The Friday gathering: Moving update
By glblguy
I wanted to provide you with an update on moving to the mountains. We finally completed the contract on the new house, the one I mentioned in my gathering two weeks ago. We offered about 15% below the current asking price, and the family countered to meet in the middle which we agreed to. The house had already been reduced to 15% below asking price, so we ended up purchasing it for about 25% off the list price. Both myself and our agent feel we got a very good deal. We now have a fully signed contingency contract in place. Now we just need to sell our current house within 60 days. The picture to the left is the view from the front porch of the house we are trying to buy. Nice huh?
Speaking of our current house, that’s been keeping us very busy this week. We’ve found that due to this being a buyers market right now, we have to do everything we can to sell our home. So in addition to the exterior painting and wood repair, we’ve also had a new roof installed. We’ve also been repainting the interior, cleaning the house up like crazy and we’ve decided to replace the carpet as well. All in all, the updates are pretty expensive and biting into our equity a bit more than I would like, but in this market, I’m not sure if we have much of a choice. As long as we get enough out of the sale to cover real estate commissions and cover the down payment on the new home we’ll be very happy.
Important Stuff
- I’m considering changing the theme for Gather Little by Little again and have been seriously looking at moving to more of a magazine theme. Since GLBL is for you, I didn’t want to make the change without getting your perspective first. You can see what a magazine style theme looks like over at Smashing magazine. Let me know what you think.
- Unique Blog Designs who designed the theme for John Chow is celebrating their 1 year birthday and giving away an iPod Touch and a slick looking new theme. Entering is easy, just reply with a comment to this post. If you’re a blogger, you can write a post about the contest and get 5 more points.
- MITBeta and ScrapperMom have been blogging on Don’t Feed the Alligators for a little over 6-months now. MITBeta is looking for feedback and is also saying thanks to all of his readers. Head over and provide them with somefeed back and congratulate them on the past 6-months. MITBeta was a frequent commenter here on GLBL when I first started and is doing a great job on Don’t Feed the Alligators! If you aren’t a subscriber, I highly recommend you subscribe, they are writing some great stuff.
- SimpleMom releases her first eBook about decluttering, cleaning, and organizing. Head over and check it out!
The Gathering
Here are my favorite articles from the past week:
- Starting an Ebay business – A step-by-step guide – Excellent write-up on how to start your own eBay business. My wife and I have been talking this week about giving this a try. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes.
- Personal finance is like public health – Plonkee relates public health issues to personal finance issues.
- Biblical Financial Lesson from the Book of Acts – Great write-up about one of my favorite books.
- Instant Credit – No Thanks – Yep, just say no.
- Don’t Pay Your Children’s College Tuition If You Want Them to Succeed – My kids all know I most likely won’t be paying for theirs. It’s not that I don’t want to, but with 6-kids I just don’t think it’s feasible. He also has a cool new logo! Unga-bunga :-)
- How To Frugally Decorate Your House On A Very Tight Budget. – We use a number of these and plan to even more once we get moved. Target is one our favorites as they ofte stock some really unique and neat items.
- Nine Things to Do When the Going Gets Tough – Excellent tips…dead on
- Real Estate Appraisals – Ten things most people just don’t understand about them – This was a timely article for me as we’ll get getting one of these done pretty soon.
- 10 Truths About Frugal Living Revealed By 5,000 Reader Comments – I love articles that contain reader comments and advice. Great stuff.
- Can you be a Personal Finance Rock Star? – I really enjoyed reading this. We aren’t rock stars, just everyday people just like you. I agree with CleverDude, show us you’re a rock start too!
- 20 Questions to Help You Overcome Barriers and Find Your Passion – Another article I really enjoyed. I also believe in finding your passion.
August 29th, 2008 at 8:36 am
Thanks so much for the mention! I’m linking to you in my already-published link post this Sunday, so be looking for it.
August 29th, 2008 at 9:25 am
I really like the magazine style themes (didn’t know they were called that actually – I’m quite new to all this) so I’d support that move. And I love the picture of your front yard – I’ve toyed with that idea as well though I don’t think the rest of the family thinks I’m really serious :) Good luck selling your current house.
BTW, thanks very much for the link! I really enjoyed studying Acts. I’m not sure why, but I love the part earlier in that same chapter (19) where the evil spirit answered the sons of Sceva, “Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you?”
August 29th, 2008 at 9:38 am
As long as I can still get your COMPLETE posts via Bloglines, I don’t care what your theme looks like. But if by going to magazine style, all that comes through the RSS feed is the title or the first 5 lines….I’ll probably stop reading. I follow over 100 blogs, and there are very, very few that I will click on “to read more” links. I just don’t have time with probably 100+ posts a day that I try to read.
August 29th, 2008 at 9:40 am
I’m definitely a fan of magazine-style themes and have been investigating a few for my own site. I don’t think I’m going to move that route yet, but I will be keeping my options open.
As far as my children, it’s not that I don’t want to pay for their education. In fact, I have to restrain myself to keep from spoiling them. But I’ve decided it’s more important for them if their education is their own and not something that Daddy bought for them. Of course, I’m going to quietly save up as much as I can, but I know it wouldn’t be enough to pay for them to all go to school on my dime. Hopefully they all get scholarships like I did so I don’t have to worry about that!
August 29th, 2008 at 10:32 am
Sounds like you got a great deal on your new home. I wish I was in the market for a new home. There are some good buys out there right now. Good luck on the upcoming move and thanks for the mention.
SingleGuyMoney
August 29th, 2008 at 10:34 am
Looking forward to hearing more about your new house! Thanks for the mention…
August 29th, 2008 at 11:29 am
Way to go on the house!! I like the mag theme, I say go for it! Oh and BTW, best of luck with the Ebay thing – I look forward to hearing how it goes for you…
August 29th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
I’m praying that selling the house goes well for you – that view is beautiful! You will have to keep us posted as to how that goes for you.
August 30th, 2008 at 8:32 pm
Thanks for the advertisement!
September 1st, 2008 at 12:16 am
I like the sample “gridline” view of the mag theme. I like how it is organized.
Keep us posted on the ebay thing. I’ll check out the article. I’m working on my debt-snowball and cannot get a 2nd job (and I’m not the blogger type) so I’m considering ebay. I purchased my DD entire fall/winter wardrobe for $100 so I’m thinking I could sell her outgrown stuff as a way to get out of debt faster. What I don’t sell I’ll donate for the tax deduction. I’ve noticed that with ebay, sometimes you can get more for your item than at a consignment sale – especially name brand items.
Congrats on the new house. I’ll pray that the old house works out the way you want it to.