Hub and I just signed a bazillion pages in two documents: one to buy a house, and another to sell our house. At this moment (ask me again next hour) I am at completely at peace with this with two small exceptions. The first is that we WILL be losing money on the sale of our own home. We have a ballpark guesstimate as to how low we can go, but we will need to finance part of a down payment for the new home. Whether we take a loan from Hub's parents or pay PMI is under debate betwixt us. I am prideful and don't want the parent loan. But the PMI is money we pay and will simply evaporate. At least with the parent loan, the money will become equity.
The second slight hesitation is that I must (together with our household help) prep the house for sale. Hub and are both hoarders, and this is a herculean task. No household staff can help you decide what gets kept and what goes. Moreover, with Hub out of the way, er, I mean out of town, I could be merciless with his hoarded stuff. MUAHAHAH!!!! Cleanup week directly conflicts with the heavy week in the lab I planned with my research student. Bad / dumb timing. And, furniture needs to be moved and removed, a task that a 7-month pregnant woman shouldn't be doing.
Because Hub is only home on weekends, we will need to fill our weekends with house work and decision-making, when it feels like our weekends are already pretty full with food prep, laundry, and other stuff way down on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. I have a feeling that this weekend Hub will be moving furniture all weekend long. Poor dude. Better relax and enjoy those kid-free evenings you are going to have tonight to Wednesday!
Regarding PMI: try to find a bank that will offer something known as "lender-paid PMI". Not every bank offers this type of loan, and this is how it works: the bank pays PMI for you to the mortgage insurance company, and you pay the bank back for the PMI through a somewhat higher interest rate on the loan. That way, the PMI money does not evaporate entirely; rather it is now part of your mortgage interest and becomes a tax deduction. I highly recommend this option.
ReplyDeleteBest of luck with the move and congrats on the new house!
I just got a "gift" (i.e. a loan that we will pay back asap) from my parents so that we could put down 20% on a new house. I'd rather not have to do this, but it makes sense financially and my parents are entirely willing to help. Think about it this way - thirty years from now when your kids are buying houses wouldn't you be willing to make it easier for them?
ReplyDeleteBy the way, we also lost money on the sale of our house... But you've just got to let it go. Bad market. Could be worse.
And I agree, getting the house ready to sell is the worst. Bon courage!!