Decorating & Renovating
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
WWYD: House poor, husband just changed jobs to a 2 hr commute
You bought a house about a year ago, it's way too huge for your current lifestyle, but you were planning to grow into it forever. Affording the mortgage is a stretch that leaves you little money left over to do D&R. Your husband has just been told that instead of working from home he will now be required to work from the office, 1 1/2 (AM) to 2 (PM) hours away. For a 9-5 job that means he'll be gone from 7:30 am to 7pm and spend a gazillion dollars on fuel each week. You have a 2yo and are pregnant.
Can you think of any reason other than not being able to afford realtor's fees to sell not to move closer to his work?
Re: WWYD: House poor, husband just changed jobs to a 2 hr commute
eta: I would rather live simply in a modestly-sized home while having money leftover to save or have fun with than to live month-to-month in a "forever" home. The stress wouldn't be worth it to me.
It's not me, I'm trying to figure out what possible reason anyone wouldn't sell. So far the only reason I can imagine is not having the realtor's fees to sell.
Maybe the value has gone down in the past year and they owe more than it's worth? Maybe she is a huge b*tch and doesn't care about his commute because it's her dream home? Maybe the schools there are better than schools closer to his job? There could be a number of reasons.
Yeah, I figured trying to figure out why was a little better than asking her "wtf are you *** crazy?!"
Depending on how much income is generated from the blog, I can see how they may decide to stay. Maybe they think the house has so much potential that it's worth it to stay to continue making money from blogging. The commute will kill him, though.
What area are they living in?
For a while I commuted from Canton to a location further South than the Equifax office, and it was brutal. I can't imagine trying to do that long term.
In the comments she gives more information.
I'm sure they're just freaking out about selling that house, but alone with a newborn and a two year old for at least 12 hours, probably doing bath and bed for the two year old while the newborn has that cluster feeding evening time and then he arrives home at 7 exhausted from two hours in the car. It just sounds like hell on earth to me.
I can think of plenty of reasons to stay. It might not be a permanent issue. They might be underwater. Selling a house that they JUST refinanced plus buying a new one and moving would be a pretty big financial hit.
It seems awfully soon to be calling them crazy, maybe they are thinking about selling. I'm assuming you don't actually know them, or their plans for the future.
My boyfriend has to commute that far once in a while, and it's not a big deal because it's not every day. Maybe it won't be for them either.
Honestly, that 2 hour commute is the reason I work a PT job in a completely dull job. That's what my commute would be if I wanted to find a job in my field. At least.
I don't feel right judging her situation because I'm sure that Jeremy would say something if the commute got rough, but I'm going to guess that they have family in the area and that this is a long term decision to stay put vs. move (i.e. maybe they're only moving him to work in office temporarily or he has the option to find another job elsewhere). I imagine the market for photographers in her area is probably better than closer to Atlanta and that factors in too.
TTC Baby #2 - BFP on 12/14/11 @ 10DPO - CP confirmed 12/18/11
BFP #2 on 1/13/12
I would sell ASAP. I think the commute will kill her poor husband, but based on some of their older posts I doubt they have the money. It would worry me that the commute will hurt his earnings and they've said he needs to hit bonus every month for them to make ends meet. It seems very unusual for the company to be moving people back into the office.
I think they live in Loganville now.
My new home: http://tinyurl.com/6r4rrlm
I actually think I saw him on Friday on my way home. I did a double take but thought to myself that it couldn't be him since he works from home. Clearly, I know too much about them.
My new home: http://tinyurl.com/6r4rrlm
LOL, I was next to a couple from teen mom at a traffic light once. They looked happy.
My Valentine Bookends (2~13~13, 2~15~09)
Didn't they also sell their old house on contract? (Meaning that they basically have renters and two mortgages right now?)
Now that you mention it, I do believe they mentioned something about still having to contribute to the old home's payments. Ugh...no house is worth all of that (but people over-buy all the time).
My Valentine Bookends (2~13~13, 2~15~09)
In my experience, a contract sale is basically a rent-to-own.
A mortgage is written up between the buyer and the seller, with an amortization schedule, interest rate, payment amount, etc. An agreed-upon amount might go toward a down payment at the end of the contract term (maybe 2 - 5 years), at which point the buyer needs to be able to obtain traditional financing.
I've never seen a contract sale (that's not between family) where the seller agrees to hold the mortgage for 15 or 30 years.
The buyers usually can't get a loan right then but anticipate they'll be able to in the near future. (Credit issues, self-employment, whatever.) So if you sell your house on contract, and still owe on it, you're making mortgage payments while the "buyers" pay you rent/monthly payment until they can get a traditional loan.
My personal opinion is that if a bank's not willing to take a risk on you, neither am I, but I can see where some people look at it as having a long-term lease in place.
They are leasing the first house so they still own it. http://www.bowerpowerblog.com/2011/03/lease-purchase-money-and-emotional-rollercoaster-kinda-story/
So, they are technically underwater on two homes. If the renters walk, the Bowers get to keep the $7k deposit, but that wouldn't put a huge dent in the mortgage. They are riskier than I choose to be financially (and we own a rental but are not underwater on either home).
My Valentine Bookends (2~13~13, 2~15~09)