June 18, 2013

What is wrong with me?  When my life is full of drama, all I want is calmness and when my life is calm, I'm only nervous, waiting for more drama.
I have had very good luck for the last six months, other than the usual up and down fiascoes I've learned to live with involving my daughter.  My dad decided last November that he wanted me to have a house before he died.  I really have no idea what prompted this, other than his brush with bladder cancer, which is in remission, but he decided that this is what he wanted to do for me.  So he and mother drove down to Florida in November and he announced that he was going to finance a house for me so I had one week to get one bought.  Talk about stress! But it was GOOD stress.  The first good thing to happen to me in a very long time.
I contacted an agent and began the search.  My dad, whom has owned his home outright his entire adult life of 60+ years, could not understand why you could not find a house you like, tell the person you want it, pay them and get the title.  It was a frustrating experience for him and that added a little more stress for me, but I always work best under pressure anyway, and it was kind of fun watching him react and imagining how different things used to be once upon a time.  Anyway, we put a bid in on a repo through H.U.D.  It was listed for $78k.  We bid $74k and had to wait almost a week for an answer.  We didn't win that bid.  I was disappointed and I could tell dad was too, as he just wanted to do what he came for and go home, but little did I know it was a blessing in disguise that our offer was not accepted.  I truly believe someone higher up must be watching over me, otherwise I would have wound up in a totally different place in life.  I keep fucking up and somehow it keeps turning out ok.
As it turned out we found a house at least three times bigger than the one we had bid on.  It was an older home, built in 1959, a repo and needed a lot of work.  It was 2300 sq. ft and had an addition of probably another 250 sq. ft. that was just roughed in and needed to be finished. The house had been on the market, vacant for six months and had just been reduced to $68k.  That is basically an unheard of price per sq. ft. for any house in Florida, even a shack.
So having been burned by underbidding on the first house, even though the house had been on the market for a while, we bid the $68k cash offer and waited.  Hours seem like weeks when you're waiting for an answer on a life changing decision.  By this time my dad had been in a hotel room for almost two weeks and was more than ready to go home.  We finally heard back and learned that we had won the bid.  The title company wanted earnest money and tons of conditional contracts signed and that infuriated my dad.  He still didn't understand why, if we were paying cash, couldn't he just give them a check and they give us the keys.  Sometimes I don't understand why life can't go back to a more simple time too.  Unfortunately, thanks to the swindlers and shysters of modern day, it will never be that easy again.  So we muddled through the process and my dad wired $68k to the title company and viola.... we owned a house in Florida.
Dad had the deed titled to both himself and me.  The agreement is that I will pay him $500 a month for the next ten years, at which time he will consider his loan repaid in full.  If something happens to dad before the ten years is up, the house is mine, free and clear.
About a month after we got the keys, dad sent a payment schedule with a letter.  It's the first time in my life that I can ever remember my dad being so generous and genuine in showing affection for me.  I read the letter twice before I cried.