Plan C

Bank #2 is willing to work with us.  However the lawyer is requiring several extra steps which means more money in her pocket and less in mine.  I can understand how our land situation would confuse someone.  Our entire lot is composed of four individual lots.  About 38 years ago a road used to run between two of those.  The road was moved, but the county records still show a "road".  These lots of land have been owned by someone in my family for longer than I can remember.  I am not worried.

The lawyer sees the situation differently though.  We have put bank #2 on hold while we try a third option.  W is allowed to borrow from his 401(k).  He could actually borrow for a number of reasons, but we are looking into the option that allows for purchasing or building a primary residence.  There are no penalties as long as we pay the amount back within 15 years.

We submitted the required paperwork and are waiting the 10 business days for a decision.  We will have an answer by the end of next week.  For now this seems like the best option.  We will be repaying into his account and even the interest paid will go to us.  Stay tuned for the company's decision.

Day 140-141: Bank #1 and the Nasty Letter

We had not closed out things with Bank #1 just in case we hated Bank #2.  I was busy doing stuff around the house and did not get around to opening the mail until 6 pm.  I found a letter from Bank #1.  It stated in not so nice terms that we did not have insurance on the new house.  Bank #1 threatened to purchase insurance for us and we would pay whatever they decided to charge.  I was livid.

We do have builder's risk insurance and have had it long before we signed any loan paperwork with Bank #1.  To make matters worse we had submitted all of the policy information to the less than organized loan officer at Bank #1.  What she did with it, I have no idea.

The following day I put in a call to the insurance department at Bank #1.  They had no record of any insurance policy.  To stall them I submitted the policy information.  I then called the customer service number for Bank #1 and got the loan payoff amount.

You may wonder why we needed to pay off a loan when we never received any money.  Bank #1 took us for quite a bit of money in fees.  This was very clever on there part.  They made money for doing absolutely nothing.  I was angry enough with them to pay this amount and consider it a lesson learned.

The lesson - if you have a bad feeling about a person's professionalism, take heed.  It also pays to check around and talk to other people.  Once we started having major problems with Bank #1, we discovered that many other people did too.  We never had to tell anyone the name of Bank #1.  All they had to hear was bank problems, and they could tell us the name.

Day 136: Bank #2

In the interest of keeping this realistic, I am going to share more of our construction loan experience.  I had been frustrated with Bank #1 since we started.  The loan officer has been described by a friend as "flaky".  She would call me one afternoon and ask a bunch of questions.  The next morning she would call back and start the conversation with "I think we talked yesterday, but I have some questions".  She then proceeded to ask me the same questions again.  That is one example of several just so you know our decision to talk with Bank #2 was not an impulse one.

The second problem was that Bank #1 had never actually given us any money.  Every time we called, the loan officer came up with something we needed to get done first.  We would finish that and there was something else we needed to do first.

The paperwork with Bank #2 was 1/10 of what was required by Bank #1.  The loan officer at Bank #2 kept asking us questions trying to find out the problem.  She could not understand what Bank #1's problem was.  We signed a couple of papers and started the proceedings all over again.

By this point we felt we would have been moving right along.  Instead it turned into one step forward, two steps back.  The story does not end there though.  More tomorrow!

Day 135 & Some Frustrating News

The weather cooperated and we were able to finish drying in the house.  No additional pictures since the back looks just like the front.  In case you really miss having pictures, here is one of the chief supervisor, Leo.

I do have a picture of one of the gable ends.  Our sub-contractor made use of all the scrap pieces of plywood to cover it.  No waste!  That is great for our budget and our trash disposal.  

The frustrating news came from our bank regarding the construction loan.  Keep in mind that we signed the loan paperwork before Christmas.  Up to this point the bank had given us $0.  The appraiser came back out and the loan officer finally called to offer us an amount of money.  Our sub-contractor and his workers flipped out.  He said he had never seen a house build to this point with such a tiny amount of money being offered.  I have to agree that W and I felt the same way.  Our sub-contractor made a call, and I talked with someone at another bank.

Check back tomorrow to see where this goes.....