A roof over my head
The madness has begun.
This morning the wife and I got preapproved for the mortgage on our yet-to-be-found-but-surely-overpriced home. yay.
So my realtor is a guy I know from the local minor hockey league games. We're season ticket holders - he probably just pays the old guy at the door $5 a week to get in.
Question: Why have I chosen someone who 1) doesn't have a college education, 2) can't calculate 3% of $200,000 in his head given 15 minutes and 3) is 23 years old, tops?
Answer: I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing. My only bet is that since I see this guy 30+ times a year socially, he's less likely to fuck me over than someone I've never met but has really nice hair, a catchy name and a Mercedes.
Why is the system to buy a home so different from anything else? I bought a car a few months ago and I think I only signed three things. That's more deadly than a gun in this country, folks. Yet when I buy a house, I have to have a realtor, an inspector, a mortgage broker, an appraiser and a fifth of scotch? I could go Blue Label and the scotch would still be the least expensive thing at the table. Where have the world's priorities gone?
We've got 75 days to vacate our apartment. I've purposely delayed the house hunting until the last reasonable moment. Why? I'm making every effort not to get passionately involved in this process. In the end, I'm getting nothing more than a roof over my head and one big fat mortgage payment... and grass to mow... and gutters to clean... and maybe a cracked slab that the inspector will miss...
I think too often these days, the DINKs like us get overwhelmed by the process. I've made up my mind. I'm not going to have my dream home at 28. Hell, I've never dreamt anything about a home other than it be structurally sound and I could put a big ass TV in the living room and a brewery in the garage.
If you've got any pearls of wisdom about home buying, I'm open to hearing them. If you've got a stock tip and you want to spam my comments, go fuck yourself.
This morning the wife and I got preapproved for the mortgage on our yet-to-be-found-but-surely-overpriced home. yay.
So my realtor is a guy I know from the local minor hockey league games. We're season ticket holders - he probably just pays the old guy at the door $5 a week to get in.
Question: Why have I chosen someone who 1) doesn't have a college education, 2) can't calculate 3% of $200,000 in his head given 15 minutes and 3) is 23 years old, tops?
Answer: I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing. My only bet is that since I see this guy 30+ times a year socially, he's less likely to fuck me over than someone I've never met but has really nice hair, a catchy name and a Mercedes.
Why is the system to buy a home so different from anything else? I bought a car a few months ago and I think I only signed three things. That's more deadly than a gun in this country, folks. Yet when I buy a house, I have to have a realtor, an inspector, a mortgage broker, an appraiser and a fifth of scotch? I could go Blue Label and the scotch would still be the least expensive thing at the table. Where have the world's priorities gone?
We've got 75 days to vacate our apartment. I've purposely delayed the house hunting until the last reasonable moment. Why? I'm making every effort not to get passionately involved in this process. In the end, I'm getting nothing more than a roof over my head and one big fat mortgage payment... and grass to mow... and gutters to clean... and maybe a cracked slab that the inspector will miss...
I think too often these days, the DINKs like us get overwhelmed by the process. I've made up my mind. I'm not going to have my dream home at 28. Hell, I've never dreamt anything about a home other than it be structurally sound and I could put a big ass TV in the living room and a brewery in the garage.
If you've got any pearls of wisdom about home buying, I'm open to hearing them. If you've got a stock tip and you want to spam my comments, go fuck yourself.
posted by Jake Barnes @ 11:07 PM
2 Comments:
At 6:10 AM,
Anonymous said…
You are better off having a trusted (keyword: trusted) friend represent you than an educated professsional. The educated professional works for the commission and wants to spend the MINIMUM amount of time pressuring you to buy a house so he or she can maximize his or her profit.
The realty system is totally screwed up.
When you do find the house, do take your calculator to closing and don't let the 22 year old Hooters girl / title company rep pressure you to hurry. You will inevitably find mistakes in the math (they usually overcalculate the property tax).
They had to start over on our mortgage when they accidentally added a 0 to our MONTHLY tax payment.
Good Luck.
At 7:16 PM,
Ashley said…
Have you quit blogging?
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