Literal troubles

  Last Monday I was depressed.  I just couldn’t shake this despairing feeling of not having any offers on the house.  My husband told me it would be ok, and even though I was praying, I couldn’t get out of my funk.  Then, I thought about Jen’s story in the book where in her adoption journey, she would have days where she broke down in tears.  Others would tell her to pray for her child, that something significant was happening.  So I thought maybe I could apply the same principal to my situation, and I started praying for the buyer.  In one of my prayers I had this thought; what if the buyer couldn’t come because the money they needed to buy our house was still being held up.  I prayed that God would allow this person to get their money.  That afternoon, I got a call from a Tim, and Tim seemed unusually level headed.  Not like most of the calls that I had gotten prior.  He asked good questions, and asked if he could come see the house the next day.  Later that day I got a call from Louis, who was a realtor, and wanted to bring a client by the next day also. 

I had said before that I wasn’t going to freak out about not having a buyer until May 1, and I had already resolved that I would fast on May 1 if the same situation wasn’t met.  Monday night I kept waking up for no reason except a disturbed spirit.  I hadn’t had any caffeine, which is the usual culprit, and I was getting a little annoyed.  I can be kind of grouchy when I get woken in the middle of the night, and while I’m not proud of this, I finally said, “Jesus, what do you want from me?”  After several more dream/wake episodes, I told Him that I would fast the next day.

Tim came, and he said he was interested.  Louis came with Carol, and she seemed really interested.  Actually, they stood at the end of our sidewalk and talked for about 20 minutes, which was awkward.  Then around 6 o’clock we get a call from Lisa, who is represented by the realtor we affectionately call the crazy lady. J She walked into my house one day and told me that we could raise the price $10,000 so that she could list it and we could pay 6% commission.  I flat out told her, “No.”  I’m the blunt one in the family.  Maybe she is not used to being told no, or maybe she is not used to people caring about how much the buyer has to pay, but she looked really shocked at my answer.  I smoothed it over, and we parted on amicable terms. Anyway, Lisa, called and asked if she could come over.  I didn’t see her when she walked up, but I knew she was here from my daughter screaming, “It’s Julia!  It’s Julia!” Julia is a little girl in my daughter’s Sunday school class.  She comes to church with her dad, her parents are divorced.  Lisa is Julia’s mom.

I should probably also mention that just before we put the house on the market, we had one warm day in South Texas.  During that day, we realized that our air wasn’t working.  We had a similar problem last year, and had to pay for them to fill the unit with Freon, but no leak was found.  This time, however, the service man was very thorough, and found a leak in the coil.  We had to consider the option of filling it up with Freon for $500, a temporary fix, or replacing the coil for $2700, the permanent fix.  We were really tempted to just fill it up with Freon, that’s obviously what the previous owners did to us.  We had been saving up money to get the pool resurfaced, and $2700 would mean that we would have to put it off again.  Even though it was hard, we decided to replace the coil, because we felt that God would bless our decision to do the honorable thing.  When I told a lady at my church about it, she said, “God will bless you, and who knows you may end up selling to someone in the church.”

I thought about this immediately when I heard, “It’s Julia!”  Furthermore, Lisa told me that she had her house on the market for many months, and on Monday she got two offers. Remember my prayer on Monday? That the buyer would get their money? A little weird.  She liked our back yard, and wanted a place for Julia to play, but I don’t think my house suited her tastes.  Still, I held out, because it just seemed like my prayers for the buyer of the house the day before were answered with her.

Wednesday night I was thinking about Carol, the lady that came with Louis the realtor.  She was in a bad situation, and it was a hard one for me.  Those that know me know I am thrifty.  I loathe debt. These people were buying another house before they even put their house on the market.  They were in this situation from mismanaging their finances. It also really annoyed me that this lady suggested that she would put air condition in the laundry room, even though I told her it was a good thing because it didn’t change the temperature of the house in the summer when you were drying clothes, and you could save on electric bill.  That’s right.  I judged her ALL over.  And just as I was saying that I wouldn’t sell our house to them, Louis called to give us a verbal offer.  They wanted to give us our asking price, and have us pay $ 4800 of their closing costs.  Really?  That just annoyed me even more.  Now, not only have they mismanaged their money, they want us to pay the way for them to get out of it.

