TLDR in The eye of every storm

02:53am

I’m at work. No surprise there.

We’re moving again. That’s always exciting and makes me want to vomit. Just when we found our perfect, cute, adorable little Craftsman home, after one year, shit hit the fan. We’ve been under a rent-to-own agreement for two years with the owner of the home. I put down option money, and the whole nine yards, got my credit score back up to a surprisingly solid number, obtained my Certificate of Eligibility for the VA home loan, met with the lenders, got the zero down payment deal blah blah blah blah blah.

The landlord/seller, who we will call “Tim,” because that’s his name, called a few weeks ago and basically said his marriage is in tatters, he has to sell the house, and can we buy it right now?

That was a shock.

Our neighborhood is not the safest place, and after living there a year, I think Katrina and I have decided we don’t want to live on constant guard about every car that drives by or person that walks down the sidewalk. It’s not exactly conducive to raising a family (that is not on the table right now, but if I’m going to buy a house, it will be for the future).

However.

Because we had option money already on the table, the realty process was well underway and we coughed up $400.00 for a home inspection, which happened today, despite me getting off at 0600 after a sixteen hour shift and desperately needing that time to sleep. Katrina handled most of it, and even with fibro/RA, she was a godsend, basically waking me up afterwards for the highlights.

Here’s the highlights:

1. Because there is no subfloor in our house (1932 wood laid across pier and beams), there is a great deal of moisture build up beneath the house, making it resemble the tar pits of rancho la brea.

2. The air-conditioning duct work has more holes than Bonnie and Clyde’s car due to natural wear/tear and old age, not helping the moisture fact one bit. Basically, the underside of our house is a muddy, comfortable, cess pool.

3. The above two combined together create mold.

With Katrina’s asthma and general help and the amount of money needed to fix these problems, we can’t buy the house. However, that does not alleviate Tim from the contract he signed with us.

He calls us and said he had two more offers on the table that wanted to assume the contract as investors, with tenants renting to own, so they can upgrade and sell us our own house to us. Basically, they would make all the repairs, up the price of the house when we buy, and they would make money off of their investment. Sounded good, because we still have the option to NOT BUY but not move out until next March after the mold revelation.

Well he and his realtor claimed that the banks wanted 40% down for such an offer instead of the standard twenty which I think is a bunch of horse shit. So that all fell through.

Tim, around six pm, when I finally get back to sleep, calls again and said he had an “as-is” offer but the family wanted to move in during the end of August. He said he’s breaking the lease, will refund our deposit, and and we’re basically done here. I said “I understand” and asked for time to think things over.

He then called the realtor and told her that we agreed to those terms.

The fuck I say. We didn’t agree to shit. If he were an ice cream flavor from Ben and Jerrys, Tim would be Praline’s and Dick.

I called our Realtor, who basically said Tim can’t legally do any of this, is bound to our lease, and if we say “no,” the answer is “no.” She then sent us referrals to two lawyers she uses, saying that in this case they would waive their attorney fee’s just to go after this son-of-a-bitch.

I waited until Tim was probably asleep, around 10:30 at night, to call him back and tell him that I was upset that he presented his case in a way that was our only option, when it was indeed not. I told him even if the house foreclosed, we would just pay the bank, and then buy it from the bank instead of him. I reminded him we have not violated one single covenant of our lease, and have no reason for eviction, and conveniently dropped the names of the two attorneys our Realtor sent us.

I heard the fear of God in his voice. It literally quivered. He basically asked us what would it take for us to let this deal go through in August. Fortunately, I happened to have a list of demands readily available:

1. Our security deposit back.
2. Our option money released.
3. May, June, July and August rent free to cover moving cost, future security deposits, and the possibility of having to move earlier than August 31st.

Monetarily, this amounts to about $7,000 worth of refunds etc. I didn’t expect him to say yes, but he did, and we executed the contract tonight.

So I’m getting a very large amount of money refunded, and living completely rent free, and don’t have to purchase a mold ridden house, but have to fucking move again.

Honestly, I really love that house, but Katrina’s heart was never there. I’m trying to see all of this as positive, but I’m tired, and I just see it adding more work to an already insanely overworked Jonathan.

We’re leaving for Rockaway Beach, Oregon, on Tuesday for a vacation. I think I’m completely disconnecting from the world during that week.

I really struggle with the unexpected and change.

tldr/ getting a bunch of money, living for free, but have to move