The Condo
When you purchase a hair brush or a computer or a bunch of bananas, the process is pretty straight-forward. There are many vendors with a set price for their wares. You can check reviews or perform your own inspection or whatever you want, but you never really feel like you're getting a raw deal or like the process is too onerous.
Purchasing a car is a bit worse. If you buy new, you have to go through a dealer. AKA, a miserable middle-man between the producer of your car and you. You could say that the grocer is a middle-man between you and the banana grower too, but the grocer doesn't charge you a thousand dollars for wheel locks or "premium sound." You can purchase from a private seller, but inspecting a banana is a bit easier than inspecting a car. Unless you really know what you're doing, you're going to want to get the thing inspected by a professional, which requires a bunch of coordination with the seller...
Purchasing a house makes purchasing a car look easy. The Grand Canyon was once a ditch, but over time the Colorado creek became a stream became a river and wore the rock away. You can see that process in home purchasing. Somebody hundreds of years ago had the idea to write down property writes in things called deeds. Since then a creek of lawyers, bureaucrats and their ilk has become a stream and then a river.
You've got the loan people, the inspector people, the HOA people, the realtors and the appraisers. Each of those guys have a bunch of government agencies up in their stuff. Federal loan requirements, local deed copying requirements, FEMA disaster warning requirements, CO detection requirements, etc.
Everything takes time. Everything is paper-based (this feels very archaic to a cloud-computing engineer who doesn't own a printer). Turn-around times are measured in days or weeks, even for simple requests. Even online lenders can't reply in less than 3 business days.
Everyone needs to get their beak wet. Want me to email you the PDF of HOA minutes that you really need to have? $200. Want me to record a copy of your deed? $89. Is your loan going to be conforming, or jumbo? You can save some points by paying a discount rate, but only if you lock for 21 days within the next two days.
An isometric exercise is what they call it when your limb applies force but doesn't move. Republicans vs Democrats is a good example of that: both spend tons of money and effort but balance of power remains even over the decades.
The house process is kind of like that too. The regulators and the private sector gatekeepers push back and forth at each other. They invent and regulate new complexities but never make the process easier or cheaper or safer for the person that all of the shenanigans are actually for... the home buyer.
You could say that Melch and I waded into this adventure last year, but we really entered into it a decade ago when we started saving for an eventual downpayment. You ever buy a pair of shoes and they just "give" you the shoebox for free? Purchasing a house in Santa Barbara is like that. You buy the land, which in super-high demand. The house might as well be free. The boards and plumbing and siding that comprise this dwelling would retail for one third of our down payment. It's the land that costs money because there isn't much land between the ocean (where it's too wet to live) and the mountains (where it's too slanty to live) that separate us from the desert (where it's too hot to live).
So, it was a long process and an aggravating process and an expensive process. We had offers rejected, appraisals delayed, contingencies renegotiated and the escrow date postponed - twice. We ended up moving in about 60 days after we had hoped to close, but this is "Mr Pinto's Adventures," not "Mr Pinto does nothing hard or interesting or worthwhile ever and just watches TV and goes to bed early the end."
Compared to getting a pilot's license, doggie cancer treatment or setting up a training program for broken ankle recovery this didn't feel like TOO much of a departure from the usual day-to-day around here.
Anyway, enough bitching. I'm writing this from my own home, that I own (Sort of. I mean, it's in my name, even though I owe the bank for most of its value). That feels pretty awesome. If it hadn't been hard maybe it wouldn't feel as good.
The Move
Some folks are stressed out by moving. Melch and I actually enjoy it a bit. We've been married nine years at the end of this month and this will be the ninth place that we've lived in during that span. On the one hand, we have more stuff than I want and more than we need. On the other, we spent three years living in a garage with the two of us and a dog so we don't have THAT much stuff.
The previous owners needed to be out on the 3rd. We had to be out on the 7th. The 4th was a holiday so there's your date.
We still had boxes from the last move and sourced some more from friends. We spent Sunday and some of Monday evening packing the non-essentials. We posted to facebook looking for some extra hands to make the moving truck part of things go more smoothly. Melch secured a Ford Explorer from a co-worker.
On Wednesday we got the keys and came over to make sure that the utilities were running and drop off breakables (glasses, liquor and wine bottles, beer bottles, etc). We also carted all of our hanger stuff since that was easier than un-hanging, boxing, and re-hanging.
