Frusrated!!!!

Can I just say this housing market is insane!!!!! When Spence and I got married this past spring, we decided that my 4 kids & I would move in with him & his 2 kids into the townhouse he bought in Nov 2008. 8 people in a 3 bedroom sounds ridiculous (and it is), but we were confident it would be temporary. We were working with his bank to short sale the townhouse since it appraised for $15,000 less than he owed on it. AND we were willing to take out a loan for the difference (out of our own pockets) to ensure the bank received their FULL LOAN amount. AND if the townhouse still wouldn't sell (plan B), we'd rent it out.

We've picked out our house to build and lot to build it on. We have the money to put down on it. Then everything fell apart. New housing regulations were released from the feds... Anything termed a short sale would be reported on your credit as a foreclosure. WHA??????? The bank gets ALL of the original loan paid back to them and it's STILL a foreclosure? I know, makes NO sense to us either. OK, so we'll rent it out... NOPE!!! Regulations now say that rental income has to be reported on your taxes for TWO YEARS before it will count as income.

AND to make everything so much better (that was SO sarcastically typed)... the townhouse community that we live in continues to build even more townhouses and selling them even lower than this townhouse is approved to short sale for. Who in their right mind would buy a more expensive used townhouse if you can buy a brand new one for less money. No idiot I've ever met.

We are SO frustrated. We both have good jobs and make decent incomes... we would qualify for twice the home we want to build. But because we can't get out of this stupid townhouse, we are stuck. We obviously can afford our home but we don't fit in it. Victims of a ridiculous situation we have NO control over. At this point, I'd love to just pack our things and walk away... except that would cremate Spencer's credit and we'd be unable to build/purchase a home for 5 years. Even then, it would be hard to get a good interest rate. And rates are SOOOOO low right now, who knows where they will be in 5 years. Home prices could again skyrocket by then too...

So what do we do? We cannot stay here much longer. Kids are going insane and making us lunatics as well. It isn't fair to them and nobody has any privacy. Ugh, seems like an impossible situation, huh? I know I'm not the only one stuck in a messy housing problem, and I am grateful we have a home and we can afford it... we just don't fit in it!!! Grrr..........