My own house!!

While Jeremy and I were dating, we had started looking at houses for sale in Hermiston and Umatilla. We already knew we were getting married and decided we didn't want to keep living in apartments.

First we decided to see about getting a home loan and seeing how much we qualifed for. My mom had always told me growing up that when I decided to buy a house with my husband to make sure we bought it on one income so when children came along, I wouldn't have to work. Jeremy and I talked about it and decided on an average monthly mortagage and a price we wouldn't go above. We were really surprised of how much we could qualify for but with our choice to budget we were able to look at houses between $140,000 to $180,000.

Many nights were spent looking online and printing off our favorites. Then we chose a realtor because of the fact that Jeremy knew him. He was very helpful and let us know this was a great time to buy. We gave him our favorites and he also looked up some others we have missed. He made some phone calls and some appts to see the houses. We spent most of one day driving around taking tours and getting a better idea of what we liked and disliked. One of the first houses we toured, Jeremy fell in love with it. We kept going and looked at our other choices to make sure, but we ended up back at that same house in the end.

The house had been built the prior year but hadn't been lived in yet. It was on the higher end of our budget but we were able to work with the loan people and the seller. Everything was so exciting! We were impatient to get through all the paperwork and find out when the closing date would be. When we finally found out they told us July 24th. We tried to be positive from the beginning but people get telling us that things seem to always come up and the closing date gets pushed back.

Now it was out of our hands and we had to wait a month and a half. We would call occasionally to get an update but there wasn't much else we could do. As it started getting closer we kept calling and probably annoyed the heck out of our realtor and loan guy.

I was also getting really nervous about getting my stuff out of my apartment and finding a place for it. Another stress for me was that we were headed to the beach for a week and the closing date was getting too close to when we were leaving for my taste. Jeremy kept telling me to stay calm and he would get it figured out. I really tried but I couldn't help getting a little stressed. It ended up that our realtor had a shed I was able to move my stuff into until we got back from vacation. Jeremy and I moved most of my things ourselves and had our friend Scott help with the big items.

The Friday before we left to the beach, we got the call that it was the day!! I was able to get off work early and drove straight over to the title company. It was so exciting to be signing papers but after awhile your hand started aching! Haha! After completing the paperwork, we had to drive to Tri-Cities to get a cashiers check for the down payment and closing costs.

Now I felt like we could leave for the coast and have a relaxing time. The only bummer was that we had to wait to pick up our keys until after we got back. Still we had a HOUSE!!!!