Grandma to the Rescue!

The actual process of buying our home was a bit of a nightmare.  Granted, most of it was done from out of state and we only have one month to get it closed, but still...it was a lot worse than it should have been, in my opinion.

As I mentioned, after our house hunting trip in January, we decided on this house.  It wasn't exactly what we'd been looking for, but it came closer than anything else, and we were on a tight schedule if we wanted to have a roof over our heads at the end of February.  So we put in an offer on the house and arranged for a home inspector to do his thing. 

The home inspection was...well, it seemed fine at the time.  It revealed problems we weren't aware of (isn't that the point?) and we had our contract amended to include the seller fixing the major problems, most notably the A/C. 

We started working with our mortgage officer to get the loan taken care of.  I would not recommend them to ANYONE.  (Of course, keep reading, you'll also see that I wouldn't recommend the home inspector, the title company, the home warranty, OR the seller)  I'll refrain from using names, but if you want to know, just ask :)

We went back and forth with the mortgage loan people for probably three weeks?  They kept requesting additional and increasingly ridiculous paperwork.  Mostly having to do with my job and "proof" that I'd accepted the position in Texas.  Um...too bad for me that AT&T does everything verbally!  I accepted over the phone and they sent me an email about it.  That email was not sufficient for the loan officer.  I had to try to find someone in HR to sign it.  It was not easy.  Then I had to write a letter saying I had accepted it.  Then I had to write a letter explaining why my salary in 2011 was lower than in 2010.  Um?  Hello?!  I TOLD you I took 4 months off after having a baby!  Crazy.....

Anyway, during those three weeks, we were also going back and forth with the seller, through our realtor.  They didn't accept our original offer and wanted more money.  Then we had to add the list of things needing fixing to the contract.  Etc, etc. 

A few days before our close date, as the movers are packing/taking our things, we hear from the bank that our mortgage probably won't be ready in time and we'll need to push the closing back.  Not going to work!  We told them we have movers delivering our things to the house on Feb 29th and we HAVE to close before then.  They said they'd try to be ready in time.  We were set to close on Monday, February 27th.  On the Friday before we get a call from our realtor that the title company is moving offices and has to push back our closing by at least two days.  We were very upset.  They didn't know this in advance and schedule their closings accordingly?  We begged her to do everything possible to get us in at least on Tuesday.  No way we were going to pay the movers to take our stuff to storage for two days, only to have to move it in ourselves.  Especially with me starting work on March 1st. 

She said she wouldn't know until Monday, and she'd give us a call.  So we make our drive down to Texas, hoping all of this is going to work out!  We stayed Sunday night at my grandma's house and spent Monday mostly just hanging our waiting to hear what was going to happen - instead of closing on the house like we'd planned.  We heard from the realtor that afternoon that she'd gotten us an appointment to close on Tuesday afternoon.  Whew!  But then we got a call from the movers that they'd arrived early and would like to deliver our stuff on Tuesday.  Um....luckily, they were able to work something out.  They unloaded our stuff to a local mover, who agreed to come drop it off first thing on Wednesday.  And we didn't have to pay extra.

So Tuesday, the big days comes!  The best part was that we stopped at the airport on the way to the closing to pick up Andrew's mom!  She was able to come spend about a week and a half with us, helping with the move, cleaning, and watching Eve.  I don't think we could have done it without her!

From their, we headed to the close.  We had to wait for a while, but finally it was our turn.  We started signing papers only for Andrew to realize that the papers had the WRONG address on them.  Neither the bank or the title company had caught it and if Andrew hadn't, we'd have purchased a home that doesn't exist.  We had to sit there and wait for 2 1/2 hours while the title company tried to coordinate with the bank on getting the correct paperwork.  Finally, after 5pm, we got the right paperwork and finished signing only to be told, "Oh, by the way, sorry but we can't officially close tonight now since it's after 5.  We'll have to finish it tomorrow." 

We told them no way - we had movers coming first thing in the morning and we had to get into the house TONIGHT.  Our realtor came to the rescue and contacted the seller who agreed to let us sign a temporary lease to get access to the house before actually closing.  So finally, hours later, we were done with the title company and the bank.  So we thought (incorrectly). 

We had a bit of good luck at that point - very close to the title company was a Costa Vida!  It's no Cafe Rio, but it was the closest we had, so we headed over for some much needed dinner-deliciousness!

Then we went and met our realtor at the house and got the keys.  Yay!  We stayed there that night on air matresses and the movers came bright and early on Wednesday morning (Feb 29th).  I went out to get us some breakfast (we had no fridge so no food and no milk for Eve).  Andrew and his mom checked off boxes as the movers unloaded and kept Eve out of trouble.

