22 March – (Late in the evening) Tricia has emailed me nine possible houses. I am not sure she sleeps. I went through the listings and they all sounded ok. Trish set up a date to look on Friday at ten, so I called my friend Diana to see if she wanted to house hunt with me and off we went.
The list Trish sent has some real possibilities. One is on Appian Way and I thought “How cool is that! I walked on Appian Way a long time ago – the one in Rome. It would be fun to say I live on Appian Way.”

26 March - We went through all nine houses – oh my. House number was next to a house that looked like perhaps the family ran a car repair service and they had a huge pit bull that did not look friendly at all. We could see him very well since the fence was chain link and cobbled up with a second layer to supposedly keep the dog in. I could not see putting my fur babies in that backyard for a minute. Number 2 was not in bad shape but it was little and dark. I do not remember much about numbers 3 and 4. Number 5 had beautiful big windows, but it was not possible to see how much light they let in because they had been all broken out and were boarded up. There were also parts of the cabinets missing and the bathroom wall had prints of a fist through it. Number 6 and 7 had holes kicked in the walls, a couple of doors kicked in, mold climbing up a closet wall and one of them had what looked like motor oil poured all over the living room carpet. I sighed! This was not fun anymore.
Then we went to number 8 and it was a possibility. I did not really like the kitchen, even though it was ultra modern with all the bells and whistles. Strangely, it had an extra room that was not listed on the description. The yard was not huge, but it was fenced well. It actually went on the list as a possible.

There was an extra house on the list because it had only come on the market and Trish wanted me to see it. However, the key would not work so all we saw was the outside and the yard, both of which were nice. Oh well.

Then we finally got to the one on Appian Way. I fell in love. The kitchen is nice and open although it is older and all the appliances have to go. But the house is open from kitchen to family room, to dining living room. It is fits me very well. The yard is huge and although the previous owner had been changing over to desert landscaping the watering system is still there so grass is a possibility. Not a lot of grass, just a little patch for little furry feet. Ok, for bigger feet that are not so furry too. So I made an offer.

Because I wanted the house, I offered the asking price, but we also asked that the seller pay closing costs. It was late Friday afternoon, and with bank owned homes, the bank has all the time in the world to reply.

I waited and waited and waited. Finally, on Tuesday afternoon, Trish called to say they had taken my offer but would only pay only closing costs up to 3.5% of the house price. We accepted that offer and sent the paperwork back to them. A quick day later we had an acceptance and then the race and the wait began. We had ten days to get an inspector out to look at the house and to cancel the loan if there was anything major wrong with the house. We had fourteen days to get an appraisal and cancel the loan if the house came in under price. BUT we did have a signed contract and it was before 30 April. So now it was just play the waiting game.