AUTHOR: M. DATE: 7:07:00 PM ----- BODY:

I love my hometown. I love this city, and I love my job. My in-laws are within an hour's drive, and there are compelling reasons to stay near them. And, of course, we have rights in this state that we don't get anywhere else on this continent south of the Canadian border. Unfortunately, it was recently ranked one of the most expensive cities in the country, mostly because of housing costs (the average cost of a single-family home in the area just DROPPED to $349,000). A house is second on my list, behind only a baby, of Things I Really, Really Want. You see my dilemma. But this weekend I got sick of going through the real estate sections and shrieking "I want I want I want!" I signed us up for a first-time home-buyer class and counseling at ACORN. There are income cut-offs, but since home prices here are so high, the "low/middle income" cutoff here would be more than enough to buy a single-family home in most places where the phrase "single-family home" is redundant. If you do this program, you also qualify for a bunch of goodies - really low down payments, reduced mortgage rates, etc. Tonight I went to the orientation. Wednesday we have an appointment with a mortgage counselor. Between now and then we'll replicate what we've been doing for our homestudy: racing around pulling together documents and budgets and letters stating that we really did this and really paid that. And Wednesday she'll tell us (I hope) if we can do this in a way that hasn't occured to us yet, or if we're absolutely foolish for thinking we have a snowball's chance in hell of getting into this housing market. Cross your fingers for us. I think we'll need it.

-------- COMMENT-AUTHOR: avonlea COMMENT-DATE:7:56 PM COMMENT-BODY:Marissa,

I will be keeping my fingers crossed for you -------- COMMENT-AUTHOR: Anonymous COMMENT-DATE:8:01 PM COMMENT-BODY:Good. You two have a new obsession to distract you from the baby obsession. Makes sense to me, and better than drugs.
Keep me posted. --------