My husband tried to talk to me, and tell me that this wasn’t a bad offer, and finally, I conceded, and said I would accept it.  Before I went to sleep, I prayed that God would set my heart on Hawaii. Instead I woke up at 3 in the morning with this prayer on my mouth, “God, please bring the right buyer.”  I couldn’t sleep, I got up and had my quiet time, and during that time, I felt led in this way: that the buyer would not have a realtor and would have a child to swing on the swing set.  And I literally cried for this person, and the child that would swing on the swing set.

When my husband woke up, I told him about my prayer time, and I pleaded with him to give me one more day for God to bring the right buyer, the one with no realtor and a child to swing on the swing set.  Amazingly enough; he agreed.

No one came that day, but when the realtor sent the offer, he forgot to attach it.  Then my friend called me and told me the real estate attorney that we would be working with left the office for the day, and the office would be close for Fiesta the next day.  We were leaving the next day to go to Drew’s uncle’s lake house for the weekend, so I called Louis and told him the offer wasn’t attached, and we wouldn’t be able to get it to the attorney until Monday.  He said he would send it.  We waited all Friday, and it never came.  I was starting to get excited.  If we didn’t get the offer we would have the opportunity to let someone come on Monday who might be the “right” buyer.  Saturday the email came, but only the first page came through on our phone.  On the ride home Sunday, I got an email from someone inquiring about the property, then a call from a realtor setting up an appointment to come, and while we were at the lake we had a call from another lady who said she would come see the house on her lunch break on Monday, and we already had a showing scheduled from someone that called on Friday. When we got home on Sunday, we had another call.  Things were looking up, and we were certain that we would get an offer where we wouldn’t have to pay closing costs.

Monday came, and only one of the 3 scheduled showings showed.  They weren’t interested at all, and I was still holding out for the person with no realtor and a child to swing on the swing set.  I got a call from the lady that had emailed me on Sunday, and we set up a time for her to come that evening. She knew that we had an offer and we would have to make up our mind the next day.  Last year, I wrote what I call The Story of Our House, a story of how God miraculously showed us to buy this house. I sent it to a friend of mine back in Georgia who wasn’t a Christian.  At the end of the letter I gave a short gospel message.  I had already decided that I was going to leave a copy of this story in the house for the new buyer to read. On Monday I opened up the file to reread it.  And I felt like God was telling me to print it.  So I did.  Then a few hours later, I really felt like He wanted me to give it to this lady who was coming to look at the house.  I wasn’t really comfortable with that, especially because it would seem really weird to give someone this story before they knew that they were the owner of the house.  At 6:30 just shortly before she was to arrive, I finally put the letter in an envelope, sealed it and left it on the counter.  She seemed really interested in the house, and she told us that she had a four year old daughter. We talked numbers, she asked questions about taking care of the pool, and things seemed promising.  I decided I was not going to give her the story, if she was the right buyer, I would give her the story after she decided to buy the house.  And then she did the strangest thing, she looked around the kitchen, and she asked, “So what made you buy this house?”  It was then that I gave her the letter, and told her that I wasn’t going to give it to her, but she asked, and the letter would answer the question.  I told her it was the story of our house, and that I had written it for a friend, and she almost cried.  She left, and said she would let us know one way or the other what her decision was.  We haven’t heard from her.

The next day, we sent the offer from the people in the bad loan situation to the attorney.  That morning I got an email from a friend asking me to pray for her.  She felt God was telling her to buy a house, and she was praying for the sellers to pay her closing costs.  I shared this with Drew.  He said he had just been praying about whether he should counter the offer with not paying for all of the closing costs.  He felt like this was God saying to just accept their offer.

On Monday, I felt like God answered my prayer about Hawaii.  I started looking up houses, and just generally felt happy about moving there.  I’ve even realized that if Carol is the right buyer for the house that God will let her house sell, and we won’t be making her financial situation worse by allowing her to have two mortgage payments.

Drew and I have decided that God used my prayers for “the buyer of the house” to answer some specific prayers in the people that he brought to look at the house. He says that I thought I was praying for the buyer, but really it was the certain people that God wanted me to pray for, and he says that’s how he knows that God has a sense of humor, because I took it literally, and he knows that God knows how literal I am.

We are still waiting for all the pieces of the loan to be completed.  The appraisal, the inspection, and termite inspection.  Any of these could kill the deal, but we trust that God already has this planned in advance.  I’ve learned that God brings people into our life for a reason, and I hope that I am more sensitive to understanding how He is working in that situation so I will be most effective.  I hope that Lisa finds the house that points her towards true joy, and I hope that the lady with the 4 year old finds the encouragement to believe that God is taking care of her.  I hope that Carol gets out of her financial burden, and I hope that God continues to use me to bring others closer to Him.