Dogs Steal Yarn

Emily has been staying with us for the past couple of days while in town for last night’s reading, and it’s been wonderful having her here. Wonderful because I’ve missed her terribly since she moved to San Francisco, and wonderful also because while spending time with her, talking about books and writing and literary gossip, I’ve had a glimpse of my old life…a part of myself that has been necessarily set aside since the baby was born. He’s getting older now, wanting some independence, and I think that’s allowing me to become a bit more of myself again. It was strange, to feel like myself—simply myself—and realize I hadn’t felt that way in a very long time. I’m not sure this makes sense outside of my own head, but there you have it.

I’m not sure what I want to say here, except that I caught a glimpse of my old life and apparently it isn’t some past existence now lost, but just a part of me that I’ve had to put on hold. And that it is still there and still good. And I can be a good mother while still being that other person, that writer. It’s not a matter of still being able to go to readings and still being able to talk with fellow writer friends about what we do. That’s never been a question. It’s something else…it’s the way I think about myself, the way I feel about myself, and I’m doing a terrible job of explaining it. I guess it’s this—I’ve felt for the past year that my intellectual and artistic life had gotten drowned or muffled, necessarily consumed and muted by my role as mother to baby. It was reassuring yesterday to find that I’m still in there somewhere. I can see that as the baby gets older, that other part of me will be able to emerge more and more.

The reading was excellent, and completely packed. A lot of our friends from the MFA days were there, everyone doing well. My agent, who is also Emily’s agent, was there, so I got to introduce her to Billy and the baby.

Emily's book is out but everyone else from our MFA class is revising their book for the umpteenth draft or have trashed their book and started another or, like me, their agent is still shopping their book around. It was a good reminder, that it's really fucking hard to find a publisher for literary fiction these days. None of us are writing thrillers or romances or chick lit or what have you (nothing wrong with those genres, of course, but they are much easier to get published because they tend to sell more copies). We've all taken the harder route, because it just happens that that is what we're moved to write, what we love to read. And it's hard for all of us and we're all still doing it anyway. It's easy to lose sight of that in the face of Emily's success--the first of our group to get published. I think it was good for all of us there last night to see each other, to ask, "So what's up with your book?" and hear most of the answers were just about the same. We're just all going through the process. And hopefully we'll all be able to be there for each others' readings in the future. (I do hope we all make it, though the odds are against us, aren't they?) Another thing I was reminded of last night at the reading was how very much I like the people I did my MFA with, and what a talented group it was. Watch this space for announcements of other forthcoming books from that group in the years to come. I'm lucky to call some really gifted people my friends.

And now I'm getting a bit sappy and sentimental. Sorry to do that in public. But I'm getting ready to move away from them all, you know. I think I may be able to convince a few of them to move to Portland. Portland is the new Brooklyn. Or at least, that's what I've been telling people.

My friend Emily will be reading from her novel, The Last Summer of the World, at the Park Slope Barnes & Noble (267 7th Ave at 6th Street), tomorrow, Monday the 30th, at 7:30 pm. If you're local, Thumper and I hope to see you there.

healthy pancakes for yummy kids

Since my little vegetarian Thumper can't tolerate cow's milk protein, his pediatrician recommended I work some blackstrap molasses into his diet. Yesterday I made him some oat banana molasses pancakes and they were a huge hit. He especially likes them cold as a snack. And I think they're pretty tasty too. No photo because we already ate them all!

Note, this isn't a vegan recipe. Thumper and I do eat eggs. Any suggestions for an egg subsitute for those vegans out there?

1 3/4 cup rolled oats
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup blackstrap molasses
1 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
1 1/3 cups soy milk (or you could use cow's milk)
1 banana

Grind oats in a food processor. Mix with flour and baking powder. Beat
eggs and milk together and add to flour mixture. Mix in molasses.
Break banana into small bits and mix in. Beat well.

Makes 12 small pancakes, just the right size for a chubby little hand to hold.

