Seeing ghosts

Well, despite my doom and gloom about the financial situation, Husband and I went and looked at a house on Sunday. The listing had come up on an ongoing search that I have running on a realty site. I had found it interesting because I had literally watched it being built, since it was on my way to work. Son had a birthday party in the same town, so we dropped him off, and I mentioned that since we were in the neighborhood, maybe we could drive by.

Husband saw the house, and liked it enough to pull into the cul-de-sac to look a little closer. He noticed the open house sign, and made a point for us to make the time on Sunday to go and take a look. (Knock me over with a feather.) Which was probably a mistake.

In short, we loved it. Everything about it was what we wanted. A dedicated office away from bedrooms, a decent sized kitchen with double ovens, a master suite, and decent sized kids rooms. Oh, and an actual laundry room-with storage. I can't tell you how much I want this place.

The only reason that we could even consider this home is because it's a foreclosure. From what we got out of the listing agent, the current list price is at least $150k less than what it was built for, which would explain some of the nicer finishes, etc. Since it's only a couple of years old, there really isn't too much wear and tear, just some stains on the carpets (probably a small dog), and some grout that could use a little attention. The thing that made me remember that a family had lived here, that they had probably seen this as their dream home, was something really small. I opened up the pantry (!! more love), and saw a single, petrified marshmallow on one of the shelves. A fictional family came to mind-kids who wanted marshmallows, hot chocolate, that type of thing. Shoes in the storage seat in the mudroom.

I guess that it just got me a little. Some family may have lost everything, and there I stood, picturing myself in their place. Almost seemed presumptuous.

We aren't in any position to do this right now. Even with my pay cut, we could probably swing it, but if anything, and I mean anything, were to go wrong on the financial side, we would end up in the same position. We also need to fix our credit, and oh, there is that little issue of selling our current house. Regardless, I still feel the ghosts when I look at the foreclosure lists. We'll see what the future brings-I just don't want to end up being one of the ghosts.