house hunting emotions (as told by troy barnes)

My husband and I have entered into our first house-buying experience, and I'm suddenly realizing I'm not the greatest at handling this kind of exciting, stressful and emotional journey. I've always been a homebody, and the two of us are probably the most sentimental humans in Arizona. We walk into a house that's for sale and we're like, oh well hello there, destiny, thanks for bringing us to our new place of solace and happiness. The problem is, when it's listed way out of our budget or sells before we can make an offer, we might take it a little too hard. It feels personal. Like we've just been betrayed by the very destiny that promised us so much.

I figured Troy Barnes, a character on the TV show Community, was the best man for the job of illustrating our complex emotions of the past few weeks.

We hadn't actually planned on buying a house this early. But we came across a few local properties, and our interest was piqued. The wheels started turning. What if we bought a fixer upper, lived in it for a few years while we fixed it up, then resold it to provide us with enough money to build our own house (which is our ultimate dream)?

We saw the house for the first time a week and a half ago. We knew right away it was the perfect type of dingy, in need of our tender love and care but not too far gone. It was priced low; most of the houses around our city at the same price are half the size. It had only been listed for one day, so we were confident with our offer and waited the necessary 10 days before the bank would tell us we were officially home owners.

But then, over the weekend, our realtor told us that the bank was rejecting all of the offers. There are a total of 3, we found out, so our initial feelings of being the special chosen ones quickly vanished. The bank wanted our highest and our best. We could raise the offer, raise the earnest money, waive the inspection period (or shorten it)...

Our confidence was shaken and we had no idea what to do. The market began rising as we twiddled our thumbs and lost sleep. Even if we raise the offer, will the other offers raise theirs as well? How can we be sure we beat them to the highest bid? Why couldn't this be a personal interview, where we charm The Bank and make them love us? Is there any way I could send The Bank a basket of mini muffins to endear them to us? Is this a sign? And if so, what's it pointing at? Are signs even a thing? 

So many questions! So much doubt! In the back of our minds we kept telling ourselves that everything will work out either way - if this isn't the house, then we'll move on with our lives and continue saving our money. If it is, then we'll get it...right? 

The Bank is impossible to mind read, unfortunately, but we decided to just do everything available to us. Raise the offer, raise the earnest money, shorten the inspection time. I tried to also send the mini muffins, but they don't like baked goods; they only eat pure gold and our hopes and dreams.

We submitted the new offer this morning. So now we're left to wait again. We'll hopefully know by tomorrow, but while I sit here typing at work it's all just like

and

It's stressful not knowing the future. I know we're not the only human beings with this problem, but it would be so much easier knowing whether or not this is the house. I'm not even sure if there's such a thing as the anything. While I believe God cares about the smallest desires of our hearts, I am not positive that he always tells us direct answers to the decisions we make. Things like where we go to school, or what we have for lunch, or what job we take. Sometimes there are clear answers, but sometimes there aren't. In this time of uncertainty and stress, I have to remember that the future is taken care of whether we're directly lead to purchasing this house or passing it by. We've done everything we can to make it happen, because in our minds it's the house - but dealing with the loss of it will not break us. It will simply be another story to tell.