Almost There

Our house is officially under contract (Hooray!). When we first listed our home we were told that the average house in our neighborhood takes approximately 30 days to sell.  There are crazy real estate happenings in North Texas and some areas are seeing bidding wars, so we kind of hoped the process might happen faster.  It didn't take us long to realize, however, that these happenings are in very specific zip codes and at very specific price points.  Thus, our house sold in about the average time other homes in our neighborhood have been selling for.  (And yes, if you read my earlier post, our home sold before our neighbors did.)

I must confess that this entire real estate process was stressful and a little scary.  Despite having completely aced Property Law in school, I still feel like an outsider to the entire process.  Plus, if you add in the paranoia that comes from having taken Property Law and from having read horrible cases of real estate disasters, you can imagine how much more scary the process was for two lawyers.  Head knowledge doesn't always translate to practical experience.  Thus, Dear Husband and I felt as dumb as the sellers that one would see on HGTV's "My First Sale."  And we analyzed and spent loads of time discussing our contracts.  Thankfully, our realtor is wonderful and very patient.

The main thing that I've learned about real estate is that the seller has NO control over the process. That said, God had His hand in every part of our process.  He led us to list our home now, rather than wait 6 months.  He helped us find a new home that meets our needs and wants.  And then He made it crystal clear that we were supposed to buy this one particular house.  It may sound strange, but 2 weeks ago, I woke up with perfect peace knowing that this specific house was the one that we were supposed to buy.  I just felt that God was telling me to stop house hunting and to wait.  At this point, our house hadn't sold, but I was confident that I was supposed to buy this one house.

That's when I made an interesting discovery.  I was being my usual nosy self and decided to do a little research on the seller of the house that God told me to buy.  (Why not figure out what kind of person is living in the house that you're going to buy, right?)  Well, it turns out that my seller just graduated from seminary and is moving away to become a pastor of a small-town Baptist church.  As it turns out, this guy and his wife needed a buyer, and we needed a house closer to our church.  And God provided.

So that's where we are right now.  We're under contract to sell and buy.  Both houses have survived inspection.  And now we get to wait and purge all of the things that we don't need.  Only a few more weeks until moving day...