Wow… What a week…

I’d meant to post something each and every night regarding all of the happenings but sometimes you just can’t find the time. In that respect — this week totally sucked…

On Monday night, we scheduled that appraisal that we’ve been avoiding since we initiated the mortgage re-fi exactly one month ago.

As a result, I hastily mowed the lawn and filled the POD in the driveway pretty much up to the limit to eliminate additional clutter. Somehow I managed to do this all of this prior to the finale of 24.

On Tuesday evening, the appraiser came over and asked about all of the updates (roof, siding, furnace, etc…) we’d made and then he ventured through the house taking pictures.

Obviously, the entry room was a topic of discussion. Further, since we’d filled the POD already, the parlor and the dining room were also topics of discussion…

Seemed like a nice enough guy but if I’ve learned one thing from all of the BMW and Cessna tucked away in the garage or an arcade game in the kitchen but he clearly mentioned repeatedly that “all things have value”…

Even still, I’m not a big fan of such subjective things. The success of our loan hangs in the balance of what one guy “thinks”.

I mean, it’s either worth it or it isn’t. It should be concrete. We’re either a risk to the lender or we’re not. It shouldn’t matter what color our walls are painted or how cluttered a one year old’s room is. It isn’t a cash out re-fi either so we’re not flight risks in the sense that we’re trying to squeeze money out and run. Our credit scores speak for themselves. This big gray area of unicorns and rainbows, err, subjectivity seems, I dunno, unfair, I guess…

And, really, this is a *tiny* loan in the grand scheme of things. I could go out to our local Porsche dealership tonight and get an auto loan (at a comparable rate, even) for a new Cayenne without a problem — but for this I need to jump through hoops. It’s just a little frustrating…

So, back on topic… No word on the results of the appraisal yet — though my credit card was dinged for $445 for good measure. I hope it doesn’t turn out to be $445 spent for nothing.

Wednesday was Duncan‘s first birthday and we spent the day at the Bronx Zoo. The picture at the top of this post was taken on Wednesday.

It was a nice change of pace, taking a Wednesday off from work, but somewhere along the way (I wrestled a hippo) I messed up one of my wrists pretty badly. I mean, it hurts…

A few years ago I jammed my other wrist playing hockey (and stupidly continued to play for months on end) and it took nearly a year before it felt 100%. This time, well, it’s *way* worse — one of those things where it’d probably have been a better outcome if I had just broken it…

Thank goodness I’m right-handed *and* we’ve already moved 99% of the heavy stuff out to the POD already.

Thursday night we had the contractor that gave us the $33487.70 quote come back to go over his crazily over detailed quote for our first floor renovation in more general terms and to ask a few more questions.

After a couple of hours — mostly spent shooting the breeze — we signed off on it and even wrote the first check.

Today, Friday, we wrote that $17000 credit card check to ourselves to get all of the money needed in place for the renovation.

So, yeah, it’s been a pretty busy week and, hopefully, next week we’ll find out how the apprasial went and if the re-fi is going to go through, and if we’re really lucky, demolition might even begin on the house.

And, if everything goes right, maybe my wrist will magically heal too…

Don’t unicorns have healing powers?

I can’t believe that I just mentioned unicorns twice in one post.

Hey, what happened to paying off the mortgage before your kid is even in school?

Well, I’ve been on pace now for over a year to have my mortgage done and paid for in early 2014 — not that far away — but I’ve decided to take a different route and here’s the reasoning…

The primary reason is that we *need* to renovate the first floor. While I can envision having my main entry way looking as it does for another 40 months or so, I don’t want to.

The other reason is because I’m afraid that if we don’t do the renovation now (or I’m guessing in the next 18 months), we’ll run the risk of never getting it done.

See, I’ve come to the conclusion that in a worst case scenario (a major job loss), we could keep up with the mortgage as it stands now on just my wife’s income.

Now say, for instance, that worst case scenario arrives before we’re able to renovate the first floor…

See where I’m going?

Yeah, we’d be strapped for cash *and* be living in squalid conditions.

Seeing the ends are nearer for a renovation than they are for a mortgage payoff — and the benefits of a renovation far outweigh, well, the alternative (a worst case scenario = nothing), this is the wisest plan that I’ve come up with so far…

Seriously, I thought about this for like 5 minutes straight…

So I’m going to institute my “Mortgage Ladder” plan in November and start saving like a mad man.

Notice, though, that I did *not* say that I’d curb my spending…

One thing at a time…