hqueen's collection of Far From the Usual stuff.

[frustratedearthmother]

Woo Hoo! Only three more days! I know Thursday can't get here quickly enough! Yep - sign papers - go get a load from storage and then head HOME!!! So excited for you!

The challenge is do I build up a down payment or do I put all that money into paying off the credit card.... decisions decisions...

Here's the way I make those decisions: Which has (or will have) higher interest? If the interest on the credit card is %13.9 and you can get a car loan for 3.9% then that's a pretty easy decision.

Credit cards are a good tool. I once put a travel trailer on a credit card, lol. DH was accepting a job all the way across Texas and we had decided he should live in a travel trailer for that year instead of throwing all our money away on rent. But, because he had already finished one job and hadn't officially started the other one - it didn't look good on the credit app that he was "unemployed."

I had recently gotten a 0% offer for a cash advance on one of our cards (back in the good ol' days) so I maxed that sucker out! I think we requested about 25K and had a check in hand in about two days. Bought the travel trailer and paid it off before we ever had to pay a penny in interest! Sold the trailer when that job was up and recouped most of our money back out of it. Pays to play the game sometimes, lol!

We went paint chip shopping on Saturday for the heck of it. We picked out quite a few shades in the colors that we like, so now it's a matter of narrowing it down. I'm torn between wanting to wait and unpack some of the curtains and pictures that we have before I choose the color, or just winging it and hoping that I remembered the colors that I have accurately enough

Well, if you buy paint first and find that you didn't remember your colors accurately - then you get to go buy new curtains!

Good luck on whatever you choose! And, congrats!

 

[baymule]

COME ON THURSDAY!!!! It will feel so good to get those keys! Good idea to go load the truck.

Pay off the credit cards, it will look better on your credit report.

 

[sumi]

Getting there!

Good advice above re the credit card. If you can save on interest, go for that first. It will work out better in the long term.

 

[hqueen13]

Thanks for your thoughts, yall! I think you're right that paying off the card is a good idea. Now I just need to do it! The card with the highest interest is actually the one that I use in my biz and I'm trying very hard to keep all the money in my biz, but I think I may end up paying some of it out of my own pocket just because I've already claimed everything on the biz anyway, so this is "old" debt and I can't claim it as it is, so I might as well pay it off out of pocket. I'd REALLY like to find a balance transfer so I can move it around and save some money, but I'll have to wait for that. Everything else is tied up a bit too much to manage that right now and I don't really want to shuffle things around.

I really like the new updates to the budget system that I use. I'm thrilled I was able to pay off my one card completely, and everything else is looking really good. I was able to pay off the BF's card that he uses all the time, too, AND I found that there was enough left over to not only cover the closing costs that we'll have to pay tomorrow, but also to cover the first month's payment next month. That's great news. Now I just have to be strategic so that we can stay ahead and always have enough in the bank to cover the next month's payment. Right now I've even got almost all of his bills covered for December, so December's pay checks can go towards January's bills. That makes me feel SO good. Then the tax returns will get dumped into the credit cards again, and we'll just keep chipping away. I can't WAIT to be debt free. It's going to take a while because there are some things we're going to need to deal with for the house, and I'll need to budget for unexpected stuff, too, but I feel better about our situation than I ever have before. I don't think the BF sees it that way yet, but hopefully he'll begin to feel more comfortable if we can maintain this for a while.

I was able to get our realtor to send us some of the documents for tomorrow so that the BF can read them. I know he'll feel better if he can read stuff in advance. He's all worried because his parents took 8 hours to close on their beach house, but that's because his dad is an a$$ about things and his parents are very combative and don't trust anybody, so of course it took them that long. I figured if we can get even some of the documents that will save some time and energy. Of course, my realtor also told me either you sign it or you walk away, so I'd rather just sign things, but I definitely want to know what's in it for sure. So we'll see how it goes tomorrow. I know he's really stressing over the whole thing, so hopefully he won't get too resistant tomorrow. We'll see how it goes. I'M ready for this to be OVER.

And yeah, I'm still torn on the paint. I do have the bedspread for the master bedroom with me, so I can match that, but I don't have the big picture that hangs over the bed, so I'm not sure if I want to chance it or go grab that out of storage to make sure. I KNOW where that is at least. The other curtains, I'm not so sure, but at least I know where that picture is! So we'll see how things go. We also have to get a mattress. I've been looking at the ones on amazon, they're only $268.00 for a queen, and they have really good reviews for being that price. They say they don't last quite as long as other mattresses, but the price is really right, especially right now when I'd rather spend that money on other things (like paint!).

I also contacted a friend of mine because she's got some sage smudge sticks, the BF actually requested that we smudge the house. It cracks me up when he asks for things like that. I'm totally fine with it since I wanted to do it anyway. I'll do it once when we get there, and then I'll have 2 of my friends come up later and we'll do a bigger job and actually do the whole property and everything.

SO ready to just DO things!!!!!! I can't wait!!!!!!!!!

 

[frustratedearthmother]

This is so exciting! Try not to stress tooo much over painting cuz you've got YEARS to do it. But, it certainly is easier to do before everything is in place... so understandable that you want it done first. Hoping that tomorrow is a breeze and that closing doesn't take anywhere near 8 hours, lol!

 

[baymule]

It's almost yours! Tell me about sage smudge sticks.

 

[hqueen13]

@baymule sage smudging is a very old tradition that comes from native americans, though many many cultures have smudged with various things, including herbs and incense. The thought is (as I understand it) that it helps to clear the energies in a place.

