Steady Improvement

It was a day of steady progress for Josie and her flu recovery. She was much better yesterday than the previous two days and, at this rate, we expect her to be ready to get back to work tomorrow. She felt well enough yesterday for us to go out for a couple hours.

We took a drive to our house in Glendale to pick up the new key. We also wanted to check out the changes (fixes) that the property manager made prior to listing the home. There was no problem picking up the key, but we were very disappointed in the results of the repairs.

There were several items that were not touched at all, and a few that were not fully completed and we had concern that there was no running water in the home which indicates that our already shabby landscaping is not getting watered. So far, we are very disappointed in the effort being made by our property manager. I sent an email to them on Friday asking about activity on the house to date and I haven't gotten a response from them yet. I hope I'm wrong, but I had expressed concern to Josie a while ago about our putting the sale in the hands of our property manager. Their main business is rentals and not sales. I feel that we might take a back seat in their efforts to sell our property over their main business thrust of finding and controlling rental properties. We will not wait very long to make decisions on changing direction if necessary.

The football games yesterday were very good. I was happy to see the Eagles win and go on to the Conference Championship next week. The result of the Titans/Patriots game (won by the Patriots)was not surprising. The Patriots are a football machine and I don't see any team beating them this year. The best part of that game was in the first quarter when Austin's former roommate, Corey Davis, caught a touchdown pass to give the Titans in an early lead. Unfortunately, the lead did not last. There are two more games today with the Conference Championships being played next weekend. Then, we will know who will be in the Super Bowl...

Some Improvement

We had another day yesterday like Thursday trying to rid Josie of her flu. There seemed to have been some improvement as she stayed home from work a second day and continued the prescribed remedy of rest, fluids and standard medications. It is difficult to tell whether she has the flu or just a bad cold. The opinions on TV indicate that the flu would not be as severe for someone who had the flu vaccine as the symptoms are similar. The vaccine would provide some effectiveness, even if it didn't prevent the flu entirely. The reason I believe it is flu is the ineffectiveness of the standard medications. They should at least provide some temporary relief and in this case Josie has had very little, or slow, relief. Whatever it is, we just hope that it goes away sooner than later.

It looks like we will continue with the treatment for the rest of the weekend and not plan any activities. We will probably go to the house today to pick up one of the new keys. We have a temporary key that was given to us until new ones were produced. We have not had a chance to pick up the new one since Josie came down with her "whatever-it-is" illness. We will also get an update on the activity at our house - if any. The real estate agents can tell what activity has occurred by checking their lock-box activity online. We do know that the listing is widespread on the internet and on Realtor.com. It only takes one party to make the deal, so bring them on...

Flu Hits Home

Josie and I both got our flu shots this year as usual. This year, the strain of flu is more serious than in other years and the effectiveness of the vaccine is reported to be only around 10%. We believe that report as Josie was hit hard yesterday with what we believe to be the flu. She could hardly breathe, was seriously congested and had all the symptoms of the flu. So far, I have been fortunate and have not contracted it this year. Certainly, the low 10% effectiveness could have hit us. She stayed home yesterday and will do the same today. None of the standard medications - Thera Flu, NyQuil, DayQuil, Airborne - have had any affect. I guess we will just have to ride it out and hope that it goes away soon. She is getting plenty of rest and doing everything that is recommended.

Nothing much was done yesterday outside of making sure Josie was comfortable. More of the same treatment appears to be on the agenda today as we will try to speed the recovery...

More Paperwork

We'll start the day with a photo that Josie took of yesterday's sunset:

It turned out to be a wet day as we received over .5" of the wet stuff. It sure beats snow, though.

We are still completing and signing paperwork for the home sale and the end of the lease. Yesterday we signed the release of the remaining deposit monies to the tenants. There were monies taken out for minor fixes and for landscaping problems. It appears that the tenant did not water some of the bushes between landscaper visits and they are near dead, The biggest problem was the disappearance of the new tree that we planted prior to renting the property. The tenant was charged $500 for having that tree removed without consent.

