I honestly don't know where to even start. I guess I'll start with this... God blessed us with a house this week. It has been a long journey. We have been living in Gary's basement for almost 3 years now (2 yrs, 8 months to be exact). The plan was to live here for 1 year and then buy a new house. A roller coaster of events prevented that plan from happening, and now here we are, almost 3 years later, just reaching the end of our journey.
I mostly wanted to write this all down, so I never forget all the ways we see God working in this. I'm going to make it short and sweet, but there is a lot to tell, so it may be a bit of a long post.
We submitted an offer on a short sale house on March 31, 2010. We had no idea what we were dealing with, with a short sale. It's anything but short. It's the opposite of short. It should be called a "long-sale." We then waited a full 6 months without hearing any answer from the bank, and no end in sight. We prayed and trusted God would give us the house in His perfect timing, even though we didn't understand it.
Skip to present. Last Friday, a new (foreclosure) house popped up in our home search. After browsing the listing, we called our realtor immediately and scheduled a walk thru for first thing Monday morning. We spent the weekend praying for clear direction and wisdom about pursuing this one, or sticking it out with the other house. On our way to see the house, however, neither of us felt led either way. We knew that we would need to make a decision immediately and act quickly if we wanted a chance at getting this new one. We would just have to trust God to lead us. After seeing the house, I felt like there was every reason in the world to pursue this house, but I still felt hesitation. I couldn't place where that hesitation was springing from though. After some quick prayers and a short discussion, we realized most of our hesitation was coming from the attachment that had formed for the other house over the past 6 months. So we submitted an offer, not knowing what to expect.
As the day went on, Jared and I (separately) fell more and more in love with this new house. By Monday night, all of our hesitations and fears were completely dispelled and I felt a peace about our decision. But then new fears set in. We started to wonder if our offer was good enough. Our fond feelings for this house were growing by the minute, and we discussed the possibility of submitting a better offer in the morning.
No need. God had it covered. At 8:45 Tuesday morning, we received a call that the bank had already countered our offer! This was such exciting news to us, because we weren't even sure if they would respond at all. Ever. We prayed, countered back, and then waited again. At 5:00pm, the bank gave us their final offer, which was almost the exact price Jared and I had decided would be our highest offer. We couldn't believe it. We accepted. And then cried. And then thanked God. And then cried more.
Here is perhaps the most visible way God appeared in this situation. After watching the housing market for a full year, maybe this means more to us than someone who does not know it as well. Foreclosures tend to go FAST as they are often times priced far below their worth. This house was listed as a foreclosure in July. In August, they dropped the price by $30,000. In September (on Friday), they dropped the price another $40,000. So the price it was listed for at that point is about half of what we believe it's worth, and we are both in awe that it wasn't sold by Monday morning. But even more unbelievable is the fact that they didn't have any other walk thrus. We found out why. The only site that had the reduced price listed was Keller Williams, which happened to be the site I was searching through. Every other real estate site we checked did not list the new reduced price until Monday night, after we already had an accepted offer. AND all those other sites also had the listing information incorrect, stating the house was about half the size it actually is.
We truly believe God was blinding everyone else's eyes to this house, and saving it just for us. We are beyond happy, and cannot wait to start our life of memories in this new house.
Isn't she cute?!!
Cake time!