Settlement went SMOOTH as butter. The woman was AWESOME and explained every single piece of paper to us, and told the BF where to initial and sign. She was really sharp and on top of things. I was super pleased with how easily she answered questions and explained things. Our realtor was starving, so when we finished he took us to breakfast at Waffle House next door, LOL. I love our realtor! We at and chatted about things we can do to improve the value of the house and such, and then we headed up to the unit while he went back to get the keys and the final paperwork. We grabbed a few things (though the BF wasn't really in DO mode yet, which was frustrating me because I was chomping at the bit!).

We got up to the house a bit before the realtor did, and so we walked around outside a little. Somehow we found out how pleased they were that they mowed the front yard, but they didn't bother to do anything else, like clean the gutters out. We found that all over the house, little things that just weren't done all that well. They left a LOT in the house, mostly junk, but quite a few things that are probably valuable. We'll have to figure out how to find the value of them and make sure we get our money's worth!

We putzed around mostly, smudged the house, and brought in the handful of things that we had with us. I don't even remember what all we did, but it wasn't that much, mostly, I think, because we were a bit overwhelmed at that point.

Friday we spent way too long talking to GH that morning, and then TW, before we finally got on the road to get up to the house. We met the BF's mom at the storage unit and loaded our pickup, plus her and my SUV's and managed to clear the 5x7.5' unit. That made me HAPPY! We took everything back up to the house and got it all unloaded, after the BF's mom had to have the grand tour that took forever (seriously, the house is not that big!).

Saturday started a little slower than we wanted, but we managed to get moving. I met my friends K&D up at the unit at 9 and we got our SUV's loaded, and then headed to the house. The BF got slowed down picking up his cousin's trailer because her husband had put a lock on it and she couldn't find the key and then it was full of wood chips that he had to empty out. He got there just before my friends and I got back, and had the fridge, dishwasher, and table top in the pickup (why he did all that by himself I don't know!!). We loaded the 2 SUV's again, and by that time his brother and mom got there with the pickup. We got everything loaded and headed to the house. It took WAY longer to unload everything than it should have because his dad and grandfather showed up, and THEY had to have the tour, too, and then everybody started goofing off. K and I ended up doing a lot of heavy work because she and I were the only ones that kept moving. I finally got everybody wrangled (seriously, my cats are easier to herd than this) and back to the unit for a final run. All told it took 5 SUV's, 4 pickup trucks, and 2 trailer loads to empty the 10x20 unit. We finally finished up as it was getting dark. We would have taken everyone to dinner, but they all had to leave, so we went and grabbed a bite before we went home and crashed.

Sunday, we picked up a chair from TW and managed to get some things done in the house. We started on the spackling and taping in prep for paint, and rearranged a few things. The learning curve on this house is big! LOL It's just odd, and old, so things aren't always quite like they should be. They left us an upright freezer, but it wasn't defrosted, so we started that process, and of course made a mess. Seriously, how the hell are you supposed to defrost a freezer without making a mess?? I was wishing there was a floor drain right at that moment, but there wasn't!

We started painting the master bedroom, and that ended up being a little crazy. The color we picked out ended up going onto the wall PINK instead of gray purple like we wanted. We were trying to get rid of the pink in the house (the other two bedrooms were already pink AND so is the bathroom!). After several trips to Home Depot I got the color I wanted, they were kind enough to retint the paint, which I didn't think about the fact that it would make it darker. I ran out of paint, and went back for a gallon (thankfully I bought a gallon and not a quart!) of the new color. When I started painting the new color by itself it was WAY lighter than the mix so I had to repaint the whole room anyway. Oh well, so it goes.

So finally, by yesterday evening we had accomplished quite a bit. I got the green on the wall and finished in the guest room, got the tape down, and we set up the bed, plus put a few pieces in the room where they are going to go. The master bedroom is painted and finished, but the tape is still up since it was still drying a bit. We got our bed-in-a-box onto the bed with the new box spring, where it is 'inflating' as we speak. We managed to get the kitchen shuffled around so that we had room to put up the table so I have a place to work at least. The freezer is defrosted and drying in the basement. I need to scrub it out because it is filthy. We moved all the stuff in the office into the middle of the room so that I can finish spackling, sand, tape, and then paint on Friday.

The plan is to finally sleep there officially on Thursday night. We still haven't yet because the bed hasn't been ready and I've been doing so much painting.

Oh, and the baseboard heat is AWESOME. It keeps the house SUPER toasty! 68 degrees of baseboard heat is WAY warmer than 68 degrees of forced air! Hopefully that will help us save money!

Now I'm just itching to get back in there and keep working! I'm in the office until Thursday, so I will have a break, which probably isn't a bad thing since my body is SO sore from the painting. I would have loved to get in the hot tub again last night but it was too late. I guess I might be able to get in tonight, I'll have to text the BF and see if he wants to....

 

[sumi]

Wonderful update! Any chance of a few pics of this new place? Great to hear everything went so well. Tomorrow is Thursday, so you have a day to rest those sore muscles now before you get back to busy. I'm really happy for you guys

 

[frustratedearthmother]

WooHOO!!! So glad closing went smoothly. Sounds like ya'll are on the move to get this thing live-in ready! I hate picking paint - it NEVER goes on the way the way it looked in your head, lol. But, thankfully, most 'mistakes' can be salvaged.

Hope things continue to go smoothly and that ya'll are sleeping there soon.

Congrats on being homeowners!

 

[baymule]

And tomorrow you heave a big sigh of contentment. It is yours and you live there. I am so happy for you that all the torment and crap you have to do to own a house is over.