To buy or not to buy?

It sounds like an easy answer, just buy a house.  Lately, I have been having doubts.  I keep wondering why would buying a house right now be bad?  Should we wait?  Is there good advice on what the best course of action is?  Didn't I read about what the right thing to do is in a book called the Two Income Trap?  I am sure I did.  I just don't know.  Worse, my husband is willing to go any way I suggest without letting me know if he has concerns...  He hasn't even been blown away by listing from the Internet either. 

Oh, no my grumpy, fat, neighbor is not dead.  I guess that was just wishful thinking on my part. 

So I have looked and guessed based on information on the Internet about how much we could afford and if we would qualify.  The answers are we will qualify, but not until March 11, 2012-exactly 2 years and 1 day since our Chapter 7 Bankruptcy was finalized, and maybe as much as $100,000 for a home loan. I know we can qualify.  I know we need to wait about 60 days from today.  I know that homes with 3 or 4 bedrooms exist in my current neighborhood for less than $100K, but not in my kids school boundaries!  I know that this neighborhood lacks bus transportation, and is far from all my friends, and the majority of my dysfunctional extended family.  I also know that the location is close to entertainment, dinning, and of course the freeway. 

What I don't know is if this is a good thing to do right now.  Should we wait another year?  Should we pay off all the credit card debt with our tax refund instead of using it as a down payment on a home?  If we pay off all the outstanding Credit Card Debt and the $5,000 I owe to University of Phoenix, I can go back to school.  And maybe finish my degree this time around.  But we would not have a house.  We would be stuck in the same 900SQFT apartment that we are outgrowing!  I have no space for an office, or quiet space to run and hide to when I have a bad day.  Now if you think the loo is a good quiet place you obviously do not have little kids!  Worse we have all three boys in the same bedroom. 

The same 3 boys that were spoiled last month for Christmas have little space to play on the floor.  As a result we find them playing in the living room, the kitchen, Mom and Dad's room, the bathrooms, the walk-in closets and outside on the patio.  Their room is difficult to keep clean, mostly because everything needs a place and many times those things are sharing overcrowded shelves.  They have too many clothes. 

My husband has his desk in our Bedroom, which also triples as the workout room, sewing room, storage shed, and pantry for all those water bottles and juice boxes the kids drink.  Our storage closet outside, barely holds our Christmas tree and decorations.  Each of our bedrooms have a walk-in closet, and they are stuffed with extra things that would normally go in a garage or storage shed for long term storage. 

 I'd bet your saying...Doesn't she claim to be poor?  How on Earth can she be talking about buying a house when she has been to the food bank twice in the last 2 months?  How can someone who is on Medicaid be buying a house?  The truth is the bank account is still empty, were still on Medicaid for health insurance and still can't buy all the things the kids got for Christmas.  But I am expecting a large enough tax return that I could either pay off all the debts we now have or use it as a 10-20% down payment on a low cost house.  FYI the houses I have been looking at are listed at 50-80K. Also I am trying to work, though that seems to be extremely part-time right now.  


As you can see there are many reasons to move to a bigger location, and possibly a home of our own.  But what are the reasons this is a bad time or bad idea?  What does Dave Ramsey suggest?  Things I haven't mentioned is that is the number one thing on my wish list, the number two thing is the Neat Receipts scanner. 

And just when things seem to be going well.  A kid falls of the counter and lands face first... Though not the one you would have thought, it was the 8 year old. 

On the move...as fast as molasses in Phoenix

Wow. It is so easy for me to be frustrated and overwhelmed right now! I am learning and growing, sometimes at what seems light speed, then you hit your proverbial platue, which right now seems more like trying to climb the Great Wall of China.

I studied like crazy and passed my AZ Life and Health Insurance License Exam. (Bragging right here: I did better than most of the adults in my initial orientation class that I attended on Friday.) :) It was very nice. However, all the adults in the orientation class, and I say adults because I was a kid, by at least 10 years, okay maybe 5, but many of them were at least 45 and male; but they have been working for at least 2 weeks on passing Online courses required to begin selling insurance with Bankers. Still glad I passed my test. A bit frightened that I seem to be so much younger than my new co-workers.

Orientation Class was literally 4 hours after I passed my exams, and the office was very enthusiastic and warm about meeting the first major milestone. I like that. An office were people are allowed to be friendly and open. How many places do you know where your new co-workers will congratulate you with a smile, hand shake and even a great big pat on the back? Most places any physical contact is just plain against company policy. So orientation class gave me a great big box of things to read, learn and prepare with for my first week of training, which begins on Monday. And it is a whopper of a week! The training program for the first week looks intense.

That is a bit overwhelming. But I have a family friend that will be helping us get onto our feet for the next few weeks. My friend, my Aunt Vivian will watch my kids for ridiculously low sums of money up front. Which is a big help, though I feel awful about not having an appropriate sum of cash to give her immediately. So, eventually I will give her what child care pays for 3 kids all day, It will just probably take me 2-3 months to finish paying here. Definitely disappointing.

Still overwhelming is the number of things that need to be done, but haven't been done since I started looking for full-time work that will actually pay our bills and get us off of welfare. I still need to clean the bathrooms, wash more laundry and well dust. We all keep sneezing, and that dogs are just plain filthy. I really should wash them before I clean the tub.

On to what is so dang frustrating. I was told during Orientation that I would be provided with a user name and password to access my online training materials and so I could spend some time playing "Catch Up" and finish the things I need to get done so I can actually go meet customers. I didn't get my email. Annoying, yes, possibly a set back of a day or three, another yes. Avoidable, unknown. I know that it was Friday and who doesn't want to leave on time on a Friday night, so maybe they typed my email address wrong and didn't notice, or maybe things that generate income needed to be done first and time just ran out.