So glad we didn't have to unload that by ourselves!

The place was chaos, but at least we were in!

Eve bonded with her Sunny D....

....as the boxes piled higher....

Wednesday was a crazy day.  The movers finished shortly after lunch and we started what unpacking/organizing we could, knowing I had to start work the following day.  We also apparently officially "closed" on the house that day, although no one told us until we happened to ask after the fact.

Some views of the moving clutter:

One night that week, I think Thursday?, Andrew had a basketball game at the church, so we all went to watch!  Eve had a blast with Grandma!

Before I share a few fun pictures of playing with Grandma, I'll finish the moving story.  It was a day or two after moving in that things began to really go wrong.  We started finding things wrong with the house that the home inspector had "missed" or neglected to tell us.  Obvious things like the garbage disposal and built-in microwave not working and the master toilet and bath leaking into the living room.  On top of that, things were not working or done that the seller had agreed in the contract to fix/do.  Like the A/C not working, the dishwasher not installed, and the carpets not cleaned to name a few.  Ah!!! 

So we got to work through those fun things.  We went through the home warranty a couple of times (won't make that mistake again).  They sent some out to spend 10 mins, tell us he didn't know what was wrong/couldn't fix it and we had to pay him $75.  So, in a nutshell, lots of things we had to fix ourselves, or have yet to fix (like the microwave).  Thank goodness Andrew is handy around the house!  But we drew the line at the A/C.  There was NO WAY we were paying for a new unit.  The seller was insisting it was working when they sold it to us because they'd had it serviced after the home inspection report and the home warrant should cover it.  The home warranty was refusing because there was no proof that it had been working and they only cover things that break AFTER we buy the house.  So we were six weeks without A/C, but very fortunate that only about one of those weeks was really hot and miserable.  We became very adept at the timing of opening windows and using ceiling fans to keep our house cool.  But in the end, the seller and warranty worked things out and we got our A/C fixed!  Yay!

Unfortunately, things also drug on with the title company and bank.  The bank hadn't sent us closing papers before the actual closing, so we had no idea how much money we'd have to put down at the close.  They also neglected to send us a copy of the appraisal, even though we repeatedly asked for it.  We got that after the closing.  Anyway, all our savings was in a bank in Utah, so we had to get them to send us a certified check, overnighted to Michigan, for a very large sum, so we'd be sure to have enough to cover whatever the down payment/closing costs would be.  The difference between what we brought and what was needed was very large and the title company told us they'd issue us a "refund" check for the difference as soon as the close was official.

Three weeks later, we had yet to hear from them or get our money back.  Andrew kept calling, but the lady who did our close was avoiding him - wouldn't take him calls or call him back.  Finally, he told the receptionist, "If I don't have a check in my hands by the end of the week, I'll have my lawyer contact you."  You guessed it - the check arrived two days later.  Shocking what it takes to get people to do their job. 

We had a similar fight with our property mgt company in Michigan at the same time.  Of our $1,400 security deposit, they withheld $1,000 for ending our lease early.  There was nothing about that our lease and they'd already re-leased the place, but they argued that they had to pay the realtor's fees to find a new tenant.  Hello?!  You would have had to do that in three months anyway when our lease ended.  And if you wanted us to cover that, you should have put it in writing!  Andrew was escalated to the head of the company who basically told him, "Well, this seems fair to me, even if it isn't in writing, so you'll have to sue me if you want your money."  What?! 

We really didn't want to go that route, so Andrew, being brilliant, came up with a compromise.  He sent a demand letter to the company, saying that he would agree to pay 1/4 of the fee for the realtor since we left 3 months early (or 1/4 of our lease).  But they needed to send us the remaining $750.  Luckily, they agreed, so we settled it at that.  These people....

I know this is getting way too long, so let me just say, I've just scratched the surface on all the problems we ran into during this move/close.  It was absolutely insane.  It felt like a competition from all parties for the title of "Who's the Most Stupid".  Honestly, I don't think we could choose if we had to.  They're all winners in that contest!

See, this is why I try to block these memories now.  Reliving it through writing this blog is getting me upset again.  It's all basically behind us at this point.  Now we're just focused on moving foward and establishing our home. 

So, with all of these things going on, we were so grateful to have Andrew's mom with us!  Not only did she watch Eve as was the intention, she also cleaned and unpacked!  And cleaned and unpacked some more!  Gotta love moving into a filthy house....

Eve had so much fun while her Grandma was here - here are a few pictures:

Sorry for the length and negative tone of this post - wish it had been a better experience but we've learned a TON about what not to do next time around!  I know I've left things out - I should have had Andrew write this.  He's the one who took care of all these things and got us through!