PS: THANK YOU for all the birthday wishes for Billy yesterday! Tomorrow night I'm taking him out for our first date since Thumper was born. My mom will be babysitting. The baby's never gone to sleep without me there to nurse him down, so I suspect we might be coming back home to an angry, awake-but-exhausted little guy and a frazzled gramma. Then again, maybe it'll go fine. My mom can walk him down for naps, so why not for night time? Oy vey. Wish us all luck!

Happy birthday, baby!

Okay, so let's set aside the cat issue for the time being, because today is a Very Big Day. Today is Billy's 40th birthday! (Clearly I am the much younger wife.)

Happy happy happy birthday, baby! I love you so much! Thumper loves you so much! Diego loves you so much! Your evil pee-terrorist cat apparently loves you so much!

Billy always reads the blog comments (except when it's about knitting). Could you please help me wish him a happy 40th?

Another straw, another camel

I keep the bad stuff off the blog, for the most part. That is, until things reach a breaking point. (Have you noticed that? Though there's bigger bad stuff that will never reach the blog because a person needs some privacy after all.)

The latest breaking point? Today we threw out our couch. It was a year and a half old and I liked it very very much. A month ago we threw out the loveseat where Billy proposed to me. Two months before that, we threw out an upholstered chair that I adored.

The common denominator = Oscar Madison, evil peeing kitty from hell.

It started when we came home from the hospital with Thumper. Or rather, it started in the four days that we were in the hospital, and the smell greeted us upon our return. Oscar doesn't like change. He doesn't like chaos, and above all, he apparently doesn't like strangers in the house. Four days of labor at home brought chaos, stress, and "strangers" in the form of the doula and my mother, who wasn't a stranger to the cat but had the temerity to be sleeping in the house, which apparently hadn't been authorized by the cat. Then we all went to the hospital and now he was alone with two dogs, with Billy only coming home to sleep and a dog walker coming in to walk the dogs and pet the cat three times a day.

Not surprising that we came home to a pee-soaked couch. (And yes, we're sure it was the cat. There's no mistaking the smell of cat pee vs the much less offensive dog pee.) We washed the slipcovers. We soaked the cushions in enzyme spray. We covered the couch with scat mats. We hoped he would settle down. He sort of settled down in that he switched from the couch where we sat to the upholstered chair where my mother would sit when visiting once a week.

Out went the chair.

And then things calmed down when we started letting him go outside in the backyard. And then Sadie moved out and he REALLY calmed down and we had a nice little family vibe going for a while there.

But then we started showing the house, to sell it. And so there were strangers coming through ALL THE TIME. We tried to keep him outside during the open houses, but he'd always sneak back in. Exit the loveseat.

And it took a while to sell the house, so there were a lot of showings, so in spite of the scat mats, now exit the couch.

(Nature's Miracle only does so much. Things get to a point where there's just no saving the thing. We put the couch out on the street yesterday afternoon, and a little while later through the open window I overheard a couple walking past and wondering why such a nice couch was being thrown out. Talking about how they could get it home. And then the guy sputtered, "Whoa!!! It stinks like cat pee!")

We love the cat, but damnit, I kind of feel like it's my right to have a couch. Clearly the cat doesn't like change...well...hella big change coming up with a cross-country move. That's temporary, but we're moving away from all our friends and family, so that means we're going to have a lot of visitors. So we can't have a couch in Portland because everytime we have an overnight guest we'll have to throw out a piece of furniture?

I don't know what to do with the cat. Honestly, he loves to be outside, he's a mighty hunter...I'd love to find a farm that would take him. I can't keep going the way things have been going...just can't.

And no, it's not a kidney or uti issue. He got a clean bill of health in the midst of all of this. The vet, normally fantastic, just handed us the business card of an animal psychologist. Yeah, I'm sure THAT'S covered by our family insurance plan.

Sigh.

A little bit angry at the cat. Can you tell? When I found him on the street I had no intention of keeping him, but we did and we do love him. But I also love to sit on furniture that doesn't smell like cat pee. Why is he making it so #&@$*) to keep him?

