Our New Home

We are beginning to accept the fact that we now own another home. Actually we own 2 homes and when we go "off" tomorrow it will be a challenge to move from 1 home to another in 9 short days. After a plane ride to Dundee and a good night's sleep tomorrow we will arise early Wed. and drive to Lehigh Acres and meet with our tile man to decide how much tile Bill and I will buy later in the day. We will also meet with a locksmith and a handyman to get things moving while we are back in Dundee packing the "stuff" that is lying around that house. It just makes sense to tile the great room area and the bathrooms before we move everything into the house. Hopefully we will get it all arranged and get back to Dundee so we can pack on Thurs., Fri, & Sat. Sunday we will attend church and rest. Monday the movers come at 9:00am and shift all of our junk into a truck and transport it to Lehigh Acres and put it in our beautiful new home. Mon., Tues. & Wed. nights we will sleep in our new home and then on Thurs. we will drive back to Dundee and set things up to stage that house for selling and catch our plane back to NC by 3:00pm. We come back on duty at noon on Fri. the 17th. This schedule should keep us busy and out of trouble but does not provide much resting time. We are just so thankful to have a well constructed home at a price that we can afford while we ponder upon retiring with a much smaller income. We have gone from "poverty" to "plenty" and are not wanting to be too poverty prone. I am sure that we will always have some type of income producing activity so that we can afford to travel a bit and eat (basic necessities). Life is very good and we are blessed with health and with each other at least for a little while longer. So many of our ancestors died younger than we are which is not all that bad since they missed out on bodies that grow old and trying to live on a too small income when you are way too old to earn much money. Faith keeps us going and laughter keeps us smiling. We love all of you out there who read this and hope you enjoy our ramblings.

How To Almost Buy A House!!!

It has been an exciting ride. We've dodged a few pot holes. It is almost a done deal. The money was wired this morning (we had to drive all of the way to Virginia to a Wachovia). The papers never arrived by Fed Ex (oops on the part of the closer who did not get them to her local Kinkos early enough on Sat.). Did you know there is a national company that will send a notary to your home for an emergency document signing party? They will even deliver it to Fed Ex and send it back to the inept closer for you. The closer does have my sympathy though. She has a cold and it is the end of the month and they are super busy and she had to work late on Fri. and most of Sat. Not a job that I would ever want again. It was also partly the fault of the lender because they did not get the documents to the closer until Fri. The lender was still bugging us on Thursday for more information (like the actual name of the owner of the house-as if we would know). It turned out to be Deutsch Bank. Who would guess? So now we will sleep peacefully and see what tomorrow will bring. It might be the dawn of a new chapter in our lives with our beautiful new home and all of it's challenges. (I am going to buy a garage door opener) Good Night!

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Here We Go Again or How To Buy A House In Lehigh Acres.

With our Realtor, Stel.
Checking out one of 26 homes.

Entering another home.

And another home.

Garage door with class.


Here we go into 408 Parkdale.
This is the one!!!

This is my new kitchen.
LOOK!! It even has appliances.


Master bathroom bathtub.

Great room with a wood burning fireplace.

Bill's media room for his TV and surround sound.

Third time is a charm. After 3 months of looking and 3 offers it is about time.

At 2:00pm today we put in an offer and by 4:45pm the bank accepted it. Now we will get a home inspection done - but this house looks good. It has air conditioning, doors, sinks and a fireplace. What more could we ask for?

HOW DO YOU BUY A HOUSE IN LEHIGH ACRES?

Getting a GOOD Realtor is sooooo important. (Our Realtor is Stel Vodev with Century 21 and she is the best. Call her at 239-246-4023.) Looking at dozens of homes is also a part of the process. Looking at homes on the same day that President Obama is touring the area where you are buying your home (because it has more foreclosed homes than anywhere else in the USA) is also a must. Finding a home that you love that does not already have a contract on it is kind of nice, too.

All of the homes that we looked at were damaged by people who stole parts of them to sell. If a house has a water system for the well then you can bet that it doesn't have the AC condenser. From interior doors, to kitchen cabinet knobs, to the kitchen sink, parts of that home are just gone. When you find one that you like and it is close to being complete then you make an offer FAST. If you are not fast enough someone else will be making an offer on that house.

Having a GOOD loan officer is also important. (Our loan officer is Michael Gottlieb at Wells Fargo and he is good. You can call him at (239) 297-6868.) You will be pre-approved and sellers will want you to buy their house. However, if you go to the Wachovia Bank in Lehigh acres and ask them to make a copy of your savings account - so you can prove to your loan officer that you are a saver - be prepared that they may print it on bright red paper that will not fax well to your loan officer.

You also need a smart home inspector. We are using Dan Smart from JD Inspections because he was recommended from those we trust. You can reach him at 239-573-3246.
Most of all, one should have fun when buying a new home. Do it with someone that you love, and that GOOD Realtor, loan officer, and home inspector, and all will eventually fall into place and life will go on.

Check out my squidoo lens at
http://www.squidoo.com/lensmaster/new_workshop/strawbalegardening

What's In A Lens?

That which we call a blog by any other name would read as sweet.

Have you ever heard of Squidoo?

Please read the following description of how to get started with squidoo.

"What's this all about?

Squidoo is a hand-built collection of nearly 900,000 pages built by people just like you.

Squidoo is about finding people when you care what they know instead of who they know.

And Squidoo raises big money for charity every single day by donating money from the ads and links you see on every page."

http://www.squidoo.com/squidoo

Last night I completed my first "real" lens. (The first practice one didn't count because it just didn't cut it.)
The subject is Straw bale Gardening. Bill did the research and helped write the modules but I put it all together and figured out how to make all of the parts fit into the template. Of course, I was up half of the night doing this but it was all worth it when I published it and looked at my masterpiece of information.
Now I will keep updating it and working on making some money with it so I can retire to warm, sunny Florida and live in the house that I will someday actually buy in Lehigh Acres.
You can view my great lens (which is kind of like a blog or webpage or maybe even a hub) at http://www.squidoo.com/strawbalegardening
Let me know what you think. Constructive criticism is appreciated because I want to make this a quality lens.

The Real Victor William Szot.

Will the real Victor William Szot please stand up? Okay, so maybe he can just lay there all wrapped up and look precious, that will be fine. This is the real picture that goes with the impressive name. His mom sent me another picture on my cell phone and I learned how to send the picture to my email and then add it to this post. Oh yes, I am getting to be quite the techy. I even wrote a Squidoo, a HUB and put a post on Facebook. When Bill can't get his TV and sound system to work I even know which buttons to push on his remote thingy and he is soooo amazed.

I'm A Granny Again!

Congratulations to my daughter, Katie, and her husband, Mike.

The latest name in our family is Victor William Szot, named after his grandpa Bill. He came into this world on January 12th in Reno, Nevada. He is joining his family of 2 brothers and a sister and, of course, his very excited mommy and daddy.

Actually, this is not a picture of Victor (or Little Bill, as we may call him). Victor has lots of beautiful brown hair. This is a picture of his brother, Duncan, but they look so much alike (and I don't have a picture to upload yet of the new little one) so I am using this one. Hopefully his mom will read this and send me a "real" picture of the right brother to announce his arrival. All of the Szot boy babies look similar but they are usually kind of bald - like this picture. I have a picture of Victor on my cell phone but I do not have a cord that will enable me to download it to my computer. So, I am stuck with this picture, but isn't he cute? Take my word that Victor is just as adorable.