Thursday morning we got up early to wrap up the packing. Melch packed the pantry and some last minute bathroom stuff while I picked up the U-Haul. We got the cheapest one because we figured two trips would be cheaper than one in a big one. I hadn't rented a U-Haul in a few years, but they've become awesome. I live 5 miles away from the place and I had an appointment for 10:15. I was back at my house with the truck by 10:30, and I had to wait for the guy to get off of the phone before he could help me. Smooth, computerized process. The return went similarly well - they checked the odo and gas and told me I'd be emailed a receipt. Less than 5 minutes each time.
Shortly after I returned with the U-haul of our helpers began to arrive. Gabe and Elysse came by and our housemate Kris helped a bit as well. We had the thing loaded so fast that I had to text the remaining helpers to meet us at the new place instead of the old one. I had told everyone to meet at 11:00, but we had the thing loaded by 11:15 and were out the door. Tony, Mark, Chris and Jon joined us at the new place and unloading went super-smooth as well.
Mark is a neighbor now as well as a co-worker so he had some tips about the place. He suggested that we not even try getting the couch through the door and advocated a through-the-window strategy. I left him and some others to manage that project and returned to the old place with Jon, Gabe and Elysse to pack the U-haul for the second trip.
That went just as well and we were back to the new place within the hour with the balance of our belongings. The bed was upstairs, the couch was in the living room and all of the boxes were strewn about the dining room. Perfect!
We returned the U-haul and celebrated by drinking some patriotic beer (I loaded up on Sam Adams for the holiday) and giving the helpers a tour of my place and Mark's next door.
That done, they departed for their remaining July 4th plans and we set out to meet Eric and Ra for some seriously needed lunch. They came back with us after the meal and helped us split all of the boxes out by room.
Once they went home, it was off to get some supplies for our incoming giant dog at Karen's house. Karen is a friend of ours from DAWG who is a generally awesome trainer and who always has tons of extra dog supplies hanging around.
After that we returned to our place to pick up the fridge/freezer items and get some Taco Bell because we were too tired to cook (not that we had any pots, pans, food, plates or silverware readily available back home anyway) or even stay awake through a sit-down meal at a restaurant.
Finally back at the new place, we rationed out our remaining energy as wisely as possible in order to dog-proof the house for our new arrival. We expected him somewhere between 7 and 8 am on the 5th, so whatever didn't happen before bed wasn't going to happen before Donnie.
The Dog
Speaking of Donnie, he's listed as a Pit Bull / Great Dane mix, but we think he's more likely Pit/Lab/Mastiff. He's about 50% larger than Kogane was. We've been looking for a new pooch for a while now and we found him down in San Gabriel a week or two ago. We liked his mellow personality and his love of people so we figured we'd sign up for a two week foster and see how things went. 12 hours in, things are going pretty well.
He's been a dream in the house while we were working and didn't even give us too much crap when we gave him a bath. He was a little shy around Mark, a departure from his normally friendly pleasure-to-meet-you demeanor. We aren't sure if that's Mark or the fact that the meeting was in his home instead of on neutral turf. We'll be introducing him to some others soon to find out and work on that.
He needs to learn some commands. If he stays with us, he might need to learn a new name. Donnie is way too similar to Gani. He also needs to go to work, go to the beach, go to the field and generally participate in all of the awesomeness that Santa Barbara has to offer. There will be time for all of that.
For now, we're just happy to have a dog in the house again. It appears that Donnie is happy to be here as well.
The MultiMedia Extravaganza
There are a bunch of photos from the move.
There is a video of the new place before we moved our stuff in.
There is a video of the new place about 24 hours later. Donnie features in that one.
Remaining work
We still aren't done putting up boxes. The kitchen has been delayed as we want to wash a lot of the stuff that we didn't use much when we were sharing things with our housemates in the last place. We still need to get a craft desk for Melch to replace her old sewing cabinet, so those boxes are in a corner. We are still going through some laundry. We need a dining room table and maybe an area rug and... and... and...
The "and" is the thing. When you have a rental it doesn't activate the nesting instinct in the same way because you can't just change things. You're not going to paint the walls on a whim or get a new fridge or remodel the bathroom.
When you own, there's never a "done." That said, we tend to be busy folks with spartan needs at home. I don't see us turning every weekend into a DIY adventure. Then again, you never know what the future will bring.
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