Ideas? Advice? Someone who wants to adopt him who thinks they can get a better handle on the situation?

No, seriously. Anyone want to adopt him?

Maybe we should have been working on that basement clutter this weekend

...but it was much more fun to hang out with friends, drink coffee and eat cookies, walk in Prospect Park, take Thumper to Coney Island to stick his toes in the ocean...

See? Happy kids result from parents finally taking a break and playing all weekend.

The basement can wait. I'll tackle it tomorrow.

Photo taken by my beloved Xina who I finally got to see after far too many weeks. Love you, little girl! MWAH!

Ah, the sweet smell of moving boxes

The packing supervisor

One set of obstacles cleared. On to the next. Anyone have any advice about moving a dog and a cat cross country?

Now that we know where we'll be living (provided the inspection goes well on Tuesday, which we expect it will), I've begun to mentally arrange furniture and paint walls. I was thinking a cool olive shade in the entry hall and up the stairs and in the upstairs hallway, and a lighter cool green or maybe even a pale greenish gray in the living room and dining room. Now, though, I'm thinking about Portland weather and the way the light will be there, and wondering if I want warmer, brighter colors to balance out the gray overcast that I expect I'll be seeing out the windows in much of the rainy season. None of this thinking is all that useful, since of course I won't be choosing paint colors until we've lived in the space for a week or so and I've seen firsthand what the light looks like. I'm just thinking about paint colors to avoid thinking about the basement. Specifically, all the accumulated stuff that has to be sorted out in the basement.

There's the stuff that we'll clearly keep. There's the stuff that we'll clearly toss. The stuff we'll clearly donate. But then there are the things I know I don't want but that I feel an obligation to keep--like the box of my childhood dolls that my mom saved and gave to me recently. They weren't anything I felt especially attached to as a kid or now, but somehow the idea of not keeping them feels cold-blooded. As I type this, now I'm thinking...yeah...let the dolls go. There are boxes and boxes of things like that, though. Boxes of family obligation. If I don't keep my grandmother's not-all-that-special glassware, it doesn't mean I loved her any less. And yet... This is how we came to have a basement full of boxes. Billy travels light, so it's almost all my stuff and it's almost all family stuff I feel guilty about not wanting. I've moved most of it twice now. Some of it three times. Without opening those boxes.

I don't want to be lugging these things around with me for the rest of my life. It's so easy to say, "Right. If it isn't beautiful or useful, it goes." So much harder when you actually have to head down to that basement and sort through it all. But if by moving we're paring down, simplifying, streamlining our life to bring it closer to the life we want to live as a family, I have to do the same with the material clutter I've built up around me. Not all the clutter--I like layers, I like piles and clusters, and that's fine. But the things I don't love or use...I can't keep moving them from house to house, just because it's hard to admit that I don't want the furniture from my childhood dollhouse or the ...well...I can't even come up with another example right now. I've ignored that stuff for so long I'm not even sure what's down there.

Advice welcome. I'm not looking forward to this. Or, rather, I'm looking forward to being done and having lightened the load. I'm not looking forward to the process that will get us there.

St Joseph even helps out Jewish Buddhists

I owe you an update, don't I? Sorry about that. There have been various hectic goings on coming between me and the computer. But here I am, ready to fill you in.

You recall a recent post bemoaning the way the sale of our house had been going, yes? And you recall the suggestion in many comments that I bury a statue of St Joseph in the front yard and the house would sell. And then hopefully you recall that I did bury said statue. I guess now you're wondering how it all worked out.