We also completed what we believe to be the final documents for the sale. We now enter the toughest part of this entire event - the waiting. Of course, we don't know when/if we will get the call that an offer is in. We still believe that it will not be a long cycle as it is a nice home in a nice neighborhood and priced right for the area. With improving weather, we hope to see some activity.

Josie has been battling some kind of sinus congestion that doesn't seem to be the flu, but we don't know. We both got our flu shots, but the effectiveness of those shots is not good. She went to work yesterday, but it seems like she is not able to go today. We hope for a quick recovery from whatever she has...

On the Market

We finally got everything done and the home is now listed as of yesterday afternoon. We hope that it is a short sale cycle and that all goes smoothly the rest of the way. All of our future plans depend upon a successful sale and one that happens in a relatively short time. We have no desire to carry the house for months which would impact our summer plans.

The process has changed a lot since I was in real estate in the early 2000's. There are more forms and documents involved now, if that's possible. We had to sign several market condition documents and provide more detail on the property itself. It would be tough being a real estate agent today with all the legal "crap" that must be satisfied. I thought it was bad enough when I was an agent. A lot has changed on the financial side also. The entire mortgage process has changed as a result of the housing "dive" in the years between 2008 - 2010. There is a lot to be said about staying in your home, once you get one. That is a good reason for not wanting to buy another one just to sell again in a couple of years.

It will be an anxious time now until we see some activity on our house. We will be rushing to answer the phone every time it rings until we get an offer...

It's Show Time

First, there is this shot of another, beautiful Arizona sunrise:

Josie leaves for work at the right time during this time of the year.

There were lots of things happening yesterday. Almost all of these events took place in the late afternoon and evening which created a situation that I can't believe - I missed the National Championship game on TV and I didn't even think to tape the game. It was a terrific game, won by Alabama in OT and I so much wanted to watch the game. I could have scheduled the taping a week ago but didn't. I guess there was a reason I missed it, but I don't know why.

The main event was getting all of the paperwork completed for the house listing. The documents were emailed to us late in the day and we had to review everything and (Doc-u) sign all of them and get them back to the Realtor (our property manager). The house will be listed today as soon as the photos are assembled and the final listing document is prepared. There are a couple things we need to do today to be ready for the sale process - Get a Letter of Experience from our Insurance Company, and complete the SPDS (Seller Property Disclosure Statement). These documents will be required to give to buyers after they submit offers. It is now show-time.

We also connected with a top realtor in the New River area who sent some listings to us of properties to review. The option of buying a lot is a very viable one and we are anxious to check out that option. We would place our RV on the space until/when/if we would build a house on the property. Even if we don't build, the land investment makes sense over wasting more money on an RV space at the RV Park with no return.

I also want to mention that last night we received an unexpected and wonderful video call from our grandson, Justin, who has just completed his training at Fort Travis AFB in California and will come visit us during the Valentine's Day week. He will be coming to AZ to visit his girlfriend who attends ASU and we will get together during that visit.

It was certainly a busy and productive afternoon and evening yesterday...

RV Awakening

There are some things that need to be fixed on our ten year old RV and we wanted to do a check on the market to see if we should pursue them. We took a drive to the largest RV dealer in the Phoenix area - La Mesa RV - at their location in west Phoenix. We spent several hours looking at other fifth wheels and getting pricing for a trade-in on ours along with checking out other RV options. It was a rude awakening when we discovered that our RV - $103K value ten years ago when we purchased it - is now only worth between 20-25K on a trade. It doesn't matter what kind of shape it is in, as a ten year old rig is not wanted by any dealership and must be sold at auction. Actually, the quality of ours is still better than most of what we saw yesterday for lots more money. The bottom line to the whole experience is that we decided our fifth wheel is worth a lot more to us than any other person or dealership.

That was a good experience for us because we were able to eliminate that option. Buying a new RV is not very cost effective for us. We love our fifth wheel and find it a very comfortable, and cost effective - place to live. For now at least, we will continue with our current rig and make the most important fixes that we need to make. A lot or piece of property on which to place the rig is now a viable option.

Our house in Glendale is scheduled to be listed today, although we have not had a conversation with our property manager since we met with him last Thursday. We expect to see rapid movement today toward making the home available to the marketplace. I hope to have good news to report tomorrow...