One More Night Of Apartment Living

Margaret will say she's sad and she's going to miss this apartment and neighborhood; I can't say the same. This neighborhood is great and we're comfortable here, but there are so many other factors that I just can't wait to be done with it all.

If you don't already know, we just closed on a house in Albany Park and are currently getting ready to move in. We're packing now, getting rid of stuff and the movers show up on Monday morning at 9:00AM.

 

 

 

Time-Line Leading Up To Buying A House:

• Winter 2009 - Decide our apartment at the time is too cold and our landlord attempted to screw us into paying to have the windows fixed.
• April 2009 - Move into a totally rehabbed apartment right across the street from our old apartment.
• April 2009 - Introduce ourselves to the neighbors right away. We've never had neighbors we liked; maybe they'll be different.
• Spring 2009 - Hear the neighbors fight one night and think not too much of it.
• Summer 2009 - Realize we can hear everything that goes on downstairs and they can probably hear everything we do. We are as quiet as possible. No thumping when we walk, no yelling, etc.
• August 2009 (?) - Colburn Family stays with us for a few days and the neighbor bangs on the ceiling to let us know he can hear the boys and he's getting irritated. That's fine. Sorry about that. He later knocks on the door and says he's tired of the noise. Sorry again. They were leaving anyway.
• August 2009 - November 2010 - More of the same. They yell at one another, we hear it. We're convinced they hate one another but are too weak-willed to break up.
• November 2010 - Colburns visit again with Sue and the neighbor loses his mind and starts slamming things, yelling out the door to "SHUT THE FUCK UP!!" It was 8:00PM and we were gone most of the day.
• November 2010 - I've had enough and declare that I'm moving out; Margaret is slow to accept and we start looking at new apartments and decide we'll break our lease.
• December 2010 - Apartments are too expensive to rent and we discuss buying.
• January 2011 - The house-hunting starts and our closing date is March 30th.
• February 2011 - Things aren't looking so good but then something comes up.
• Mid February 2011 - We find a house, make an offer and they accept without counter offers.
• Late February 2011 - We negotiate our loan and get a 30 year fixed, lender paid PMI and 5% down.
• March 30th 2011 - Close on the house (OMG! There is so much to sign and lawyers will talk about anything).
• March 30th - April 4th 2011 - We sweep and mop OUR NEW HOUSE and clean the bathrooms. We're in the process of packing up the apartment and the movers show up at 9:00AM on April 4th.

We'll be able to say farewell to our fucked up neighbors and begin to feel sorry for the suckers who move in. It's too bad the neighbors will "win" (why should they get to do anything they want and people put up with it or just avoid them altogether (I'm sure that happens in their lives outside of this apartment as well)?).

Whatever! We're out.

We were lucky to have an agent that we trusted, (thank you, Christopher McFarland), and who pointed us in the direction of other good people. Thank you also to everyone who offered advice on our loan and inspection findings and for offering advice on buying a house, in general. Most importantly, thank you to everyone who listened to us bitch non-stop about our neighbors and every opportunity. We were those people that just couldn't move on. Sorry.

The next few months will be total therapy as we recover from PTSD due to living in this stressful environment.