Buying a Home the Joshua Way Pt 3

Our choice

We first saw the house in mid-July and put in our initial bid in late July. The bank owning the house countered and we put in our second bid in August. They rejected it. We let it sit on the market.
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Just as September turned into October my husband and I talked over our plan for this house. We agreed to leave it be until spring, realizing that we weren't willing to up our bid until we had saved up more money and the bank was more eager to sell the house. Just one day later the bank dropped their asking price by 30k bringing their price that much closer to ours (but still 20-30k more than we wanted to pay). Their price cut told us they were not eager to hold onto the house over winter and might be ready to accept a lower bid. So we put in the same second bid we had offered in August. Five days later they accepted that bid. We would be buying the house within budget, especially considering the repairs that needed to be done before we could move in and the stuff that we wanted to make the house our home.
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The Lord brought the story of Joshua entering the Promised Land and conquering Jericho to my mind and reminded me of it multiple times between our initial spotting of the house in July and our final purchasing of the house in November. Now, Joshua and the Israelites were without a homeland because they and their ancestors had obeyed the Lord's commands. Abram left Ur to follow the Lord and to live out His will for himself and his descendants. Now, so many hundreds of years later, Joshua was leading God's chosen people into the land the Lord had promised to Abram. God clearly told him that this was the next step, Joshua needed to trust the Lord's impossible instructions for the conquering of the first city of the Promised Land, and then Joshua and the Israelites needed to work a bit to obey.

We have had lots of help transforming this house

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This was a Joshua-type miracle for us on each one of those points. We were in need of a larger house because we welcomed into our life all the children the Lord has sent us, choosing not to turn away from His plan for us. We were in the Lord's timing. It was His plan that we were seeking and His timing in bringing that plan another step further. Time after time I asked the Lord to remove from me the desire for this house if in fact this was not His plan for us and time after time He simply strengthened that desire. We prayed in faith because we felt the Lord was telling us that this was the next step for us, so we wanted to trust Him to make the impossible happen. Though we needed to work a bit on our end as well.
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Many, many projects being done now
and many more waiting for us in the future

The bank owning the house accepted our offer the first week of October. We needed a mortgage loan that was working with the house as a foreclosure and giving us enough to complete the repairs and remodeling that needed to take place before we could actually live in the house. Our realtor told us at the closing that he fully expected our particular type of loan to take at least 2-3 months to complete, based on his experience as a realtor and an owner of multiple homes. He praised our loan officer for pushing it through quickly, allowing us to close only 6 weeks after our offer was accepted. While our loan officer worked so well with us and did an excellent job (let us know if you need a referral...), the success of his work was not entirely in his hands: it was very much also in His hands. (Also let us know if you need a referral to a realtor. Though he should have been less surprised at the outcome: he also knows the God of Joshua.) We closed on the house just before the mortgage credit report expired and just before the legal window for closing expired, so we didn't have to wait for another credit approval nor file any expensive extensions for our bid on the house.
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A week from today this won't look like a
construction zone. It will be a home for us to live in.

Our building contractor began work on the house the day we closed on it and expects to finish this coming week. Honestly, this home is far more blessing and far more work than I ever expected to own. We know lots of people who buy fixer-uppers, either to live in themselves after purchasing for far less than the house is worth when their done with it or to flip, selling the finished product to people like me. People like me who don't buy unfinished houses because we don't know how to do the work ourselves, we don't spend our free time on remodeling projects, and we don't frequent the building contractor resale stores. People like me who don't spend time on redecorating pinterest boards because we don't expect to ever take a home down to its bones and rebuild it. Paint colors...appliance choices...flooring options...room rearrangements... Actually, we didn't take this house to its bones, but we did replace 2/3rds of the floors, all the appliances, 1/2 the walls, the majority of the bathroom fixtures, several doors, and most of the light fixtures. That's enough redecorating to overwhelm me. There are projects in this house to keep us busy for the next decade or more, as our finances allow, in the windows, walls, and so much more.
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The location is just right for us. The size is just right for us. The structure is just right for us. God made the price and the timing right for us. We honor Him for breaking down the walls that "should have" prevented us from moving forward in the path laid out for us.
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Thankful Thursday: This isn't my blog
Happy Heritage: Prayer of Faith
Buying a Home the Joshua Way Pt 1
Buying a Home the Joshua Way Pt 2
Buying a Home the Joshua Way Pt 3
The Lord will do amazing things
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Linked with Fellowship Friday