We've bought a house!



For the past 2 years we've been checking out homes in the area as the housing bubble exploded, and prices fell off a cliff! Sadly so many have, and continue to, lose their homes so there are more foreclosures and short sales competing with "regular" home sales, driving prices down, down, down. This area of California it seems is one of the top 10 worst hit in the nation for foreclosures, but while for some it is a tragedy for others its an opportunity to finally buy a home that is affordable, that is realistically priced, not hyper inflated by a market played out like a game with reckless abandonment by the financial sector we were used to trusting. My how things have changed in the past few decades as we all went about the business of living our lives. Well, its easy to get a good rant going on that subject but suffice it to say, we're all paying the price for taking our eyes off the ball, entrusting others to keep our ship on its seemingly eternal, smooth course, giving up the wheel to those we voted to be our voice as we pursued other more personal interests. My, look what happens while the cats away....the mice WILL play!


When we first moved to this state from the NW 5 years ago our mouths dropped at the high cost of real estate - ANY real estate, be it a virtual shack anywhere near a beach or your average 3 bed/2ba home in any inland city such as Bakersfield. From what houses had been valued at back in our home state, leastways in our area of the state, we'd were looking at double, even triple, the price! We decided at that time to just continue to bank the $$ from the sale of our home in WA, even though, long story short, we ended up losing a chunk of it in the financial downturn, thanks to those very same unscrupulous and greedy folks I just ranted about...in our particular case, two young investment brokers at Wells Fargo Bank. But thats another story, one however that shook our long held faith in banking institutions. I had always looked up with respect and admiration to the great benefactors in the Banking Industry, at one time had worked in a bank for several years when I was a young twentysomething. I liken it to how I had always looked up to Doctors as near Gods. Such innocence has long been lost. Those days are forever gone, forever lost...

Despite the market flooded with foreclosures and short sales, we soon discovered it would not be easy, finding and purchasing a home here. What used to be simply a house for sale, was suddenly a house for "auction"...contrary to all the "normal" procedures we'd always understood re buying and selling a house. Oh no, in these times, unbelievable as it would have seemed, the banks, the overextended, failing banks, STILL continue to hold all the cards, having become fat on TARP funds. Seeing no rush to quickly release their huge real estate inventories, letting them "trickle" out more slowly created more demand and higher prices. When we'd see a REO house listed at a certain price we soon learned that was just the "starting bid". After placing your bid you could expect to be met within a few weeks with what is your "best" offer, and after that, what is your "biggest & best" offer??? Never knowing of course, if there even was anyone out there who HAD actually bid higher than you....or just the bank "working the deal". Time and again we got frustrated and stopped looking. Thinking that we'd just continue to rent for a few more years.

Then just as we were least expecting it, a house basically fell into our lap! Funny how that happens...wish too hard and it won't happen, fa-get-about it and it will! Something to do with "energy" or physics? But wait, wasn't that the principles set forth in the book "The Secret"? Well, hate to argue, but the thinking, wishing and praying on the matter had the opposite effect for us...just "letting it go" is what worked for us! Regardless, thats what happened. A house we'd looked at a year ago was suddenly back on the market, one we'd both felt would be "perfect" for us...it seems the previous pending buyers, the ones who'd held the "winning bid" THAT time, got tired of waiting for the banks to maneuver and agree on a selling price, it was a short sale (or as our realtor calls them "agonizingly long drawn out sales") and after 8 long months found something else. The very day the house hit the market again our realtor, bless her heart, pounced on it, called us and within hours we'd placed our offer, a few days later we were told the bank accepted. Timing. Its all about timing! We still held our breath though for the next weeks, waiting for something to thwart the deal...a bad home inspection, an appraisal that wasn't where it needed to be...so, so many different things that could have resulted in disappointment.

And so, as we prepare to move into our new California home, we once again look to the future, and hope for more stability and peace as this country begins its slow and long road to recovery. I am grateful for my home, even as I feel a sense of guilt, as I consider all those that today are homeless in this great country. I believe its long past time America turned its generosity inward, and took care of its own. The needs are many and great.

Home is a shelter from storms - all sorts of storms. ~William J. Bennett