Insecurities/housing update

It's been a while since we posted about the house we made an offer on. That's because we really don't know what's going on. Short sales require waiting. That's cool, we're good at waiting (positive affirmations help, right?). It's only been a couple of months, after all (...).

Since we put the offer in, we've:
a) had to prove that we can pay the down payment
b) had to set up an inspection just-in-case (fortunately, we don't have to pay for it until we know we can get the house)
c) had to prove that we can get a loan
d) been approved by lender #1
e) been informed that lender #2 wants lender #1 to pay them money (ha, unlikely)
f) been informed that lender #2 wants to do their own appraisal of the property

so that's where we are now. Apparently it's pretty normal for lenders to want to do their own appraisal. I'm a bit concerned because we don't want to pay anything more than we've offered. But what if it's only a little bit? Do we compromise that?

The house should appraise for more than the asking price- we're aware of that. But the market is terrible and the comparable houses in the area haven't sold. There are no other offers on this house, and it's likely to remain that way.

Other insecurities: buying now means low mortgage rates. But it seems as though this country is heading downhill fast - maybe it's because we're young and haven't seen too many crises, but I can see things getting much worse, much faster. And I don't have a promise of a steady full-time job in the future- I have several applications in the works and relatively steady part-time work, but it'd be great to have the security of a full time job. It almost seems like what we should have done was buy land or buy a house with a lot land that we can use to our own profit- chickens, big gardens.... or maybe I'm just totally paranoid and have seen too many zombie movies lately.

I guess I just need to keep reminding myself why we want to buy in the first place:
a) renting is more expensive than mortgages here
b) we'd LOVE to have our own place.
c) pet friendly options are scarce
d) we're going to be here for probably at least a few more years
e) we want to meet people and become part of a community (not easy as renters, here- it's not a college town after all)

I guess where I'm going with this is that if this house falls though (still about a 50/50 chance we'll get approved by the 2nd lender, I'd say, combined with the fact that we haven't done the inspection yet and we kept that as an escape clause - no dangerous houses for me!), I think I'm going to be ok with it.

(And I say that now, while all the stinkbugs are busy destroying crops and hanging out in places that are not the house I live in now- this house seems totally fine in summer....) ha.