this house thing? it's stating to get on my nerves. well, more than that: my ulcer is acting up again and my anemia is back in a big way. i'm tired, frustrated, and have just about had it. if the house falls through, i couldn't do this even if we could afford to, which we can't.

and it's going to suck if we got this close only to lose it. unfortunately, we might because of two major issues that just came up:

1. because the house price was reduced when the appraisal came in, we have to pay about $5500 in closing costs. that would hurt, but we could do it, if just barely, with the tax money we've got coming in, but...

2. the grant program we're using to help with the down payment has said that we can't use any of that grant money for the repairs, and fha won't give us the loan unless we do the repairs, so now we have to come up with an extra $3000 that just isn't there.

the good news in all this is, if we can find that extra $3000, our mortgage will be about $100 lower than originally figured.

the bad news is, well, where the hell are we going to find $3000. oh, and all the other plans that just got scrapped because of this new problem. oh, and, either way, we're in a world of a financial mess to dig out of, it'll just be harder if we're stuck where we live now. there's been a new nightmare in the utility department, one that points out exactly how much our landlord has control over what we pay on utilities.

i really am beginning to hate this house. if we get it, hopefully i'll come to love it again.

right now, the realtor is going to try to get the bank that's selling the house to come up with $3000 towards the closing costs. it's just about the only option open to us. we're looking into some other possibilities, but i'm not holding any hope that they'll pan out, mostly because of timing. for example, kitten has money coming in because she's in school, but there's no disbursement dates listed, so getting it in the next 2 weeks is not something we can count on. we've even considered asking the kids' uncle for a loan, but i doubt he'd help if he could even if it is for his nephew in the end. truth of that matter is that linnorm's family made it pretty clear where i stood with them when the marriage fell apart, and i accused their mother of abuse. they barely even speak to the kids any more.

all of which means there's now a good chance we're going to lose the house.

i'm frustrated beyond belief, but i'm almost positive that our realtor and lender are even more so. but i also bet they're pretty damn motivated to try to get his thing to closing successfully, if only because so much work has been put into it already. they may never want to see us again when it's all said and done, but they damn well want to get paid for this one.

and all i can do is keep moving forward. we've already put out something close to $1000 (or, thinking about it, maybe more) on this house. i can't just pull the plug. i have no idea what we're going to do if it all falls apart, but i also just can't have much hope for it any more. hell, i'm not sure what we're going to do to get the utilities connected if it comes through—every dime would have gone into acquiring the thing and we're still going to need to pay one more month of rent where we're at.

the one thing i do know is that, if this does go through, i am never doing this again. we are not moving ever again. this has been so stressful that it's even affecting my health. i don't ever want to go through this again.

stick a fork in me, i'm done.