the world cannot end soon enough.

today marks the four week anniversary of our house offer being transferred to the new bank. tomorrow marks the eight week anniversary of receiving the approved paperwork back from the seller. we still have no idea what's going on.

some backstory: we found a house two months ago that we liked. it's farther north than we had planned, but it's a good location two blocks from a transit hub, has a nice yard and two car garage. the kitchen is a bit small, but otherwise it's a three bedroom, 1.5 bath house with a second bonus room, a "secret" office in the two car garage, and we really liked it. it was originally listed for $388k, dropped to $348k, and we ultimately offered $315k. we found out it was a short sale, but decided to run with it... it was by far the best house we'd seen, and was within our budget.

two months later, we're no closer to having it than we were when we offered. we actually got an acceptance from the bank, but with a note that they sold the note to a new company. we waited two weeks for the new bank to take the file, hoping they would rubber stamp the previous approval and we'd be set. that hasn't happened.

we were warned going in not to get too attached to a short sale, that we should make an offer and if it didn't work, be willing to walk away and move on. the problem is, we haven't found anything else. we've looked at over eighty houses now, and there have been exactly three we'd considered. two of them (both of our backups) are off the market already, with offers of over $340k each. we've stuck with this one offer because we've been told over and over we have a good shot at it, and even that's it's "meant to be", but mostly because of the bargain. there's just nothing in the seattle area that we want that's under $350k. in this economy, you're only seeing the dregs and the people that HAVE to sell listing their property. it's mostly garbage. the areas we like all start in the $400k range, and we just can't afford that.

the past several weeks have been extremely frustrating. I haven't been sleeping well. I've had near chronic heartburn and recurring headaches. I've been surly and depressed. it's so frustrating knowing that I've worked incredibly hard to repair my credit from past mistakes (ie, first marriage), saved money for a downayment, and despite doing everything right, we can't get the house we want.

I've been tempted to just walk away from the whole idea, and blow the tens of thousands of dollars we have pegged for this house on the track instead. I really do wonder if we'd be better off just moving to a better apartment and renting. the idea of taking on $300k worth of debt terrifies me, but I was willing to do it. I just can't convince anyone to take that $300k worth of debt in exchange for something I'd be happy with.

I've had four vanilla white russians (aka "the honky") tonight, plus my token st paddy's day drink, the "baby guinness" (see below, bailey's floated on kahlua)... combine that with not sleeping well recently, and I'm bloody sleepy. I'll likely go to bed early tonight, and with any luck, a comet will hit the earth and wipe out humanity before I wake up tomorrow.