We began looking for a house last November and had a few false starts with houses that looked great but weren't good choices for us for one option or another. After a particularly stinging disappointment (a nearly perfect house with some serious exterior issues), we were feeling quite discouraged. No more than a few days later though, a new listing was posted and we thought it looked pretty great. No more than a week later, we had put in an offer and were anxiously waiting for news. I, foolishly, thought that our offer being accepted would end the really tense part of the process. Ha! Little did I know...
The details are too long to get into but I'll summarize the highlights of what went wrong here.
Wrong turn 1: My husband was already living (and paying bills) in Texas when I moved here. We didn't bother switching any of them into my name because that seemed like a lot of hassle for no reason. Apparently not. I didn't have enough credit cards to satisfy the bank for our mortgage because I like paying in cash whenever possible. No problem right? I have eight years of bill paying history, all of which reflects good credit. But wait! I'm not still paying any of those bills because I had the audacity to move in with my husband. No luck there. That's okay. I have lots of other payments- like car insurance! Crushingly, I pay my car insurance bi-annually because ... I don't like having to pay lots of bills? Anyway, at this point, we had an actual, legitimate problem. We were told we would need a waiver for my "lack of credit."
Wrong turn 2: We got the waiver! Wait, you're thinking, that's great. That's not a wrong turn at all! At this point, waiver grants, we had no idea why our mortgage was still being held up. After weeks of asking and, eventually, escalating our problem, I was told that "the mortgage process is just very complicated so sometimes we tell our clients what they want to hear." Yup, the bank had just lied about the waiver. Which brought us to...
Wrong turn 3: My new job! Of course, the job came well before we found a house that we were interested in. Applying for a mortgage, I furnished my existing pay stubs as well as my offer letter for the job I was about to start, which clearly stated I would be paid monthly. The bank, in its infinite wisdom, was waiting for me to furnish pay stubs from my new job. They hadn't told us that they were waiting and hadn't considered that our closing, at the start of March, wouldn't allow enough time for me to get them a monthly pay stub and then a credit waiver in time.
It all ended well a very stressful five weeks later and we are now proud home owners! That said, by the time we closed, I was frazzled and stressed by the whole process and wondering what sort of mess we had gotten ourselves into.
It's taken about two weeks but I'm finally beginning to feel excited about our next big adventure- home ownership!
