The bottom line - as regular readers might have guessed - is that buying is cheaper than renting. Hannah took a quick trip down here a few weeks ago with a list of potential houses clutched in her sweaty palm. She got to house number five and said "yep", launched into furious negotiation, and got us what we wanted, including moving in immediately. This was a little disconcerting as we were essentially squatting while we waited on the whims of the seller. What if we were gazumped? Presumably, because this is the States, we would have sued. Maybe I should add litigation to the dream list.
Anyway, that didn't happen, which is good as the US mortgage process is bizarre and terrifying, mostly because they'll lend any amount of money to anybody - even us! With all this extra lender-risk comes lots of extra checks and evidence gathering, with a few additional racially-profiled bureaucratic layers if you're not a genuine American and might jump the country if you can't pay your mortgage (which we totally would).
After weeks of document swapping and signing, the final sticking point was whether the automatic garage door would auto-reverse if it hit a 1.5 inch wooden block. I'm not making this up. We had to pay a man over $200 to come out and "certify" that it did, and then we were allowed to have a mortgage. The loan is from Chevron's own bank, of course, just in case our lives weren't already submerged enough in the sticky black pool of big oil.
But now we're in, and we own bricks and mortar and (contrary to England) the mineral rights under our property! Ah - now I see why Chevron was so generous. Unlike rented apartments I suddenly have space to put stuff and can rebuild my collection of thrift-store-sourced things that had to be so cruelly culled in our international moves. And we're allowed to put up a pole, like all our new neighbours, and fly the flag! Although disappointingly few have gone for the red dragon.
As for those other pillars of the American dream, love and arms? Well, we've only been here a week, and two-out-of-three ain't bad.
There's no place like home, there's no place like home...
