First Home Style

The other day I met up with my good friend, Tracey. These days we always seem to talk more about our careers and financial matters.  Tracey and I are in the same career field but have different kinds of responsibility. My job, for a large government agency, requires spending long hours on my feet and travel to many locations. Glamorous it’s not but it allows me a lot of autonomy. Tracey works on a yearly contract for a university in Manhattan. I live in Brooklyn with a roommate. Tracey lives in Manhattan with a roommate. Tracey complained about her lack of autonomy and job security.  Tracey, like many people, feels that she is underpaid for the lifestyle that she wants to live. I mentioned several times in this blog how totally uncool I am. I don’t hang out in trendy coffee shops and don’t spend long hours queuing to get into the hottest new restaurants. I don’t have a gym membership. Instead I take great pleasure in finding free and inexpensive things to do around the ci...

Yesterday I met up with my friend Dominique for lunch. We laughed and gossip and ruined our diets. We went to the new Michael’s on Atlantic Avenue  and wondered about downtown Brooklyn shopping at Loft and Housing Works on Montague Street. Eventually the conversation turned to our dreams.  For as long as I could remember, Dominique has always wanted to start her own business.  She makes really great natural products such as lip balms, lotions and deodorants.   I was encouraging  her to continue as a sort of side hustle as I felt she was giving up on her dreams. But there I realized that I had also given up on my dreams. It has been over a year since I last blogged and that wasn’t my intention.  My dream was to buy a home and blog about that experience but somewhere along the way I got discouraged and stopped looking. I stopped attending open houses or even searching properties on Streeteasy and Zillow.   And so as I g...

Happy New Year! I know I'm a few days late. I have been meaning to post here for awhile but the end of 2013 was froth with many distractions. So here is a little update. I heard from my previous real estate agent, Adele last week. She's doing better and is receiving physical therapy since her involvement in a car accident over the summer. We talked for about 10 minutes and she stated that she would like to continue help me in my home search.  I said ok. I told Adele that I had been working with another agent, who she already knew and had a professional relationship, Ms. Williams. Adele didn't appeared too bother by this. However it got me thinking about weather or not this was even ethical. Ms. Williams is ok, I guess. But over the past several weeks I have noticed a few deficits. She almost never remembers anything I tell her and she repeatedly sends me listings that I previously told her that I wasn't interested in. She is a nice lady, but just too darn forgetful....

I know I haven't posted in a while but really there just haven't been much progress to report. We still haven't signed the contract as yet. My attorney continues to be concerned about the cooperative. He's actually reviewing the minutes from the cooperative board meetings tomorrow ( we want to ensure that the cooperative has a plan to increase the money in their reserves). As I've stated sometime ago, I'm disheartened that we haven't closed on a property as yet. I feel that now would be a great time to buy a home in Brooklyn, but I feel that I'm being priced out of the market. Gentrification is a term that's floated around quiet a lot, and it is nice too see a new restaurant, wine bar, yoga studio or gourmet supermarket moving into a neighborhood. However, it's maddening when the original neighborhood occupants can't afford to continue to reside in the area.

I think that in my last post, I prematurely wrote about taking a break from the property search. Yes, this has been a stressful time. While the feeling was genuine, it isn't a true reflection of where I am in the process.  I have been in this property search for sometime now and at this stage, I'm almost desperate to get to closing. I'm tired of attending open houses. I'm tired of  putting my search criteria in Streeteasy and Trulia and somehow hoping that the results will be different.  Though I was reluctant to search for yet another mortgage lender, I had to do just that.  It had all happened out of my curiosity and frustration that I walked into a  bank and asked to speak to a loan officer. It was free and didn't require a commitment. I told the loan officer about my concerns and the trials of the last several months. Then I asked about the cooperative that I made the offer on. And to my surprise he knew it well. He had just close on an apartment in that bui...