Jefferson House

We have been looking at houses for a while now.  We found one we really liked a year ago.  It was a 5 bedroom on half an acre in West Richland.  I needed a lot of work, but work we can do.  We went to get a loan--and I had no credit.  That's what happens when you pay off everything and then don't buy anything you can't afford.  But no one would give us a loan.  So we got three small lines of credit: like Les Schwab Tires. We put the tires on the account and then take a month or two to pay them off rather than just paying cash for them in the first place.  In my opinion it's silly, but we are playing the game.  So we are now approved for a loan.  We have found this house on Jefferson in Kennewick.  It is a 1948 house.  It needs a lot of work.  What we are impressed about is that the plumbing and electrical is updated.  The foundation looks great.  And everything in the house is workable--ie liveable.  We can take the next few years remodeling and updating it.  Work is something we can do.  So we put in a offer to find out that we had already been out bid.  But we read through the whole contract.  I've learned a lot about mortgages and bidding.  We put in a second bid which was competitive with the other bid.  We were turned down.  We have felt that this is a good move for us--so we have put in our final bid of asking price with them paying closing costs.  We are still waiting to see what happens.  But I decided to share with you--because whether or not we get this house, I have learned a lot.  It has also taken going through this process for Todd and I to know what we wanted to do and what the Lord wanted us to do.  It took some to get us to agree too.  Neither of us wanted to make a decision the other couldn't live with.  By going through this process we've also decided the house is worth what they are asking--we weren't sure at first.  And we weren't sure we were willing to do the work that comes with this house.  Someone beat us to the punch in offering the asking price.  So by the time we offered, it was sold.  But here are the pictures from the ad.  Either way--it has been a good experience if not easy.  We have learned a lot.