A Wee Bit of Stress

John and I still rent out our old home.  We've been doing that for over 2 years now.  And up until recently things have been great.  Over the last 6 months the condition of the home has declined....a lot.  The yard is almost completely dead, the inside is suddenly way too dirty, and rent was becoming consistently late.  It was frustrating.  But what was most frustrating is that our renter was annoyed with us.  I still can't figure out why.  But she was.

One day she sent an email letting us know that if we ever wanted to sell our house she would be interested in "breaking the lease amicably."  If I'm being honest when she sent that email I was happy.  She was giving us permission to break the lease!  I mentioned to my mom that our renter wasn't happy in the house anymore and we weren't too keen on her.  And that it might be time for us to do something with the house. We looked into selling but that still wasn't an option.

Then the crazy started happening.  The next night I got a text from my mom asking what the rent was on our house.  Apparently a good friend of her's son and his wife had been looking for a house.  I was a little hesitant about the situation but emailed our renter and let her know that someone might be interested in taking over her lease if she wanted out of it.  She said she was. Awesome!  Things were working out!

I did some snooping and looked at facebook pictures of our new potential tenants and soon realized that they would be a good fit for the home.  He works for Tru Green and agreed to help restore the lawn, and she has good taste and is a neat freak.  A win, win in my book.

But then somehow things got messy.  Our current renter started accusing us of kicking her out of the house etc. and before long there were threats of lawyers legal issues.  We were upset and confused. I honestly think she made a hasty decision saying she wanted to break the lease and then quickly regretted it.

John and I were losing sleep over the matter and I spent my days with my stomach in knots.  We were miserable.  When we reached our last straw I decided to spend the day fasting.  And by the end of the day I had decided what I was going to do.  I drove to Sonic and bought two shakes and showed up at her front door for a little chat.  John really didn't want me to go.  But that didn't stop me.

I honestly think if I hadn't had something in hand to give her she never would have been open to having a conversation.  We sat on her porch and I explained that John and I were confused and thought we had been helping her get out of a lease she no longer wanted to be tied to.  And she basically said she was stressed and had made a rash decision.  But the bottom line was....we were all moving forward and the fire had been put out.

We got the rent money that was owed to us and now we are to the point where we only have 2 days until our new renters will be moved in.  The whole situation has been so stressful!  I'm sickened when I see what has happened to our house in just over 2 years.  It looks like a sad and miserable house, not the happy home I remember.

My hope at this point is that our new tenants will love the house like we did.  I will be spending a day cleaning, getting carpets cleaned, and attempting to clean up the yard a bit.  All in hopes that the house will now be cared for.  And then if we're lucky....we can sell that darn house in the spring!