Freedom!!!

Ok, so this time we didn't call Dave Ramsey (cut me some slack - when his show starts, it's 5am here).  And we're in Korea instead of Disney World.  But we are utterly and completely debt free!  Well, as far as our credit reports can tell - I'm pretty sure with everything our parents are handling for us while we're abroad, we owe both sets some money right now.  But it's pretty exciting, nonetheless!  And besides, our parents don't charge interest.  I think.  Don't get any ideas now, Dad and Mr. Charlie. 

Anyway, after four and a half grueling months of tortuously slow processing that could be wrought only by the telltale "efficiency" of a government agency - and extension after extension of the original October 21st closing date of the purchase agreement we signed back at the beginning of September (yes, September!) - the sale of our house FINALLY closed this week!  And we have to give many thanks to Ms. Donna for all of her help in making this happen because while we were over here gnashing our teeth in vain, she was the one that actually had to go make it happen!  She helped stay in contact with our Realtor, and she was the one that actually had to sit through what must have been an excruciating closing.  So, Ms. Donna, thank you, thank you, thank you!  We truly cannot thank you enough!  You must really love your son!  :)

All I can say is, if you're ever selling your home and a buyer makes you an offer that depends on a loan being processed by the NACA, laugh in their faces and tell them they'd better sign another six month lease on their apartment.  Because that loan isn't happening anytime soon.  Don't take that offer if the housing market is anything short of dead. I'm serious - if there's even a sporadic pulse, walk away.  This agency is bureaucracy (and idiocy, though I think those often go hand in hand) at its worst.  And I think the sheer pittance that is the aggregate IQ-level of the employees of that place (and yes, i said aggregate, not average) is rivaled only by that of the most exaggerated stereotype of the DMV that you can conjure.  It really was that bad.  So for the sake of your sanity, just don't do it.  I'm sure you already have enough experiences in your life that make you realize just how much of your money the government wastes on a continual basis.  Caitlin, are you sure you want to deal with this stuff for a living? At any rate, I have to give a huge thanks to our Realtor, Chad Milton with Burns & Co., who by far earned his commission in dealing with these people.  Thank you!  I'd say it was a pleasure, but...  Well, you made it as unpleasant as you could!  Thanks for all your help!  (He also graciously provided the pictures of the house that I'm adding now.  They actually have furniture and our other possessions, so it looks more like the house we lived in than the empty shell I took pictures of right before we left the US.  Oh, yeah, and pictures of the outside, which I somehow completely forgot to take!  I'm updating the blog with these pictures from Chad because this is really how I'll always remember our house.)

Though in some small way, I should thank them.  Because aside from the fact that their administrative combination of absolute incompetence and dilatory indifference cost us over $2000 that we'll never get back, waiting to close on a house that sat empty for 5 months, I was so frustrated with the process and relieved to be done with it that I think it took the edge off the sadness that surely would have taken a more prominent place in the mix of emotions that accompanied the sale of the first house I ever owned.  And even though I know it would have been more difficult if we'd actually been in Baton Rouge and gone to the closing ourselves, when it finally happened, I still shed a few tears (and a few more now as I write this) over the home I bought a few short months out of college, unknowingly (consciously at least) against my dad's subtle advice.  The home I shared with my best friend during her last year of college, that I slept through Katrina in (yes, slept), and sweated through Gustave in (for 2 days until my parents' calls eventually got through to inform us of their blessedly functioning air conditioning). The home whose office I worked out of for 2 years, where Blake and I began our marriage, with the great patio space we used for our first (and following) crawfish boil.  And I know Blake will miss it a little too, though not in the same way, and I'm excited that the next house will be more ours than this one ever was, that we'll get to pick it out together this time.  But there's a small part of me that will always be with the little house on Old Hermitage.  And even though, looking back, it scares the mess out of me that I bought a house so young with such little savings (and a variable rate second mortgage with no down payment - seriously, what was I thinking!?!  I know, Dad, I get it now), I'm glad that I did.  And I just can't quite bring myself to regret it.

This is what the house looked like when I bought it.



And this is after Ms. Donna helped us with the flower beds (twice), and we
painted the columns and the facia, and planted a tree, and put a bench on the
porch, and...  you get the idea.