I do hope this is one of the last of the "big ones" in our lives, though, I truly do.
So, yeah... the whole house thing. It's hard. And, sure, I know, totally a ridiculously petty "first world" problem. But this is my insignificant blog about my insignificantly (white) privileged accidental-immigrant-person's life, so there you go.
The BIG question now is whether to "give away" between 14 to 20 thousand dollars to a "big bank" and live in a smaller, pretty plain and older, but cheaper, residence or "waste" 70 to 80K in interest over the next 15+ years and live more comfortably in a brand-new, energy-efficient place. (in either case the plan is to pay in it off in between 8-15 years, depending on the initial cost).
We had pretty much decided for the newer, bigger option, but twice now, K balked at the idea (remember the old metaphor for our lives? Roller-coaster? Ups & downs?). The first time I totally flipped, you remember, right? The second time was Monday night and all I did was shrug and say, "Whatever, you decide, honey, I'll support you in whatever decision you make." (and then, of course, I "blah-blah-blahed" a bit under my breath about how the boys will be gone by the time we can afford to live in a decent, nice place with enough room for them to play and stuff, blah, blah).
We saw a couple of the smaller/cheaper places yesterday, after I got the boys late to school. :-) And we also saw another new place, BETTER (and more house for your buck) than the other one because it has a basement, BUT, with dark floors and cabinets (dark wood is just NOT my thing for some reason I haven't yet discovered). So we were all flustered and confused and though the thinking switched towards paying more to enjoy more in a house that we can actually retire in if we want to, we were all mixed up with our two main options at this point. Blah.
I know... first world problem. Silly "American-Dream" kind of problem. And yet, shelter remains one of the primary needs of human beings. I may come back to brainstorm a little more about this issue, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.
The biggest problem for us is this: we were completely scarred by our experience with our previous house. We owned three houses and we were pretty successful in buying and selling all three, but the fixer-upper-from-hell (FUfH) basically "ruined" our lives! I never called it that before in the blog, but you bet it was, see the list of things we did to it here, behold the amazing transformation that we made happen with ALL the savings of nine years of our lives going down the drain in the process... K keeps telling me that we wasted those 9 years of our lives (because of the FUfH), so now we need to be very careful and plan things right so we can "do the right thing." And I know that in the end we will.
I have absolutely no regrets, though, and even those painful regrets are completely forgotten now.
Time to move on!! Yipee!! I'm excited, though, about moving to a bigger place. Moving is a big pain, but I enjoy it (in a crazy-twisted way, I suppose).
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2 comments:
It's not a unimportant matter, in fact it's the opposite. K is right to be cautious.
And about the boys,they won't care about the size of the house, they will be happy as long as you are happy and keep providing them with you (amazing!) parenting.
I grew up in a tiny house in a really bad neighbourhood and I'm turned out just fine. It would be nice to be like most of my classmates and have a nice big house, but I think my character is stronger because of it. God has a plan, just trust His plan for you. Don't let what you want be first.
Ask Him... and then accept... what is it that He wants for you?
It's funny, but since I moved here all of this is so foreign to my experience! Growing up I always imagined my future home to be a certain way (hardwood floors, big windows, old and with character, decent yard, maybe even a deck...) but here that is just not an option. In the end we bought a townhouse (end unit) with exactly the same design, ceramic tile, etc. as all the other units in the development. We signed the contract based on blueprints (they hadn't begun construction yet) and it is worlds away (almost literally, as well as figuratively) from what I imagined, but hey, it's fine. More than fine, if you consider that here in Spain most families live in flats, not houses, anyway. I doubt we will ever move to another house, so this is it. So I really can't be of much help on the subject (though whenever we go to the States I become addicted to all those House Hunters/ house sellers shows!) Good luck. I'm sure that whatever decision you make will be fine.
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