My wife and I are in the midst of selling and buying a home. It is stressful.
At this point, we are in the option period of the contract to sell our current home. We have also made one offer on a very nice home. But at the same time, another nice home has come to our attention and we're working out some details on that home with the current owner. We may make an offer on that home too and then decide which one to purchase.
We went through this several years ago when we bought our first home. We looked at half a dozen homes before whittling the search down to two. Our home has served us very well. There have been some minor and major repairs, but we're still floating. It was a leap of faith with the first home. We had bought our first car six months before our first home and I was obsessivly worried about our finances. I wasn't sure if we were going to be able to afford a car payment and a new home. Also, we only had one child when we bought the home and so I was also concerned about being able to support a growing family. But despite all my worries, we survived.
We faithfully paid our tithing and made generous fast offerings. My paycheck gradually increased. We had our 2nd child and then our 3rd child and finally our 4th child. With the addition of our 4th, our house is quite cramped. Our 4th currently sleeps in our closet! We thought my company was going to move us with a job transfer, but the transfer never came. So we've decided that we're not going to wait for the company to decide our fate regarding a home purchase.
I made some initial calculations about how much we can afford. It wasn't until this week that I found a few flaws in my estimates. It turns out that our new mortgage will be much more than our current. As it is, our budget is very strained. I've not changed much ... I am still overly obsessive about our finances. So I've been pulling my hair out and ranting to my wife about how we might go bankrupt with this new house. But she keeps reminding me of the feeling we've had about this decision.
We've both felt that this is the right move (buying a larger home for our family). So now we just need to have faith and trust that everything will work out eventually ... just like when we fretted over buying our first home.
So I'm writing this while we're in the midst of selling and buying so that I can look back on this day and see that when we trust in the Lord, things will work out. I hope to report several months from now that all is well in our home and that our decision was indeed lead by the Spirit.
In my heart I know things will work out.