So what did I do instead? Well, Friday I spent time with my husband, just sitting. Saturday, I got my FBI fingerprint card done, and then listened to an Audio Book called: God is a Salesman, by Mark Stevens. Funny title. I checked the book out of the library without knowing what it was about. Okay, I know the title says Sales, but that was not really what it was about. It was more about relationships, long-term relationships, Christianity, God, happiness and something University of Phoenix calls the Platinum Rule. The audio book is short. It is only 3.5 hours so I finished it in a day. I like the book, I think Mark Stevens has gotten it right. God can teach you how to sell. I mean God can teach you to treat people the way they ought to be, and you to act the way you should. The book was a bit about you ought to not settle for doing your best, but being exceptional and giving people the respect, time, investment and generosity they deserve. The main moral of this story was that people deserve no less than your pure acceptance and full and unbridled generosity. Similar to the lesson that is taught by Mr. Keith Ferrazzi in Never Eat Alone, is that if you give to people without accepting something of equal value in return, you will receive more given to you than you ever "paid out".

So based on my personal belief and what I have read, the cut throat sales approach that involves closing, so often declared the way by greedy corporations is just not what works, not for me and not for really successful and happy people. So when I worked for University of Phoenix, I always wanted to be open, honest, and help in every way imaginable to my students, and I did. I helped new students cope with anxiety, work on finding a way to balance work-family-education so they could be what they needed and wanted to those around them. No that was not accepted by my corporation, and I know my immediate supervisor was torn by doing what was "right" with what the company wanted. Troubling, made for a bad experience, no person, or boss should ever have their hands tied in way that favors immediate gains, while sacrificing the long-term relationship. Never understood that why University of Phoenix encouraged immediate gains at the cost of a longer-term business relationship-which actually is much more profitable.



Treat people they way they need to be. Guarantee people that their trust is not misguided, that you will always watch their back, the same way you would your kid brother. Guarantee that not only will you do your best, but you will go above and beyond what we have come to accept as acceptable customer service, and do it the way you know it should be.

Just something that explains a bit about being poor, and poorer

So I was searching Digg for something interesting to read and found this.  I think if you are poor, aka earning less than 30k a year then this thingy explains your situation, if you make an adequate salary, say 50K a year then this might explain why your poorer friends declined lunch last week.



Via: OnlineSociologyDegree.net

Are We ever going to have enough....

Just three minutes ago I resolved to do something about this plaguing problem!  I decided without discussion with my spouse that "We" will save some of our tax return in a savings account not connected with our checking account, and that "We" will save some of "His" paycheck in that account.  Huh, I bet I, I mean He will think we should have discussed this.  He is probably right.

I watched another documentary today.  I like watching those, it is like watching Fox News channel without all the commercials or theatrics.  Just in case you did not know I love to park the TV on Fox News, it is like my white noise machine.  Anyway the documentary was called "One Percent".  If you haven't watched, I don't recommend it for entertainment value as I have seen far more moving documentaries about the same subject, maybe it was the poor sound track choices.  Anyway.  For some reason I decided to do something a few minutes ago.  "One Percent" is a show by a Johnson & Johnson heir who is concerned about the disparages between the Richest One Percent and the rest of us.  He interviews a few of the riches billionaire's and a few heirs to their fortunes as well as poor folks.  He is unhappy with how big the gap is, and seems to be concerned that their is not a way out of the cycle for the poor, but he does not offer any solutions on what could be done to change the plight of the poor.

While I am not a fan of President Obama's policies on social services, I find myself literally torn in two on the subject.  First I think the idea of Universal Health Care for all is a ridiculously bad idea, not just Obama Care.  I don't like big government or the United States debt, and most of the policies.  I am not certain I am a Republican, but I do find Glenn Beck entertaining, and most of the redistribution of wealth ideas presented over the last 20 years appalling.

But as a poor American Citizen trying to redefine what the American Dream is I currently accept Food Stamps and Medicaid.  I know I said Universal Health Care is a bad idea, I also have to accept the bad choice, because individual private health insurance in Arizona is completely unaffordable. (Note: Arizona's private health insurance is unaffordable because the State Government has Mandated coverage of many life saving treatments, as well as many alternatives.  These Mandates about the types of minimum services covered has greatly reduced the number of providers to choose from which has increased the price.  Something about Supply v Demand, limited supply/choices in AZ means those rotten Insurance companies that are mandated to cover stuff can demand higher fees.) So as you can see the health insurance issue leaves me with two bad choices, spend 2/3 the yearly salary on health insurance or accept state Medicaid.  Oh, and it is only two choices that I have at this moment, the second I find an employer that offers health insurance I am so off this medicaid program.

Not sure why that popped into my head.  We are considered poor.  My household qualifies for food stamps, medical care, probably section 8 housing, pell grants, discounts on utilities, food boxes and other assistance from charities.  We have lived paycheck to paycheck for as long as we have been working.  I lived paycheck to paycheck before I was married and thought that when I got married that would end.  It did not.  Does not seem to want to end.  So how to change it?



So how do I solve the Are we ever going to have enough problem?  I think I will start by building a savings account.  Not a lot, because we all ready spent half our tax refund on a new to us Truck, paid off the loan shark installment plan to Pruitt's Furniture for our couch and 2 chairs.  And yes, my husband had to take time off work because I had surgery, and no his employer does not provide any paid leave, not even sick days, so some of that tax check went right to helping us bridge the gap created by the missing pay checks, something that makes me rather angry!  I so hoped that the tax check money would do something to help pull us out of the whole we are in so we could be come Middle Class Americans instead of Poor Americans.   I can only hope that setting aside just 25% of our tax check helps us in some way, may the economy have mercy on our savings, and may we learn new ways to make the two pennies we got go that much further.  Damn to hell the $5.00 gas that is coming!