mishaday | Stuck in the Middle

So Dad's house is still for sale. It's probably priced a little high for the shape it's in (15 years of no updates-shabby). Dad doesn't have the money to update it but he still goes to Lowes for rose fertilizer, and comes back with flyers on replacing the old electric range with a shiny gas stove (there's a gas hookup, but still. No. No, you can't afford it; No ,the carpets will still be shabby and pink. Just. No.)

We've gotten the routine of quick clean and clear down: visibly clean and no cat accoutrements (especially the litterbox!) in sight. Mocha goes in the car with us, and Darlene... well, she hides under the bed. She's shy enough she won't come out while strangers are there, so I'm not worried for the 1/2 hour we're out of the house for a showing. Also, wrangling her out from under the bed after we've run the vacuum? Not happening.

It's disruptive, though. A half-hour showing requires 23-30 minutes of clean and clear, and be out of the house 10-15 minutes before the half-hour showing. That's upwards of an hour and a half. Just to pile into my car, park around the corner out of sight and wait. I have some handsewing and Dad stalks them on the doorbell and front door security cameras.

And my condo is still for sale. I had extended the listing through the end of March, and well... it's March. My agent says the housing market is hot, but anything with shared spaces or walls... just isn't moving. The idea of moving back in to that little place makes me tired and sad, so I think (especially as we approach summer) that I need to consider renting it out. I may need to refinance to make it all work right, but if I can get it to break even, then I can get into a larger place.

I'm juggling the idea of renting for a year or two. I might need the time to re-gather a down payment if my condo doesn't sell. I'm also going to need to talk to my boss about continuing remote work. To date I've said (with the assumption of moving back to Seattle) that I'd want to do something like 3 days in the offce, 2 wfh. I want to remain in the PNW (and there's the complication of my things in Pods can't go far without having to take everything out to shove them in a moving van - that idea is exhausting.) but working remotely full time might be in the cards.

I've set myself the mental date of June 1st to get back to the PWN. It's a ballpark, based on all the factors. That'd be a year in NM.

I had set my mail forwarding to expire in January, with the assumption that'd I'd be on the ball enough to continue it if I still was in NM. Then Mom died, and yeah, no. I was 95% done with my taxes before I realized that yeah, I really needed to check my mail before I tried finishing them. I'm mostly sure I have everything electronically, BUT. I'm hoping to fit in a quick trip next weekend.