MY NEW HOME!!!

After living with my relatives for six months, I had saved up enough money for a down payment on my very first new home!

I began my search in May 2009. I set forth a budget and worked with an excellent agent who found me several homes within range that we went and viewed. I searched all throughout the valley (Gilbert, Mesa, Tempe, Chandler, Ahwatukee) and found several nice places that I saw myself living in. Gilbert had two homes in particular that really caught my eye. Reasoning? Not only were the places really nice, but the cost of living is much cheaper in Gilbert than in any other suburb city. Gilbert is experiencing a lot of growth right now and homes are selling for extremely cheap, so I felt very strongly about moving there. Even though I would be moving outside of the ward boundaries where I was currently living, I was ready for a change.

I placed an offer on both homes that I liked and one of them was accepted! I now had ten days to back out of the offer just in case something were to happen where I couldn't buy it. Days 1-3 come and go, all was well. Days 4-6 come, but don't go as I had planned. Due to circumstance change in my life, I had to back out of the offer that was initially accepted. I was a little bummed, but knew it was the correct decision. I later found out that the home that I had an accepted offer on dropped $15k in price the following week. OUCH! I'm still didn't regret my decision even though the place dropped SO much in price.

My search continued. I decided that I needed to stay within my ward boundaries, so this narrowed my search to very few options. Luckily, though, within a matter of 2-3 weeks, we stumbled across a place that I fell in love with. It was outside my price range, but still doable. My agent and I placed an offer and it was immediately accepted.

The place that accepted my offer is the place that you see in these pictures. It was a new build, so being the first tenant to occupy the condo/townhome was a good feeling. The smell of fresh paint, new carpet, etc... was, and still is, fun. I closed on July 31st, 2009 and moved in the following week. Let me tell you though and I'm not sure if this was a normal process or not, but getting all the paperwork ready for the day of closing was absolutely ridiculous. I don't think I had ever been so flustered before in my life. With the housing market being hit hard as of late and with all the recent foreclosures and shortsales, banks are very hesitant with giving out loans for mortgages these days. They want every nitty gritty detail explained regarding credits into your account over dollar $$$ amount. I can't tell you how many times I exchanged emails, phone calls, etc.. with my loan officer explaining to her where this money came from, where this money from, where this money came from. Caused me much fatigue and frustration, but in the end it was worth it. I understand that banks, now-a-days, are careful with who the loan money to because they want to make sure you can afford the monthly mortgage payments. So I appreciated the fact that they were genuinely concerned for me being able to afford mortgage payments, but the process in getting to the final closing date was absurd. Would I do it again? Absolutely, but only when we're not in a recession!