Coffee Cup Dreams

The manager at Kaldi’s is married.  He’s attractive enough, but that’s not why I scoped out his left hand.  The thing is, times are tough.  I’m sure he’s a hard worker as he seems to be here every time I pass through – always friendly, ever-helpful.  And I’m certain I’m a hard worker because so much of my time is spent preparing for, doing, or thinking about my role as a teacher. 

I want to know how much money he makes, if he has a financial planner or a family budget plan.  Is he a student as well as a barista manager? He can’t be more than 30 years old.  Does he have children, a wealthy benefactor, a fancy sports car payment, a gambling problem? I speculate about him and what kind of home he lives in, what he does on the weekends, if his wife is the primary breadwinner and whether he grapples with the choice to either buy the single cup of coffee or splurge for the bottomless mug. 

This morning I found out from Chris, our mortgage broker, that we’re back to square one.   Matt and I find ourselves in a strange pocket of the housing market - wanting to own a home and start investing in our future, but without a down payment.  We are in our mid or late twenties, we are educated with Masters degrees, and we both work much more than just 40 hours a week.  We also have large student loan payments and rent that continues to rise.  Do we have the incredibly bad luck of picking careers that are not going to provide, or are we in the same boat as everyone else?  Can the man who manages my coffee and cream make a large down payment when I cannot? 

While I drink the coffee he poured for me, I search the internet for loopholes in the policies of lenders and federal loan programs.  All of this makes me feel foolish.  I do not want to have to look for loopholes.  I want to be able to do this on my own, without assistance from family or the federal government.  That small bit of pride I have is only compounded by an overwhelming desire to call a little piece of the world mine. 

I want to mow grass.  I want to pay homeowner’s insurance.  I welcome leaky faucets!  I want to paint walls.  Linen closets.  To have my own linen closet would mean the world to me.  I will have a vegetable garden in the back yard and in front, I will grow a flowerbed with daffodils and petunias and bougainvillea every spring!  I WILL have these things, but maybe not for a very long time. 

After reworking my budget, I see only a few small places to cut  - two-dollar mugs of organic coffee at Kaldi’s for instance.   While I am more than willing to do this, I see it will take a very long time to save our 3.5%.   A little depressed, I wonder if Brent, the coffee expert has bougainvillea in his front yard.  

House Hunters

After a year of diligent web searches and a lot of house jealousy, we've decided to buy a home.  Some might say we like to do things backwards, buying a house before there is a wedding, but we've done a lot of thinking and this feels like the right time.  Our reasons?  Interest rates are at an all-time low, houses are priced competitively for a quick sale, Obama's administration has increased the lure of the first-time homebuyer tax credit, we've done our homework, and we're ready to invest in our future as a couple.  A wedding doesn't give you the return that real estate does, so we're tackling the investment first, the fun stuff later.  

And what an investment it will be.  We are working with the right people to help us navigate this crazy market and so far, I think we're keeping our heads above water.  We have an all new set of vocabulary, including terms like escrow account, personal mortgage interest, amortization, FHA loan, debt-to-income ratio and many, many more.  

Now that we've decided to take this step, we are waiting to hear if our lenders are willing to take their step.  We've started looking and have narrowed our choices down by house criteria and neighborhood.  We know this will probably not be our forever home, but we're looking to make it ours, while we grow our investment before moving 

on.  

With too many house choices, and a lot of hope, we wait to hear from our mortgage broker for some good news.  He will either come back to us and tell us we've qualified for a grant that will allow us to buy only in the central quadrant of the city, where we originally wanted to live, but found wouldn't be such

 a good investment, or he'll tell us that we can get an advance loan for the tax credit we'll receive in 2010.  If that's the case,

 we can buy anywhere in the city.  

We've got some hope, only a little confidence, and a lot of anxiety.  And we wait.