I feel the need to defend our story.
I just finished watching Real Estate Intervention, the HGTV show that Kevin and I appeared on. I was watching someone else’s episode (you can only watch yourself so many times) and the couple had a similar story to ours. You know, bought a dream house, lost a job, got a job that required a move, can’t sell house.
At first I was really sad. Then I got angry for them and for us.
See, I’m big on personal responsibility. I almost never blame someone or something else for the stuff that goes wrong in my life. (On the flip side-I almost never give myself credit for good either, but that is an entirely different post-and perhaps years of therapy.)
So when all this house/move stuff went down I started could, shoulda, woulda–ing us and our past decisions and I haven’t stopped since.
But as my old high school boyfriend used to say, “Mr. Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda don’t live here no more.”
And this is why: today I realized, we didn’t do anything wrong.
Now I will commence the defending of our story:
We bought our first house 6 months after we got married. This was back in the days where rent was more expensive than mortgages. It was a great house. It was not where we originally wanted to be-because that place was too expensive. We bought a cheaper house in a cheaper city. We felt a bit in over our heads, but we were young so things only got easier as we got more secure in our jobs-and paychecks. That house was a wise decision. We didn’t make the profit that our neighbors did but we also put in less sweat equity than they so we found it fair. We lived three fantastic years in that house and it was worth every penny.
We bought our second house when it was time to move out of the city, before the market boom but with enough time that we didn’t lose any money on our first house.
We still didn’t move back “home” where we wanted because it was still too expensive. So we settled (literally) on a lovely (Big) house in a nice neighborhood. We didn’t love it but we thought maybe we could move someday. We used that house to get out of debt. We were not so happy there, but we thought we would be there long enough to build our dream.
Then the husband got a job in DC and was looking at over an hour commute one way. With baby number one on the way, we thought that would have been too much. (Funny, how perspective changes. He spends at least 90 minutes on a train now and we think we’re close in.)
Thankfully, our area market boomed-so we could make a pretty good amount of money on the sale and use it to move back where we wanted to be all along.
We sold that house, for a hefty profit-quickly.
Then we couldn’t find a house. Because, guess what? That market’s boom was even bigger than ours and again-everything was too expensive.
We lived in the in-laws basement-joking (kinda)that we may never get out.
We had learned a lot in our years as homeowners. We weren’t going to get in over our heads. We weren’t going to settle. We thought this would be our forever house.
We were in the center of the real estate storm trying hard to hold on to the buoys of reality and our dreams all the while trying desperately not sell our souls or lose our shirts.
It seemed impossible.
We went to Saturday open houses for properties that were listed at $499k and we knew the entire time that not only would the house sell for at least $550k by Monday, but we couldn’t even afford $499.
There were no houses less than that. None. You might not believe me. It is true. Even in the far out suburbs things were over $499k because they were bigger and on more land. We came from far out suburbs. If we wanted far out suburbs, we would have stayed where we were, but we couldn’t afford that house anymore.
We also knew, or at least suspected, that in time those far out suburb houses would lose value. See, we knew things couldn’t continue the way they were forever. We just knew.
We looked at smaller, yuckier houses-close in to the city. We did this because we knew smaller and yuckier was what we would need to fit our price range. We wanted close in because we knew that was an area that wouldn’t turn over on us in time. Close in held value. We knew.
We thought we knew.
There wasn’t anything small and yucky going for less than $499k either.
We started to visualise raising our kids in the basement.
Then, as these things go, we got word through Kevin’s mom that her friend’s son lived across the street from a house for sale by owner. It was a heavily desired and thus insanely overpriced neighborhood. So much so that we had given up on ever living there.
The selling family was moving up the street and didn’t want their new neighbors to be involved in the madness that was the current real estate circus so they decided to list low and sell without an agent. Isn’t that refreshing?
We had an agent, but we paid him out of pocket, because that is who we are. We could have ditched him and kept his commission off the sales price but we didn’t. We did the right thing. We felt like we should and we had enough money that we could. The karma of finding this house made us feel like we owed It something.
We settled on The Whitmoor House two months after we sold the Big House. We put a giant chunk of money down. We paid what we thought was a fair price, even in the crazy market. It was well over $100k less than anything else we’d even looked at. We didn’t have any tricky financing. We had an ARM, but it was seven years and our very conservative, Big Bank-backed mortgage “guy” said that was pretty standard and we could refinance in time to have a solid 30 year mortgage in a year.
He thought he knew.
We weren’t in over our heads. We didn’t pull one over on any financiers. We bought, within our budget-an insanely small and fairly (yet probably still over) priced house.
