Money money money!

Jared and I have decided to go straight to the lender for our loan. All of the estimates we've got so far have been pretty similar, and I really don't want to pay a broker.

Mortgages are very annoying and confusing. There are a billion and one little details on those stupid legal size sheets and I don't understand half of it. My one piece of knowledge I've taken from this is: in addition to mortgage costs you have to pay for a year of home owners insurance up front. . .yeesh. More money.

We also learned we MAY have to do some kind of counseling before we close on the house. This is so ridiculous. Jared and I have excellent credit scores, 20 percent down payment, no debt, and steady good paying jobs. . . .counseling. . .pfffft. It's not our fault people made dumb choices and made the real estate market tank. Oh well, we might not have to do it. We shall see.

So tomorrow we lock in our mortgage rate and that will be the last big decision for the house. Jared keeps singing "It's the final countdown." I'm pretty sure the only major thing left in the process is the appraisal. We feel pretty confident the house will appraise for what we bid, if not more. . .but I suppose you never know. I can't wait for this all to be over.

On a personal note, I went to the eye specialist on Friday. I have some kind of bad eye infection in both eyes. The doctor said it should clear up fine, it might take 2 weeks though. I've been in hell not being able to wear my sunglasses. I go back Thursday for a follow up. Wish me luck.

House Gets a Clean Bill of Health!

I finally got word from our real estate lawyer that all the paper work went through on the radon, and the house now tests at .9 instead of 33 for the radon. Yay! Tonight we are meeting with the broker to talk dollars and cents, so hopefully that will go well.

On a down note I'm home again from work because of eye issues. I'm hoping it's just a reaction to the ointment the doctor gave me Monday. I've been waiting 2 hours for the nurse to call me back. At any rate my eye hurts and is irritated again, so I'm home from work since I can't see that great. Ugh! I'm falling apart!

Financing

The major house project we are tackling this week is financing for the house. We already have been pre-approved for a couple of loans, but since we are ideal first time home buyers we figure we can shop around a bit for some new loans. I doubt we'll have trouble being approved.

As far as I know there are two ways to go about it. . .a broker, or going directly to the lender/bank and applying. Right now we're mainly talking to a broker that our real estate agent recommended, but he has not given us solid numbers yet. I know brokers charge a fee for their services, I just have no idea how much that is. It seems the numbers he's given us are the cheapest compared to the other brokers we've looked at. But nowhere did we see him list HIS fee. It was always just closing costs listed. If it's minimal I won't mind paying to save ourselves the head ache, but if it gets expensive I'd rather do the leg work ourselves and save the extra money to buy new couches. :)

On a side note the weekend was super busy. Saturday I worked in the morning, and Jared and I went to the Kane County Cougars game and had a picnic dinner (all paid for by a periodontist my office refers patients to. Can't beat a free night of fun!) Sunday we went with Daniela and Greg to an antique fair in Sandwich and had another picnic lunch. It's neat looking at all the old trinkets and furniture. I managed to survive the weekend with only a mild sunburn too! All in all, a very successful and fun weekend.

Laundry Rant

As most of you know, laundry at the apartment is probably one of the things I most dread doing. Not for the fact that I hate doing laundry, but the fact that we live in a unit of mostly 2 and 3 bedroom apartments and each of the 7 other apartments hold families with 87 billion kids each. Which means that there is ALWAYS somebody doing laundry. There are 2 machines and they are never free when I want them. My favorite day to do laundry is Sunday and Friday. . . .yeah, 8am to 9pm the machines are being used by the family across the hall. . . .gr.

Recently I have found that if I start laundry as soon as I get home from work on Thursdays (around 2:30) the machines have been free. For the past few months my claimed laundry day has remained undisturbed, and I have been semi-happy. (unhappy for the fact that I get up at 5:30 in the morning and work all day. . .laundry is not exactly what I want to do first thing when I get home) Until recently. . . . a new family has moved in and started doing laundry on Thursday afternoons. I got home late a week or so ago (around 3) and found the new family starting laundry! *&%#$@^!&#$%$^#&@%^!!!! Is all I had to say about that.

So today I rushed home from work to hopefully beat the new family and what do I find? Both of the washers open, both of the dryers open, but a mystery basket with a load of dirty laundry and detergent on the floor. What is the correct way to proceed? (Immediately I thought the new family knew I wanted to do laundry and put a "dummy" basket of laundry on the washers to keep me from beating them to it. . .hahahaha, I know I'm ridiculous. . .but it did really cross my mind, I just didn't take it seriously) Well, I waited 15 min and after nobody came I started just one load. I left the other washer open just in case somebody were to walk in (despite my anger, I do not want to be a bad neighbor). After the 25 min wash I went down again to start my next load, and who do I find but the nice lady that lives next door starting a load. So then I told her how I waited 15 min and nobody showed up and that was why I started a load. Next she asks if the mystery basket is mine. . . I told her no. . .and asked if it was hers. She told me no and said she thinks that that basket has been sitting in the laundry room for at least a week. What the heck????? You'd think somebody would miss their basket and clothes. I HATE community laundry.

It's almost reason enough to buy a house for me. I can't wait until August.

Daniela's Graduation Party

This was last weekend. We played bags until it got too dark, then the party was moved inside for some Rock Band and Sequence. Here is a sneak peak of the action. . . I don't think the guys will ever be professional "bag" players.

Fabulous Day!

We had two very big pieces of good news today!!! The first being that (unofficially, it's not in writing yet) the customer is going to resign their contract with Jared's company, which means he will have job security again for another two years!! Second is I called our real estate lawyer and he said that (also unofficially, it's not in writing yet) he talked to the owners of the house and they are willing to take care of the radon problem before we close! I actually jumped around the back room at work I was so excited about the news.

To top off all the good news we got today, I also had a wonderful day at work full of extremely easy patients, AND the last season of Gilmore Girls is finally airing on ABC Family channel so I finally get to see how the show ends. Jared is at the Sox game tonight with all his fellow managers from work, so that also means I get to watch the first episode tonight on the dvr. AND I'm having left over spaghetti for dinner (one of my favorite meals). . . .oh man, such a good day!

More Radon Stuff

We still do not have a final answer on what is going to happen with the radon problem with the house. With Jared out of the country all last week, it was hard to make decisions since he didn't have cell phone service down there. We are still telling the sellers we want the problem fixed before we close on the house. Our lawyer is on a conference till Friday afternoon so we probably won't hear anything about it till Monday. I don't see why they would not fix it since the money they offered at closing was more then the estimate we got to fix the problem. It's in their best interest to fix it themselves. But who knows with these things.

This weekend will be a busy one with work, Daniela's dental school graduation party and another visit from Lucas! I'm sure I'll take lots of pictures to post on Facebook.