Frustration

The process of buying a house in the Twin Cities has been filled with nothing but frustration for me. The first time we looked at houses, we realized that it was going to be difficult to find something within our budget. We considered expanding our search to townhouses, but our real estate agent talked us out of that. Instead, we increased the amount of money we were willing to spend by a little. After a couple more weeks, we found the house we wanted to buy. It was a foreclosed property in Cottage Grove, Minnesota. So on Memorial Day, we wrote up the offer.

Without much problem, we seemed to reach an agreement with the seller, although it did take them what seemed like an inordinate amount of time to get back to us. The inspection found some issues that needed to be addressed before we would buy the house. After a few days, the bank which owns the house agreed to make the repairs. We were supposed to close on the house on Thursday, June 19. On Wednesday, June 18, our real estate agent let us know that the closing would not take place as originally scheduled. Apparently the paperwork was not ready yet. So, the closing was set for Monday, June 23. As I wrote about earlier this week, that didn't happen. The closing was rescheduled for 4:00 this afternoon, but as of yesterday the title company had not supplied the required paperwork. It wasn't until 3:00 today that my real estate agent told me that the paperwork was ready. Of course, since I didn't want to make another unnecessary trip, and use even more vacation time from work, I was still in Cedar Rapids.

So today, a week after we were supposed to complete the paperwork to buy the house, we still do not have a house in Minnesota. The paperwork is ready. We are just waiting for the seller's agent to specify a time at which we can get this done. Mel and I would like it to be tomorrow, but our agent is afraid that it might not be until Monday. If that is the case, Emma and I will likely stay in Cedar Rapids until Sunday so I can get more packing done. Yesterday I scheduled the moving company to load up our belongings next Thursday, so we really need to finish this purchase. Once that is done, we need to concentrate on getting our Cedar Rapids house sold.