Mainly, because in reality, I'm not even close to this thing. There is a smidge of debt that comes before the task of saving a down payment.. and then the bigger reality that owning a home will require me to work more than 3 days a week somewhere.
I've seriously been preoccupied with this notion ... well, I guess sometime around the time when I was bit with the bug to have a yellow kitchen of my own. I used to have a tea on Sunday morning and slowly go over the real estate section in quite contemplation. I used to surf the MLS every day and fill in all the little blanks: How many rooms? How many bathrooms? What side of town? Oooh, lets look at all the pictures! I still do these things, just not as regularly in the past few years... I've almost given up on the idea that home ownership is for me. But, I still catch myself makimg note of the for sale signs as we drive down the street.
The questions I've been asking myself:
- Is this MY desire at all, or has someone, or society at large, slipped into my subconscious that it is what is expected of me? That somehow it will make me feel as if I have succeeded at... something?
- What do I feel that home ownership will really DO for me and my family?
- Would I even be able to maintain a home?
- Do I want to still be working full time to make mortgage payments when I'm 63?
I think I feel that buying a house would solve some problems.
The pixies are crammed into a closet of a bedroom, and they are going to need some space... SOON.
A second bathroom would be wonderful. I can't count the amount of times I've been joined by a child who's got to poop, when I'm trying to have a relaxing mom-bath.
I'd be able to do permanent fixes in the house. Painting. flooring. A finished basement.
Also, permanent outdoor stuff. Gardens, fences.
So much else.
However, then I have moments where I think... I want one of THESE:
So, anyway...
Am I wasting energy thinking about this thing? This thing that, as each year passes, seems less and less likely? Perhaps this thing just isn't meant for me after all? I feel a little sick thinking about never having a home...
I"m still chewing on this one... Still trying to work it out.
L.
2 comments:
There you go, doppelganging (is that a word?) me again. The home thing has been a big preoccupation... I'm actually crossing fingers over the mortgage app I put in this week. The last four years or so have been all paying down debt and socking away for a down payment. It takes soo long. It's coming down to the wire though because I don't know how long I have this little place for.
So much of it, for me anyway, is about permanence and having a space that is MINE (well, ours, counting the kiddies). It's also permanence.. knowing that once I'm in my own house, I will not be going anywhere for a long time.
I can't deny the appeal of a migratory existence.. there's so much out there to see, but I'm saving all that for my second adolescence (you know, once the kids are out of the house). Can't say I don't think about how I could work it though.
I JUST read your blog, and thought the same thing. Funny how we do that, now and again.
Yes, I think the permanance thing IS about the kids for me, too. I don't think I'd be a very good parent in a motor home.
I do like a home base, though. I spend time thinking "when it's time to move the fridge and stove and washer and dryer and garden boxes and sheeit I'm exhausted from having to think of all that, never mind do it." I'd like to have the Chevy AND have somewhere to come home to.
I've been in this rental for 9ish years now. The whole time it's felt like a stop over. Except I don't know where the next place is.
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