House up-date

Last time I wrote about our new house was on September 26th and I wrote that we scheduled to close on Tuesday October 2nd. Well to say the least a lot has happened since then and as most of you know the house did NOT close then. We've experienced A LOT of drama and A LOT of heartache in the last few weeks, so now I have to take the time to document all of our recent "adventures."

Through all this I have learned that dealing with Bank of America is a nightmare. They are a ridiculous company that may as well be run by monkeys since all the employees there don't have a clue as to what they are doing. We were told on numerous occasions that our house would close on October 2nd so we did everything we could on our end to make sure it did close on the mentioned date. We submitted our down payment, signed ALL the paperwork, got our loan together, etc. Well the 2nd came and went and didn't close because I guess we needed a signed document from Bank of America that said they weren't going to foreclose on the properly and that they were going forward with the short sale. One would think that one piece of paper wouldn't be too difficult to get...yet somehow B of A decided that they needed more time for ONE PIECE OF PAPER!!

We were then promised that the house would close on Thursday October 11th. In the meantime I spent countless hours looking at new homes and other options for us to live since I had no faith that Bank of America would follow through on their promises. As I predicted the 11th came and B of A still was unable to produce that one piece of paper. To say the least I was devastated. That was a HORRIBLE day full of tears and lots of anger. I decided that I had given up on ever closing the house and I was ready to move on. I think I had Spencer convinced that it was time to move on too, but the following day (the 12th) we got a call from Bank of America saying that they submitted the paper we had been waiting 16 days for.

I thought that since we finally received the paper we could get the keys to house that afternoon, but of course it's never that easy! Since all the documents we signed stated that we would take ownership of the home on October 11th and we didn't all those documents were now void and the rates we were given for the loan had expired...meaning we could easily have to pay more now. Spencer spent that entire Friday making phone call after phone call trying to get our loan agreement extended and an appointment for us to sign NEW paperwork for the closing of the home. By this point I was just straight up angry!! I know I don't know a lot about real estate, but I really think I could have taught myself everything I would have needed to know and could have done the entire deal myself in the time it took Bank of America and our escrow company to get their stuff together!! I was beyond irritated to say the least. Spencer and I went in Friday afternoon to re-sign all the documents...which is a TON of paperwork in case you are unaware. I made my anger, frustration, and utter disgust quite apparent to the escrow agent while we were there re-doing everything we worked so hard to get done right the first time!!

Once again we were promised that the house would close on Wednesday October 17th. I definitely wasn't holding my breath on that promise, but to my utter surprise Spencer called me Wednesday late afternoon and told me that he was going to pick up the keys to our new house at 5:00. My body was instantly flooded with a sense of relief. After pretty much 3 weeks of feeling nothing but anxiety it was so relieving to feel like I could just relax.

Spencer did indeed come home with the keys that night but of course the drama wasn't over yet....

 

So let me back up just a little bit. When Bank of America originally approved our offer for the short sale way back in August we were told that it would be a quick process which is why we hurried to sale our home in Moreno Valley and the owners of the "hoarder house" we also advised to move as soon as possible, which they did. The problem is, the owners moved out of state and pretty much left all of their belongings behind for someone else to deal with. The owners 80 year old mother was originally tasked to clean out the house but soon discovered that all that work was going to kill her!! Keep in mind the house was filled floor to ceiling with junk in every. single. room. Feeling bad for the old woman, the owners daughter decided that she would take over the responsibility of getting rid of all the junk. Now their daughter...well she's a piece of work. She decided to move into the disgusting house with her children so she could be there all the time to "work." I use quotations because she wasn't working, she was basically looking for a handout. She lived there for free for 2 months, didn't pay any of the utilities, didn't touch the yard or the pool, and pretty much destroyed the house even more. Spencer would go by there from time to time to check on her progress of getting the house cleaned up and would only see more things she was damaging. With this woman occupying the house only caused Spencer and I more anxiety and stress about the house never closing. The longer she continued to live there the more damage we were going to have to deal with. To illustrate this woman's sheer incompetence as a human even further when I walked through the house while she was still living there it looked like every piece of food she ever ate was strewn out all over the floor and every wrapper or piece of trash was also on the floor. It was enough to give me a nervous breakdown. Basically she was disgusting and worthless.

Anyway......(did you like my rant?)

When Spencer showed up at the house to get the keys the daughter and her kids were supposed to be out and whatever was left in the house was to be ours now, but of course she was still there as well as a ton of stuff. (She did manage to get rid of some of it.) Spencer said there was a u-haul in the driveway so he knew they had been working. She asked Spencer if she could have one more day to get out so Spencer agreed to give her till the following day at 5:00.

Fast forward to the next day Spencer decided to go over to the house around 3:00 to see if she was almost out of there. When he showed up she wasn't there and not ONE thing had been done since the day before. Spencer hung around to see if she would show up. Sure enough at 4:15 (45 minutes until she had to be out) she showed up and begged to be given another day...seriously?!! Spencer refused her request and told her that everything in the house was ours now. Spencer, being the nice guy that he is, he did stick around and help her get as much out as possible until about 7:00, but there was still a garage FULL of junk that now we would be left to deal with. Needless to say Spencer called a locksmith that night and scheduled to have all the locks changed first thing the next morning, we weren't going to take our chances with the crazy daughter!

So that's the whole dramatic story. But the house did close and we officially own the hoarder house. We did get a giant dumpster and disposed of the remaining items that were in the garage. There is a TON of work to do so it will still be several weeks until we can actually start moving in. I will admit that at the moment I am skeptical that the house will be beautiful but I am trusting my husband that it eventually will be. In the meantime we are still staying at my parent's house and are extremely grateful for them letting us stay here with our crazy loud children.

I intend to take lots of pictures and keep the progress of the house up-dated on my blog, even though I'm not sure I'm really going to want to remember this crazy time in our lives.