I blogged about the house not selling on a Monday night. On Tuesday morning I ordered a St Joseph statue online, encouraged by the stories you'd told me in the comments and trusting that asking for a bit of help couldn't be a bad thing, even if we aren't Catholic. (Is a saint so drastically different from a bodhisattva, when you get down to it? And I've been known to chant the name of Kwan Yin, so why not ask a nice Jewish carpenter for some help selling my house? Though in the case of Kwan Yin it isn't a matter of appealing to a divine entity for favor or intervention etc... and...well... You know what? I don't want to get into the sketchy theological justifications for my burying the statue of a Catholic saint in my yard. I'd have a hard time supporting why I believed it would work and squaring it with what I normally think I believe, so let's all avert our eyes politely from the inconsistencies, please. Okay? Okay.)

Well that was uncomfortable. Where were we? Tuesday morning. St Joseph real estate kit (yes, that's what it was called.) ordered. Tuesday afternoon, an offer comes in from a solid buyer. Less than Buyer #2, but only a little less, and enough to meet our goals. We accept. There's already an open house scheduled for Sunday, though, and we decide to go ahead with it, intending to only accept back-up bids if there's more interest. (Do you see where this is heading?)

On Friday Buyer #5 has the engineer appt. and it goes fine. They're ready to sign a contract on Monday. Great. Our lawyer sends the contract out.

On Saturday the broker who had been shady with us (see that initial post) calls and tells us she's left the firm. We're handed over to another agent who we liked better anyway, who lives in our neighborhood so knows it better. We should have gone with her in the first place, but live and learn...

Sunday. The open house. It's packed. More packed than any previous open house. And on Monday two offers result. One of them is really high. So much higher than the accepted offer (higher than any previous offer) that we start to waver on our resolve to stick with that safe, bird in hand low offer. The couple making the offer makes a really compelling case. We take a deep collective breath, nervous because of what happened with Buyer #4, and we leap. We go for it.

That evening, UPS delivers the St Joseph, and I bury him.

And you know what happened? The deal went through. We're in contract. Unlike the first five deals, we've been in direct contact with these buyers, because we ran into them outside the house after they saw it at the open house and got to talking. Billy closed this deal, not the real estate agent. The house is going to a great couple who really want it and are excited to buy it and live in it. Everybody's happy.

And so we went ahead and made an offer on a terrific house in Portland. A house that's in a neighborhood we want to be in, in good condition, of a great size and layout for our needs and lifestyle, and best of all...well within our price range. And that offer was accepted. We're in contract on that too, contingent on the engineer report that will happen early next week.

So there you have it. With a bit of luck and a saint in the yard, headed toward a happy ending in New York and a happy beginning in Portland at the end of August.

And yes, we'll dig St Jospeh up when we close on the house and bring him to Portland with us. And after closing we're going to make a donation to Habitat for Humanity.

And now, let the great Purging of Assorted Crap in the Basement begin.

Each age with Thumper brings its own discoveries and challenges, its own rhythm that shapes our days. The stages slide into each other, they overlap so subtly that it takes me a while to notice. And then it will hit me all at once, how very differently we’re passing our time now than we did just a couple of weeks earlier.

I had one of those realizations this afternoon. Thumper used to stay stubbornly awake until 10:30 or 11pm each night, then sleep in until 9am or so. He would nap from around 12 to 2, then from around 5 to 6ish. Anything we wanted to do outside the house—errands or playdates or the playground—were best done in that window between the two naps.

Lately, though, he’s started going to sleep earlier—between 9 and 9:30. So now he’s waking up between 7 and 8am, and napping from around 10 to 12. But he still holds off on that afternoon nap until between 4 and 5. We’ve got this bigger window of time to get out into the world now.

Today we woke up at 7:30, played for a bit, had some breakfast (mmm cinnamon raisin Ezekiel bread and banana!), nursed and took a little nap from 10 to 12. At twelve we got ourselves dressed (okay, I got us both dressed) in outside-going clothes, we had some lunch (mmmm Dr Praegers spinach pancake and leftover quinoa), and headed out in the stroller (with the sling tucked into the carry basket, because you never know when he’s going to want to cuddle close for a few minutes and help push the stroller instead of ride). We ran some errands, including having his fat little feet fitted for his first real shoes (blue sandals!). Then off we rolled to the tot lot to play with the other toddlers, then we rolled home, got an ice coffee for me and shared an oatmeal cookie. A nice long nurse and then he napped for two hours. He woke up at seven and had dinner (mmmm... Amy's Organic cheeseless roasted veggie pizza and steamed broccoli! Because Mama didn't feel like cooking!) and a bath and then Billy came home. Some cuddling with Daddy and then off to bed at 9:30. And now he and Billy are both asleep and I’m blogging.

