Dustin and I decided in July to sell our home and find something a little less expensive. Remarkably, we received a contract after seven days - something almost unheard of these days. We viewed several houses and decided to put a contract on a house that we really liked.
House #1:
The house was very nice and had been totally redone. It had been painted inside and out. It had brand new carpet, granite counter tops, new hardwood flooring, etc... It was a trying experience in the offer/counter offer times. Finally, after much negotiating we reached a verbal agreement. About fifteen minutes after our verbal receipt was given another offer was presented for full price. There was a question as to whether or not the verbal agreement would be recognized. It was and we proceeded with the inspection. Unfortunately, after receiving the inspection report we learned that there were many issues with the home that would be almost impossible to negotiate. In addition, they were issues that were not disclosed on the seller's disclosures. We decided to terminate the contract in our option period.
Upon returning from out of town, we learned that the title company had not received the release of funds paper from the sellers. After much phone tag, the sellers' realtor was finally able to be reached and the title company received the needed paper. Then the title company didn't want to release the funds because they said they wanted to make sure it cleared. We knew that the check had cleared the day it was deposited. After many more attempts and presenting the bank statement that showed the check had cleared we finally received our money back after a week and a half. (We desperately needed the money in order to put a contract on another home).
House #2:
We decided to purchase a brand new Royce/Espree home. It was actually larger than the home we were selling and was much less expensive. It was awesome to know everything was new. Everything seemed to be progressing nicely, and we had enrolled Isaiah in the elementary school the new house was zoned for.
The week that I started back to work I received a call from our realtor letting us know that there was a rumor that Royce builders might be having some difficulty. The next day I sent an email message to our loan officer at Hammersmith Financial (an in house lender for Royce) and it came back to me. I called our realtor who immediately went to work to find out what was happening. She was informed that Hammersmith was no longer being used and that all client files were being transferred to Countrywide (not a reassuring feeling knowing what happened with Countrywide earlier in the summer).
More strange things began to occur. Many Royce employees began to lose their jobs. There were only two builders left to take care of all the houses in Houston and the surrounding areas. Stewart Title refused to close anymore Royce homes because of liens being placed on the homes by contractors. We were told that only a few of the major things from our inspection report would be able to be fixed. Alamo Title would be taking over the closing of our new home. We also had to amend the contract to take off having the fence provided, but the sales price was dropped by $2,500.
Tuesday, September 2 I received the HUD statement for the upcoming sale of the home we were selling. When I looked at the amount we were to receive I nearly passed out because it was much lower than what we were expecting. We did not realize that the money in our escrow account would not be received at closing (Live and Learn), but that it would be refunded to us within thirty days. In addition, the HOA transfer fee went from $75 when we purchased the home in 2007, to $1,500 (YIKES! Is that legal? The developer who did it said it was.) All of this meant that we would not have enough funds to close on our new home. Panic began to set in.
I contacted our new loan officer with Countrywide (Shawna - She is awesome and a major blessing!) I told her everything and we adjusted the funds and she received clearance to get the loan taken care of. When she called me Tuesday night to tell me the loan portion would be fine, she also mentioned there might be a question as to whether the house would still be able to close on Friday due to issues with the builder. She said there was a meeting scheduled for Wednesday morning and that either she, the Royce sales associate, or my realtor would be calling me Wednesday to let me know what was happening.
Wednesday, midday, I received an email from my realtor saying to call her right away. When I called her back she said the house would not be closing on Friday and that all of the sales associates had lost their jobs. There is some issue with the houses being tied up in litigation currently and that it would probably be five or six weeks before we could close. We now had less than 24 hours to be completely out of the house we were selling and to find a new place to stay for short term.
I took a half day off on Thursday and went to get a mailbox, transfer our mail, and start searching for a new place to stay. Dustin and I went to three apartment complexes on Thursday evening. The last one had pity on us and have allowed us to lease the "guest suite" apartment for the next month. We know from talking to others that this was a complete miracle.
House #3:
At 2:45 a.m., after completing the packing and cleaning I decided to check www.har.com to see if there were any new listings. I did find one that interested me very much and is also in the right school zone and much closer to where we work. On Friday morning at closing I told our realtor about it and she was excited about it because she had just learned about it the night before too. She was going to wait until after closing to present it to us. She made a call and we went to see the house after closing. We really like the area and the house has been updated - it's 35 years old. We made an offer.
This morning we received a counter, we countered, they accepted. We are having an inspection done on Monday morning. (The inspector knows us well - he's giving us a discount this time). Please pray all goes well. It does seem that God has had a major hand in all of this. It's obvious that His timing is not our timing, but it's always perfect! (The current closing date for this house is September 26th).
Dustin keeps telling the boys and me that this has been like a giant treasure hunt and the prize will be great.
No comments:
Post a Comment