Missives from the 6th Floor

There are still a bunch of things that can go wrong between now and then. The sale of our home could fall through (happened to us last time we tried this contingent trick), or it could be delayed enough that it forces us to kill the contract on the purchase.

The house we're buying could fail to appraise for the purchase price, or the buyer's lender could take exception with the appraisal on the house we're selling.

With the recent instability in the mortgage lending market, who knows. Our credit is solid - and we're putting more than enough down, but when the words "bankruptcy" and "Countrywide" get used in the same sentence, that's not really assurance. After all, a financial institution is only as strong as it's portfolio, and enough instability in one part of it's holdings can have ripple effects into other ranges.

And then there's the fact that this whole thing is a chain of contingencies - our purchase is contingent on our sale, and our sale is contingent on a handful of things any one of which can send this house of cards tumbling down.

So here we are.

Waiting.

Waiting to hear back from some party involved in the transaction that they've found the problem that kills the deal. Waiting to figure out if we should actually start packing stuff up, or getting estimates from movers. Waiting 'till the ink dries on paper, which won't happen for 6 weeks, and we get keys.

Waiting.

I hate waiting.