It seems totally natural, even inevitable. This is our schedule, this is the rhythm of our days. But two weeks ago our days had a totally different rhythm. And two weeks before that, different. Etc. Now that we’re both used to the stroller (okay, now that I’m used to the stroller. He always liked it fine) I’m loving how it allows us to walk farther from home, go places the subway won’t easily take us, stay out longer… When he wants a break from the stroller, it’s easy to pop him into the sling and the stroller still carries our stuff and we have fun pushing it together. I’m also loving this new, earlier bedtime. It means I can actually get some things done after he goes to sleep without having to do them at midnight. I can’t complain too much, as he gets his night owl tendencies from me, but I’ve always been a bit envious of those moms whose babies naturally go to sleep at 7pm. (The flip side, though, is how early those moms have to wake up. I’d rather have the night owl baby than have to get up at 6 in the morning, thanks.)

Now that he’s cruising so well and getting ready to walk, he wants to get out and explore more. Wants to cruise the platforms and railings at the tot lot, slide down the little slide, flirt with all the moms. We head out in the stroller and we point at the pigeons and talk about the city buses rolling past. We wave to big kids going past us—he LOVES to see big kids. It’s our good-bye to New York summer and we’re having a blast together, the kid and I. And this fall will begin our Portland adventure. We’ll have lots of exploring to do. New playgrounds to check out. New moms to flirt with. Big kids and pigeons to wave to. They DO have pigeons in Portland, right?

PS: We're going to sign the contract to sell our house tomorrow! The buyers (yep, buyers. yes, I've been keeping a secret from you) already signed! And we made an offer on a place in Portland! Woohoo! News! Good news! All shall be revealed after we sign tomorrow.

On a happier, knittier note...

Check out Kellie's great version of the Blank Canvas Child's Vest. I love the way it looks in a variagated yarn. (And what a gorgeous child...)

Joke(?)

Q: What did one New York real estate attorney say to the other?

A: Nothing. They're both taking four-day weekends in the Hamptons.

Keep those good thoughts coming, please!

Good stuff is in the works, but the lawyers are slooooooowwww. Actual news and details soon, I hope.

Oy vey.

Today is a rather important day in this house-selling process. Please send some good vibes and hopefully I'll have some fantastic news to share tomorrow.

Another stickyhot Sunday

Have I mentioned that I don't especially care for hot weather? Yes, I think I have. I've mentioned it over and over again for several years, in fact. So let's take that as a given and move on, shall we?

(But, ugh.)

I cast on for the empire waist cardi last week and this is all I have so far:

The Shine is working up nicely on Knit Picks US#3's. I'm liking the Knit Picks needles very much, and am not minding the Shine at all, which is saying something because I usually don't like to knit with cotton. Must be the Modal in the blend that makes it nicer to work with.

Not nearly enough knitting time. I keep going to sleep at night instead of sitting up, knitting. Clearly I need to get my priorities straight.

Good stuff is happening with the house, but I'm afraid to trust it, much less blog about it. I hope to have good news to share soon. If your fingers are crossed, keep 'em crossed for now, please.

Not wanting more than you need, or the perils of getting caught up in house porn

The one that got away

We’re moving to Portland because (besides the fact that we love Portland and want to live there), given our specific set of circumstances (the value of our house here vs. the cost of houses there; Billy’s earning potential in his particular field there) Portland will afford us a significantly better quality of family life than we currently have in New York. With the profit from this house (yes, I ordered a St. Joseph statue to bury in the front yard), we’ll be able to buy a house out there with either a very small mortgage or no mortgage. I won’t have to work while the kids are young. We’ll be able to save money and contribute to our retirement accounts. Great plan, provided we stick to it.

