We spent the first weekend cleaning. So far we are loving our new place. We lucked out, the sellers were extremely organized and left us leftover paint, chalking, etc. and labeled everything for us. They also left a HUGE shopping bag full of manuals for everything in the house that we haven't had time to go through yet. It is a very well maintained house. Yeah!
Closing costs were about $18271 which we accounted for already.
Even though this house needs a minimal of work, there's still a LOT to do! Lol.
And I can see why new home owners get in so much trouble charging everything on credit cards and spending waaaaay too much money.
I'm getting sucked in myself on the spending spree and really shocked at how much money I've been spending JUST in the last 10 days after closing on the house.
We have the money but I honestly never spent so much on consumer goods (except for a car) in such a short period of time! I'm going to have heart papitations when I write checks out to pay off all our credit bills in full when they come in. But right now it seems like we are tossing money in the thousands here and there like confetti. Lol.
Furniture: $17,000 (family room, bkft area, master BR, DR & LR all done)
W/D: $ 2400 (front loaders, 4.5 cf capacity with pedestals)
From Sellers: $ 800 (aquabot, 2 lawn mowers, shopvac & some furniture 4 bsmt)
Total: $20,200
That's it for now except maybe a snow blower soon.
Here's where the money is coming from:
We orginally budgeted $35K for furniture and home repairs/improvements but wanted to spread it over the next few years at around $2500/mth with an additional $500/mth coming from our monthly budget for a total of $3k/mth.
We "justified" spending so much $$$$ all at once, aside from the convenience of getting it all done at once with the following additional funds.
$ 9000 DH's parents gave this $ as a gift the day of the closing for furnishings
$ 5000 I got my consulting fee the week of closing (not incl. in inc. budget)
$ 3232 Just got Fed/State tax return refund this week (filed 10/15)
$17,232 Funds I didn't account for previously in my $35K budgeted figure
So, in actuality we are "only" spending the net $3K ($2500+$500) I had orginally budgeted for per month.
In addition, we will be getting:
$8000 New home buyer credit that we will either get next year or sooner if I amend our 2008 returns.
So, even though it seems we already blew more than half of our furniture/home improvement fund of $35k in less than 2 weeks, in reality we will still have about $5000 on TOP of the original $35K we had budgeted for.
It still seems a bit painful. But once these bills are paid for, we should still be on track and in good shape. But I am a whole lot more empathic to those that go crazy and spend like there is no tomorrow when they get a new house. It is really hard to resist the impulse even though I am normally a frugal person. I'm just lucky that I had do have the funds on hand. Many people don't and won't realize the damage they did until they have to pay the bills!
Closing costs were about $18271 which we accounted for already.
Even though this house needs a minimal of work, there's still a LOT to do! Lol.
And I can see why new home owners get in so much trouble charging everything on credit cards and spending waaaaay too much money.
I'm getting sucked in myself on the spending spree and really shocked at how much money I've been spending JUST in the last 10 days after closing on the house.
We have the money but I honestly never spent so much on consumer goods (except for a car) in such a short period of time! I'm going to have heart papitations when I write checks out to pay off all our credit bills in full when they come in. But right now it seems like we are tossing money in the thousands here and there like confetti. Lol.Furniture: $17,000 (family room, bkft area, master BR, DR & LR all done)
W/D: $ 2400 (front loaders, 4.5 cf capacity with pedestals)
From Sellers: $ 800 (aquabot, 2 lawn mowers, shopvac & some furniture 4 bsmt)
Total: $20,200
That's it for now except maybe a snow blower soon.
Here's where the money is coming from:
We orginally budgeted $35K for furniture and home repairs/improvements but wanted to spread it over the next few years at around $2500/mth with an additional $500/mth coming from our monthly budget for a total of $3k/mth.
We "justified" spending so much $$$$ all at once, aside from the convenience of getting it all done at once with the following additional funds.
$ 9000 DH's parents gave this $ as a gift the day of the closing for furnishings
$ 5000 I got my consulting fee the week of closing (not incl. in inc. budget)
$ 3232 Just got Fed/State tax return refund this week (filed 10/15)
$17,232 Funds I didn't account for previously in my $35K budgeted figure
So, in actuality we are "only" spending the net $3K ($2500+$500) I had orginally budgeted for per month.
In addition, we will be getting:
$8000 New home buyer credit that we will either get next year or sooner if I amend our 2008 returns.
So, even though it seems we already blew more than half of our furniture/home improvement fund of $35k in less than 2 weeks, in reality we will still have about $5000 on TOP of the original $35K we had budgeted for.
It still seems a bit painful. But once these bills are paid for, we should still be on track and in good shape. But I am a whole lot more empathic to those that go crazy and spend like there is no tomorrow when they get a new house. It is really hard to resist the impulse even though I am normally a frugal person. I'm just lucky that I had do have the funds on hand. Many people don't and won't realize the damage they did until they have to pay the bills!

Ha-ha, my own particular version of young and ignorant worked to my advantage over time.
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