Our New House

We moved the end of February.  It is now the middle of July.  I still get people asking how we like our new house.  First of all, sadly, it's not our house....we moved from one rental to another.  If it was, then the answer below would be quite different.

When we moved to Oregon 5 years ago, we had a goal to buy a house within a year.  It hasn't happened yet.  In fact, it won't happen until at least next year.  It's not from lack of trying; it's our dang credit that has halted our goal in its tracks!  Not only that, but Jim is his own boss, which lenders DO NOT like!  With the fact that we own a house in California, and that we've been able to pay $1100 in rent a month for the past 5 years, AND not only did Jim's business survive through this horrible economy but did WELL....you'd think we'd be a good risk for the banks.  Nope....our own personal bank won't even give Jim a business credit card.  So he has to pay cash for everything that he needs for his jobs (not always easy!).

So, renters we are.....and renters we will stay until we start to make, oh, I don't know....like....$500,000 a year, or something.  Actually, I'm not sure WHAT they want from us!  We don't even have that much dept: only our house in California and my car.  We do owe the dentist some money, but that does not show up on our credit report.  It's been a very frustrating venture, to say the least.

ANYWAY!  The old house was a nice 2,000 spare foot house that was well taken care of.  New kitchen, nice paint and carpets, fenced yard, nice neighborhood.  Our master bedroom was HUGE.  Central air and heat.  Nice window coverings.  We liked it.  But I have always wanted a large piece of property with room for my animals and a garden and such.  I'd like to get a cow or goats or something that will help feed us.  In the old house, we totally overflowed the garage with Jim's business and a lot of my animals, and there was no way we were gonna park a car in there!  We were even hard pressed to get all our vehicles parked in the driveway.....four cars and Jim's work trailer.

The new house is bigger....about 2500 square feet.  It has two garages (one is used as a normal garage.  The other is totally Jim's garage for all his tools and business paraphernalia.  It's VERY nice to have it all separated), a nice barn (it holds ALL my animals:  rabbits, guinea pigs, birds, rats, mice, chickens.) and one more bedroom and bath (the extra bedroom is Jim's office).  The dining area, family room and living room are all much bigger than before.  It's on an acre of beautiful property that backs up to the river.  There's a brand new deck off the back of the house that is a wonderful place to sit and just enjoy the view.  There are fruit trees in the back and I can legally shoot my rifle.  It fits our life style much better than the old house.

What don't we like?   The yard is not fenced (a problem with three outdoor dogs!).  The absent fence also means that we can not keep wild critters out to protect all my small animals.  We had to fortify the barn so the rabbits would be safe.  Everyone on our strip of houses along the river mows their land.  No problem except we don't own a rider, only a push mower.  The house has not been touched for remodel since it was built, I'm sure.  It has old flooring, old cabinets, ugly wall paper and paneling.  The plumbing is weird.  Every light bulb in the house was a 60 watt or less (had to change them all out so I could see!).  The kitchen is small and all the appliances are old and don't work well.....I have to wash all my dishes before I put them in the dishwasher.  We finally replaced the vent over the stove because it didn't work well and we needed a microwave, so got a combo.  The windows are all old....most of them stick and IF they have a covering, they are old, ugly and broken.  Some don't have screens.  The only air conditioning is a small window unit upstairs in the Living Room.....it doesn't work all that will, either.  Our master bedroom is MUCH smaller.  We really don't have room for our dresser and the bed-set blocks one of the closet doors.  To top it off, we don't like the property manager and the neighbor is weird, almost scary.

I don't want to sound like I'm complaining.  I really am happy I'm here!  Things are much easier with the barn and extra bedroom and garage.  We'd buy the house in a heartbeat if we could!....it IS for sale!  I'm just a little frustrated because I don't want to put any money into improving things when it's not our house....I mean, it does have potential!!  If is was our house, I'd be ripping wallpaper off and knockin' out walls!!  lol!  Maybe next year.  The loan broker that we are working with right now said that next year should be much better for us since Jim's work has really picked up in the past two years.  All we can do is pray that she is right.....that, and be patient just a little while longer.  It's not a matter of IF we will ever qualify for a house....it's when! 

(Pictures coming soon!)