Coldest and Most Stressful (FEBRUARY UPDATE)

So here we were, now into February.  Not only was it shaping up to be one of the coldest in recent memory, but everything was being delayed.  Surveyors not able to get out there, mortgage company said that since it's been so long, they needed updated documents, so it was off to round up more bank statements and pay stubs and all that exciting stuff.  

I felt so bad because I know they are wanting us to hurry up and close, and there is nothing I want more than that but things just aren't happening as fast as we wish they could.  I found myself waking up at night thinking about the whole process. 

We had a couple of weeks where the weather kept falling into the 20's at night, the teens out at the soon to be farm, and barely got above freezing during the day.  This is pipe busting weather.  Even left work early a couple of days because of deteriorating weather conditions, sleet, icing roads, etc. 

A Houston elevated roadway covered in ice and bad drivers

OK, before everyone from a colder climate starts laughing, this is Houston, a humid, tropical environment most of the year, and we just don't do well in harsh cold.  More importantly, people here don't know how to DRIVE in this kind of weather and it's best to just stay home and be warm.  Needless to say, that slowed down everything yet again.  Ice, cold, surveyors, appraisers, it was all converging on us at the same time.  But once we made it thru, relatively unscathed, things started to happen. 

After I resent all the documents once again, things started moving forward again...they scheduled the appraisal for end of the month.  Then the survey was completed and tentatively approved and sent back to the County for "final" approval (how many approvals DO they need?).  But fortunately, by the end of the month, we were almost good to go. 

Appraisal went fine, the guy was super nice, I explained that I understood this house needed work, paint inside and out, some wood repairs, new linoleum in the wet areas (mudroom, kitchen, bathroom), and other cosmetic things, but overall she was a good, solid, house.  He agreed, said everything looked like it was right in line with where it needed to be, he understood why we wanted this place so badly.  Thankfully, he was someone familiar with rural properties and how to best value them.  It's not like buying a house in a subdivision/neighborhood where every other house is the same value or the same style.  Our closest neighbors will be acres away, and in a totally different kind of house. 

But in the end, he said it had great potential, which is what we wanted to hear.

The Mortgage Company said all looked well, and they had sent it off to final Underwriters for approval.  By the end of February, we found it was just a matter of days apparently, and we'd soon own an old farmhouse on acres of land!   Like the image above shows, fingers are crossed!