And we loved it. We loved every square inch-even though there weren’t that many to love.
We loved it partly because it was exactly where we wanted it to be. We learned the lesson in our old house; that no matter how nice the property, if you don’t fit in the neighborhood, it’s never home.
We loved it partly because it was exactly where we wanted it to be. We learned the lesson in our old house; that no matter how nice the property, if you don’t fit in the neighborhood, it’s never home.
We loved it because it was small enough to do tons of work to; so we put our stamp on it immediately. There were no soaker tubs. Heck, there was no master bath. But it had beautiful molding and hard-wood floors that I still dream about. My kitchen was the size of one you’d find on a boat (not a yacht) but I picked the Sea Glass colored Corian counters and we had huge parties where people STILL gathered in it.
We loved it because our babies called it home. They had friends on their block. They could walk to the park, the bus-stop and Starbucks for brownies. We had impromptu and planned parties on our neighbors’ lawns-weekly when the weather suited it.
We loved that house because it was smart. We were patient. We lived in a basement. We thought before we jumped. We beat the system of crazy real estate and made an intelligent, mature decision. We bought a house we could afford. It was small but it was so far under market value that if someday we were ready to move to a bigger one we would be able to do that.
We thought we would live there for a very long time. We thought we were beginning our life as mature adults who make wise decisions in order to build a secure life for themselves. We pictured our kids and their neighbor friends walking home from high school together. We finally found our home and it wasn’t grand but the love inside was.
Then the bottom fell out; of the market, of K’s job, seemingly of our lives. You saw our story all unfold on 22 minutes of television.
I don’t use this blog to whine (much) so I don’t intend to start now.
I also try very hard in life and here on the blog to focus on what is good and what is right in my world-which is-almost everything. I know we will survive this and come out stronger. We always do. I am not worried.
And seriously, do I EVER write this much??? (I think I’ve exceeded my usual word count by about 100%.)
Today, I wanted to defend us-mostly to myself. Somehow writing it down allows be to release it and move on.
And I really need to move on.
And I really need to move on.
We have made stupid decisions, but this house wasn’t one of them. We didn’t get greedy. We didn’t get lured in by tray ceilings and two story foyers. We didn’t buy something we shouldn’t or couldn’t have bought at that time, with our income.
No, we stood strong at a time when it would have been easy to give in. We made a smart financial decision. We bought a house that was within our means. We thought we knew enough to be looking ahead. We understood the market was a fluke and we bought within the confines of that understanding. But then, the world changed and it took our finances with it.
We thought we knew.
We thought we knew.
Looking back, we wouldn’t have done it differently. That house more than paid us back in the friends that we made living there. If we didn’t have to relocate, we would still be there-walking to the park and having wine on our neighbor’s lawn.
Now we have renters, that I pray stay- at least long enough for us to get out from under the rock of relocation and rebuilding my business/income that we struggle under daily. That should help keep Mr. Should-Woulda-Coulda at bay.
P.S. Looking for more parenting guidance and tips for self-care? Check out From Chaos to Calm a guided training to help you feel better in this tough season.
We could have written this story too (well, except for the owning a few houses before our first.) We bought around the same time as you. In a neighborhood a little less nice but near yours. And we had a solid little life and a 7 year ARM.
And then hubs heard that his position would be eliminated. And the ARM was nearing its end.
We needed to figure out where we were going to live long term, but first we had to find a way for Daddy to support us. We didn't have to move, but we if the best job had opened up elsewhere we would have.
Other events happened that make our story and timeline different than yours. And we weren't covered by HGTV. But your story was real and true and you did EVERYTHING right.
Ever since watching your episode, we have become Real Estate Intervention groupies. And I don't like some of the judgments that get passed on the people.
Some of them by the dude, who has all the hindsight of the market changes to now criticize (did he really have any clue exactly when the bubble would burst? I'd LOVE to talk to some of his clients who bought in 2005-2007!!!) Others by the way the pieces are edited.
At any rate, your story was AWESOME and you and K. came across as FABULOUS and you looked GORGEOUS in every freaking shot.
You should have your own show!
And you own a rental in the best 'hood in SS. Your kids can go to Maryland for in-state tuition and you can come back and live in it when you're older for a few years and avoid the capital gains taxes after collecting awesome rent cash for years.
Kings 1, Real Estate Bully 0.
Wow, Cristie! I can relate!! When we have a chance I'll have to whine to you about my story. You are right, no regrets is the way to look at it!
Nicole