Buying a House Can't Always Be Sunshine and Roses and Rainbows. SIGH.

We are reaching the end of the posts catching you up on The House Saga. If you need a refresher, we decided to move, went house hunting, made an offer, and here we are ... the wrinkle in our plan. (I'll warn you now -- this is the longest of the bunch.)


It all seemed to be working out. We put in an offer on a house at the very beginning of June and it was accepted the next day. We can DO this, right? If closing is in six weeks, we can get in that house before the baby arrives, even if she comes early like Josephine did! WE DID IT!


Except, no. I mentioned that the sellers wanted to have the option to stay in the house for 45 days after closing, since they had not closed on the house they were buying. Since the house had only been on the market for 12 days when we made the offer, we could see their position and put in our contract that they could stay up to 30 days if they paid us for every day they stayed. Our real estate agent assured us that generally motivated people to get out as quickly as they could. We didn't want to lose the house and start all over just because of that, even though it could put us all the way at AUGUST SIXTEENTH for a move-in day (Important reminder: Baby X is due August 27th, and Josephine came 3 weeks early).


This sounds kind of like no big deal, because, come on Veronica, you can do that. You can move a week before the baby's due (KILL ME NOW) OR move right after the baby comes if she comes early (KILL ME FASTER). It will be stressful, but you can do it!


HOWEVER, when Jeremy took the new job, he got new insurance, and this new insurance will not cover the OB/GYN I had in Lansing or to deliver in any Lansing hospitals.


SHIT.


In fact, the closest place I am covered is an hour from Lansing. My choices were basically: 
1) Stay in Lansing and pay for prenatal care and the delivery out of pocket (ha!)
2) Pick a random doctor and hospital based on proximity to my home and risk being more than an hour away, whether we ended up staying in Lansing or moving, OR
3) Pick a doctor back home and hope we get over there in time to have the baby there and not be still stuck in Lansing once I went into labor


I had a feeling that most OB/GYNs would not be all that willing to take on new patients who were, say, 37 weeks pregnant, so it's not like I could just wait it out and see where things took us. There was the option of going with choice #2 (picking a random doc an hour away), getting all transferred and having my check-ups covered, and then if we got a house back home I could find another new doctor and transfer all my paperwork again, but then I was definitely running the risk of not being able to find a doctor in the Bluewater area willing to take me so late in the game, and then we were in the exact same position of being far away from the hospital when I went into labor.


Supposedly most doctors don't have many qualms about taking a patient late unless she is high risk, but how the heck am I supposed to know what they consider high risk? When I tried to get in at my new doctor's office, they said I would have to release my files to them and the doctor would review them and decide if she would take me as a patient or not. I was under the impression (at that point, at least), that I was having a very healthy and normal pregnancy, but who knows what she might have considered a red flag and not worth it to take me on?


I did, in fact, get a doctor in the Bluewater area to take me as a patient (and then I started having problems! Ha! She never saw it coming!), but for months before that, I was so unbelievably stressed. I cried every day for MONTHS, and I have had hundreds of horrible dreams about every possible thing that could go wrong. I feel much better now about having a doctor, but ... there is still the small issue of us not knowing if we can get into the house before August 16th.


DUM DUM DUM.


This means if I go into labor before we move, I will need to drive TWO HOURS to get to my hospital. Since Josephine was three weeks early, there is a pretty good chance Baby X will be early as well (all three of my mom's kids were early -- healthy, but early). Plus there are all those people who keep telling me that their first labor was 30 hours and their second was like TEN MINUTES. And if I am delivering early, it could be all smooth sailing and NBD like Josephine was, or it could be an emergency situation. To say this has been stressing me out is the biggest understatement ever in the history of anything EVER. (EVER)


Then we got a glimmer of hope. Things were moving right along, and everything was coming up Dimick for once. We got an e-mail from our agent asking if we wanted to close on July 3rd! JULY THIRD! Which means they could only stay 30 days past then, and we would be in by August 3rd at the latest!


We rejoiced, we started packing with renewed vigor, we couldn't stop smiling and high-fiving each other.


Then, the next day, our agent informed us that the sellers were unwilling to sign on the 3rd, and since our contract stated we must close on or before the 16th of July, we couldn't legally "force" them to close before the 16th, even though we would lose our loan lock, which expired on the 5th, and would have to pay to get a new one.


Our agent said our only hope was to offer the sellers the option of staying until August 16th no matter what, as long as they closed before the 5th so we wouldn't incur any penalties. They declined that offer.


On top of all that, our agent told us they have not even gotten their appraisal back (!!!!), and the type of loan they are getting needs to be underwritten by the bank and THEN underwritten by the government, which can tack on WEEKS. PLUS, the the listing agent of the house they are buying said there is not much chance of the seller of the home they are moving into being ready to close before the first week of August, and then he has 15 days before he has to move out. So, it looks like the people who are selling us the house are going to need every last day and will be there until the 16th of August.


DEVASTATION.


Our agent said to put ourselves in their shoes -- parents with four kids and nowhere to go -- and I thought, LET THEIR AGENT STAND UP FOR THEM! YOU'RE ON OUR SIDE!!! WHAT OF MY BABY?!?!?!?!


It's a good thing we decided to do this whole thing when I wasn't at all hormonal and stressed.


I get it. It's not like they're doing it on purpose, and I'm sure they're also anxious to move out, but it doesn't feel like that. To get my hopes up for getting there early and getting time to settle in and not be worried every day for the remainder of my pregnancy and then have the opportunity ripped away was horrible.


Anyway, that's our frustration. I know you can't count on anything going according to plan when you are buying a home, especially when you are trying to do so on a timeline, but it makes it even worse that everything on our side of the equation moved quickly and efficiently.


We found out today that we will be closing on the 16th for sure, and then the sellers have those 30 days. At least we are set to close, right? And, I know It's still worth it in the end, because we are getting a home we really love, but ... tick tick tick ... I am pretty freaked out over here, what with this baby growing away and acting like she wants to get out early (Did I mention at my 33-week appointment yesterday I was measuring 34.5 weeks, just like with early-bird Josephine? HA HA HA! Hilarious!).


And yes, I am working on a plan in case this baby comes while in transit to the hospital. It involves ... catching? I DON'T KNOW! I'm working on it!