What proves too optimistic?: Signing Away Your Life

I logged on to the Mini Financial site yesterday morning to view our payoff amount, to see if the check had cleared. But, no, the balance was still there. A little later, still there. Around noon, it was still there. I began to wonder if my compulsive statement reviewing was doing any good when I logged on to find the site was unavailable. An hour later I checked it to find the same message, then it clicked, hmm if they were making changes then the site might be unavailable. Ten minutes later I was asking a Mini USA representative to e-mail an official letter declaring the sum paid in full and our financial obligations terminated!

Today, Adam called in sick (with intergrity unmarred because he is in fact sick- with whatever end of summer flu bug that is going around) and I canceled my afternoon shift. We waited all day for the Title company to contact us with an appointment time. Then at 1:29 pm, as we were driving to the bank to submit the wire transfer for our down payment, we received notification through our realtor that our appointment was at 3 pm. The transfer went smoothly and then we had some time to kill. First order was getting a light lunch, Brugo's on the corner of Kietzke and Virginia, yummy! Best cheesesteak ciabatta of my life! Then some browsing at Borders, may it rest in peace. Finally, 2:45 pm rolled around and we excused ourselves to be a little punctually premature.

Joan, our realtor, met us at the Title office. We waited about ten minutes and then I received more than enough opportunities to perfect my new signature. The Title officer, Susan, was wonderful, nice and gracious. She was thrilled to pieces with the fact that Millie was sitting on her desk munching on a rice cake and rifling through the loan documents as she explained them to me and Adam. And Millie for her part was just as wonderful. Yes, there was a time when she managed to call another Title officer via the intercom. Followed by the decision to make Susan's business cards rain all over the table. But for the most part she was her angelic self, cooing and gumming her rice cake in peace. After an hour and a half of sign here, date here, initial here. We were done! And the best part! Our mortgage payment on our 1300+ square foot house (complete with front and back yard and one car garage) is going to be five bucks LESS than what we are paying now for a 900 square foot apartment.

Tomorrow, we get the keys...

Here are some teaser before photos of our new home.