced into a year long lease for WAY more than we can afford if we want to keep Noah in the good school he is in now, and loves (as do we). Or we will have to squeeze into a tinier space or a very run down kind of place for a full year. Ugh.

And we have to work all this out, make appointments and go see places, and sign a lease before we go to Hawaii so that we can just focus on packing all our crapola when we get back.

Doesn't leave much time for researching island getaways. But I need to house hunt.

I don't want to stress about being homeless when I am laying in that hammock in Kailua-Kona sipping that Mai-tai, ya know?

...sigh...


(end rant)