I have come to the conclusion after 16 years of home-ownership that it is overrated.
I guess there is something warm and fuzzy about equity, but it is pretend money, at least to me. It's not like I can just get to the money in my house without a whole lot of time, energy, worry and spending more money to sell the house.
You would think after a decade of parenting I would be used to all this spending money business, but I am not. With kids, there is a certain amount of reuse/recycle involved, and I can always make a little bit back when I sell toys and clothes at consignment sales.
And I don't drop thousands of dollars on my kids at any one time. (yet)
But houses......that is another story.
Last year was The Year All Our Stuff Started Falling the Hell Apart.
Dishwasher=gone.
Microwave=slow, overly-dramatic death.
Vacuum cleaner=bit it.
Refrigerator=didn't technically die, but its limbs were falling off and at 15 years, we knew it was just a matter of time.
I am old-school, the child of Depression-era parents. You fix stuff until the repair person says, "Lady, would you please just go buy a new one."
This has been The Year of Big, Substantial Things Needing to Be Replaced Resulting in an Almost Non-Stop Panic Attack over Finances.
The tail end of last year and first of this year we had a new roof installed.
Two-and-half years ago we were told the seals were failing on a number of our windows. So we are biting the bullet and getting new windows for the house.
The sump pump died (causing our basement to leak for the first time ever) so we had a new sump pump and a backup sump pump installed.
Today my desk chair fell apart as I sat on it (I'd already tried to put it back together once), and I think our garbage disposal doesn't work anymore.
I try to be thankful that D and I save money and don't have to go into debt to make these repairs and do upkeep on the house.
I try to be thankful that we even have a house, especially given the destruction in the Philippines.
That voice of doom that lives in the nether regions of my brain starts getting a little too loud when I have to spend money though, when I have to turn over a measure of my security.
I am thankful for, and yet hate so much, my first world problems.
I guess there is something warm and fuzzy about equity, but it is pretend money, at least to me. It's not like I can just get to the money in my house without a whole lot of time, energy, worry and spending more money to sell the house.
You would think after a decade of parenting I would be used to all this spending money business, but I am not. With kids, there is a certain amount of reuse/recycle involved, and I can always make a little bit back when I sell toys and clothes at consignment sales.
And I don't drop thousands of dollars on my kids at any one time. (yet)
But houses......that is another story.
Last year was The Year All Our Stuff Started Falling the Hell Apart.
Dishwasher=gone.
Microwave=slow, overly-dramatic death.
Vacuum cleaner=bit it.
Refrigerator=didn't technically die, but its limbs were falling off and at 15 years, we knew it was just a matter of time.
I am old-school, the child of Depression-era parents. You fix stuff until the repair person says, "Lady, would you please just go buy a new one."
This has been The Year of Big, Substantial Things Needing to Be Replaced Resulting in an Almost Non-Stop Panic Attack over Finances.
The tail end of last year and first of this year we had a new roof installed.
Two-and-half years ago we were told the seals were failing on a number of our windows. So we are biting the bullet and getting new windows for the house.
The sump pump died (causing our basement to leak for the first time ever) so we had a new sump pump and a backup sump pump installed.
Today my desk chair fell apart as I sat on it (I'd already tried to put it back together once), and I think our garbage disposal doesn't work anymore.
I try to be thankful that D and I save money and don't have to go into debt to make these repairs and do upkeep on the house.
I try to be thankful that we even have a house, especially given the destruction in the Philippines.
That voice of doom that lives in the nether regions of my brain starts getting a little too loud when I have to spend money though, when I have to turn over a measure of my security.
I am thankful for, and yet hate so much, my first world problems.
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