When we were out there in May, looking at houses, we saw some really nice places in our price range—the price range we determined because it would allow us to follow that plan I just outlined. All of those houses we saw then are gone, because we can’t make an offer out there until we’re in contract here. We’re working with a really great realtor, and he continues to send me listings. Last week, he sent me the listing for my dream house. Absolutely my dream house. Pristinely restored Craftsman house in a great location in SE Portland. Dripping with original details. In beautiful condition. People…there was a sleeping porch off the master bedroom. Built-ins everywhere. Dark wood. A lovely yard. Big front porch for people-watching. And at the very top of our price range, but still in that range. It should have been priced $25k higher at least, but they wanted to sell quickly. And sell they did. In two days. We couldn’t move on it because that was when Buyer #4 pulled his crap. And then it was gone.

I forgot all about the houses we’d liked very much at the lower end of our range. All I was able to think about was this gorgeous beast of a Craftsman that I’d missed out on. We started looking for more houses like that one, and the prices crept up and up. We found ourselves saying, “Well, maybe we set our price range too low. Maybe we should be looking to spend 50k more. Look what great houses we could get for 100k more.” We did the math. We’d be able to swing it.

But, see…that’s what we’ve been doing all along, and it hasn’t been working. We don’t want to “swing” as much as we can. We don’t need a perfectly restored Craftsman house dripping with original details. We WANT that. What we NEED is a nice, simple house in good condition with at least three bedrooms and one bath, with upgraded mechanicals, in a close-in neighborhood. We can get that at the bottom and middle of our price range just fine and achieve that goal of very low monthly expenses.

I’m glad we caught ourselves before we got too wrapped up in it and made an offer on some fantastic house that would have been way more than we need. We managed to bring each other back down to earth, and we looked again at the less-expensive houses, saw again how very nice some of them were, how perfectly suitable to a young family. Maybe in a few years we’ll be in a position to buy one of those fancy Craftsman houses. But maybe after living in a nice, simple house for those few years, we won’t feel the need to “trade up” anymore.

We’ve got a kind of fancy-pants house now. It needs work, still, as old houses do, but it’s got a lot of original Craftsman detail. It’s a big house by New York standards, with a big yard. And we’re swinging it, but it’s a stretch now that I’m not working. When we found this house, it was my dream home. And now that we’ve lived here for four years, it’s just our house. Some days I don't even notice the built-ins or the fireplace or the woodwork. I see the kitchen that needs cleaning and the garbage that needs taking out. We’ve already stretched ourselves for a beautiful house just beyond our price range. The point is to not recreate our New York life, mistake by mistake, in Portland. The point is to do something different, something smarter and simpler. I suspect I’ll be coming back to the post, from time to time, to remind myself of that.

I haven’t been blogging about the sale of our house because I haven’t wanted to jinx things. But now everything that could have gone wrong pretty much has, and there’s nothing left to jinx, I want to get it all out in the open. I feel like it’s been a dirty little secret: Cari’s house still isn’t sold. Shhhh!

Yeah, well.

A quick recap of recent events to bring you up to speed.

Buyer #1 you already know about. We negotiated to a good price and accepted his offer. Two days later he backed out of the deal because a house he’d liked better came back on the market. He didn’t waste much of our time and it was early days yet and we were fine with that, pretty much.

Buyer #2 had put in an offer before Buyer #1, but it was so far below asking he’d been told to take a walk. Now he was back offering more money. It was pretty well below asking still, but we felt it was a fair price and one that would allow us to reach our goal, which is to move to Portland with a nice nest egg tucked away and a very small mortgage on a house out there. We felt a bit ill-disposed toward this buyer, frankly, because there had been a lot of heel-dragging and back and forthing and what have you, but we were going to go forward with the deal. The buyer had the engineer report done and it came back fine and he was all set to sign the contract.

