Cat urine has more staying power than the Rolling Stones

We are doing our best to avoid the dreaded rehab loan. Since we are buying an old house that was listed "as is" our mortgage company and the assessor are both saying that the property is unliveable. Happily, the current owners have allowed us access to the house so that we can spruce up the place a little and hopefully get an assessor to agree with us that this house is liveable.

So we've been doing a lot of sprucing up. We brought in a stove (thanks dad!), wired it up, did a quick fix to the sagging floor in the mud room, and hung smoke detectors and a carbon monoxide detector. That was all child's play. The real struggle has been the smell. You see, the current owner had cats. A lot of cats. The cats were kept in a room and, as far as we can tell, left to their little kitty cat ways which seems consisted mainly of spraying all over the place. The odor is unmentionable. Brigit has been mopping and scrubbing and spraying and mopping and . . . you get the idea. This has gone on for two Saturdays in a row and as of yesterday it seems like it's as good as it gets. It still smells, but it's a "liveable smell". Atleast we hope so.

Who knows? Maybe we're getting used to the smell.

Today is Monday and we're hoping to get the assessor back sometime this week. Our next post will either be one of glorious victory or utter defeat.

Mortgage locked and loaded

So our mortgage is approved and locked-in. We paid two points and ended up with a 5 3/8% interest rate. We have the cash to do a 30% down payment but we've taken the advice of our lawyer and put down 10% instead. The thought is that we're better off holding our money back and using it toward the renovation because of how much work needs to be done immediately.

Now that things are moving forward we're feeling pretty antsy about getting our hands on the house. I'm excited to get a crowbar and start pulling down walls while Brigit has been browsing the internet for furnishings non-stop. At this point we're not sure how far the money we have will get us, but I'm hoping to have all the guts done by winter whether or not we're sitting on milk crates and eating ramen noodle.

Waiting, waiting, waiting

Our mortgage broker Milek is dragging his feet again. We have all the ingredients for a smooth home purchase but he seems to be doing everything he can to keep us in our apartment. We met the sellers the other day and they seem really nice. We're so excited and anxious for this home to finally be ours...come on Milek!

It wasn't even that scary giving our lawyer a check for $10,000! We are so ready for this.