One of the things that I think I am supposed to do with my life, is get my mom into a house of her own. I have been trying to get us a house for maybe three years now. I am not sure when all of this got really going. I tried to begin to figure it out, in 2004. But then it seemed impossible. Because she doesn’t have the kind of income that people have who buy houses. But then the economy crashed, and that all changed. As I watched other people’s misery, I quietly rejoiced, hoping and praying every day, that the numbers would get worse. Because the numbers for the stock market being bad, actually means the difference between my mom being able to ever buy a house or not. With the stock market in turmoil, my mom CAN buy a house. Under normal stock market conditions, she can not. That is because it brings the house prices down. But that is not all. It is just the beginning.

As it turns out, people who have lots of money are out there buying up all of the houses that are now low enough priced for my mom to buy. They are buying them not to live in them themselves, but to fix them up prettier, and sell them for a profit. They are called investors.

At first, I thought that investing in houses was something fabulous, if I could do it. But I don’t have the money. Until I saw first hand how there are not enough houses on the market, for those who want and need to buy houses to live in, to buy. This means that those investors are keeping the lower income people out of the market, taking away their buying power, still, because they are buying every single one, for profit. So the poor are staying poor. But my mom has worked for thirty years at a government job. She has stayed living in a place that is now old and decrepit, for twenty three years. She needs to move. We need to move. It is too small and definitely not healthy. There is not enough room for her or for me. It is falling apart around our ears.

I want her to have a good life, for the last part of her life. That would mean buying a good house, and having enough space for our things. I want her to die happy. But more then that, I want her to live her older years satisfied and fulfilled, like she should be.

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It tears my heart out imagining her living ’til the end of her life where she is living now. People in America should not have to live like this. No one should.

So I have been working for free, figuring out the numbers, the details, the ins and outs of it all, and finding listings of homes for us to go see. We have been out looking at houses almost every week. We only stop when we have an offer in, and as we wait to find out if we got it or not, then. But, she has put in eleven offers before yesterday. That means that we have seen about sixty to seventy houses and chosen eleven to put in a contractual bid on. She was out bid by investors ten times. One time they didn’t want to take her loan type. (She can put down less of a deposit then other loans with the loan that she has, which helps make it possible). Going out looking at houses every week, and finding the listings, has been enough work to be a paid job. It is hard, tiring, and takes all of my time away from working on my career or any other job that I could possibly do. But it’s well worth it.

There have been tears, many tears, and great joy along the way. When I find a house that I love, I get so happy. But when she gets turned down and somebody else has gotten it, my heart has gotten broken, again and again. But then I have to get up and do it all over again. This part of it, has been going on for two years. The most busy part to where it is constant, it is my whole entire life, has been for one year almost.

To top it off, she doesn’t have furniture, not furniture that should ever be used by anyone anyway. Her furniture needs to be thrown away. There are a few nice pieces. But most of it was old when she got it, and has been used for twenty seven years. It’s decrepit. That’s just sad. But it also gives me a drive inside, a pulse that is pushing through my chest to keep going on and make something happen that is good for her.

A side benefit, something that I only realized recently, is how much it could change my life as well. If we get a house that has enough space for our things, then life will be completely different. But I am not sure if we are going to get a house that is really big enough to do that at all. We have been having to choose some houses that simply would not have enough space for our things, due to prices of houses that are out there. But, even a house that does not have enough space at all, would be much better then where we are living presently. It would also be a house for her, a place to call home. Oh, but I hope that we get one that has enough space! Imagine that, a real house, an honest to goodness solid, pretty, house. How peaceful that would be. This is the part of our journey that I am on.