And then…well…we had a bird in hand and were all set to plunk that bird into a lovely two-story limestone cage, when we noticed two very fat birds in a bush.

Along came Buyer #3, a lovely family with an 8-month-old baby, coming from Manhattan and looking for more space in Brooklyn. I met them (usually a bad idea) and liked them very much and thought they would be terrific neighbors for our neighbors. We love our neighbors. The wife had lived in Portland. She complimented my mother’s paintings. It was all very lovely. Too bad we already had an accepted offer from Buyer #2, yes? Ah, but Buyer #3 wanted the house so very much that they offered more money than Buyer #2. $40k more.

Yes, that’s right. $40k more. They offered over asking price because the house was perfect for them. And it is. This house is perfect for them. And I liked the idea of them taking over our home. We gave Buyer #2 the chance to raise his offer and when he declined we passed him over in favor of Buyer #3. Totally legal, though it did give me some ethical pangs. But $40k, or the thought of it, drowned those pangs out. That’s a hell of a lot of money for our family. We had a deal with Buyer #3, an accepted offer. A nice family would be moving into our house. We were thrilled. So thrilled that when an even higher offer came in, we kept them as back up bidders and stayed with Buyer #3.

And then the wife portion of Buyer #3 forgot that the house is perfect for them. Or rather, still loved the house but got cold feet over the move to Brooklyn. Her husband was either crushed or very very angry or some combination. Apparently what he said to the broker was, “We’re a young couple in a young marriage and we have some things to work out.” Okay. Glad I wasn’t there to hear that conversation. But couldn’t they have worked these things out in their lovely, spacious Brooklyn townhouse bought from me and Billy?

They wasted a lot of our time AND we’d thrown over a buyer who was ready to go for them. Not their fault. We made that choice. And that was the risk that Buyer #2 had taken by bidding so low.

Back to Buyer #2 with our tail between our legs? No. Because we had that backup bidder, who was offering $45k higher than Buyer #2. We were giddy. We were counting unhatched chickens. Counting and spending unhatched chickens. Never wise.

You see where this is going, right?

What we didn’t know, and what the broker should have told us, is that Buyer #4 dangling the big money in front of us had previously put in a shockingly low offer and the broker had told him to take a walk without ever telling us about that offer. Which is illegal. So when he came in with that high bid, we thought it was his first stab at getting the house. We accepted his high offer, everything was going well, he had his engineer report, it looked like we were moving along toward contract and a major windfall and…

Now, remember that Buyer #2 had been through the engineer inspection already and had been ready to go to contract.

Buyer #4 comes back to us and says that based on the engineer report, he wants to renegotiate. He wants to pay $65k less. And guess what amount that is? His lowball offer from before that we didn’t know about. We said we wouldn’t negotiate based on an engineer report we hadn’t seen, and asked to see it. He refused to release it, which confirms that there was nothing to support his renegotiation. Bastard.

But our goal is to sell the house and move to Portland, so we said since he’d 16k bid over asking, we’d accept the asking price. And if he had an offer between his stupidly low one and asking, we’d be willing to hear it. He came back with 5k more. He’d never had any intention of buying for anywhere near what he’d offered. He used that high offer to get other buyers out of the way and get our backs against the wall.

Well, now we’d rather sell the house for less to someone else than let him have it.

You know what comes next, right? We tried to go back to Buyer #2 and he’s not interested anymore.

So we’re back to open houses. Back to the beginning. We have no idea when we’ll be able to move. Billy has a job waiting for him in Portland and we don’t know when he’ll be able to get there to start it. We have to sell here to buy there, so there’s no going before the house is sold.

I know, I know…karma for throwing over Buyer #2. But…not really. We made the best decision we could with the information we had at the time. It’s only hindsight that has us kicking ourselves.

What’s that saint we’re supposed to bury upside down in the yard? I think we’re ready for some divine intervention.