It’s finally happening.
I’m putting my house in Michigan up for sale. Since I bought it in 2006 while working at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre, & Dance, the Canterbury house played witness to countless memories, a few bad, but mostly in the good to great range. Dozens of cookouts, get togethers, and several killer Halloween parties went down there. That house was the backdrop to the best years I spent in Ann Arbor.
But it’s time. After moving to Boulder in August 2010, I put it up for rent, since the housing market wasn’t favorable, and I had outside hopes of one day turning a profit. It’s been occupied by a number of people in the intervening years, but the dream of ‘investment real estate’ never quite came to fruition. In the best of months (those when it was both occupied, and nothing broke or needed repair), it only cost me a $200-300 difference in the mortgage payment and rent. Times when things did break, the sky was the limit. It’s now April 2015… so you can do the math, because I would prefer not to.
More compelling than the monthly shortfall, however, was the bizarre budgetary reverberation this outflow/inflow caused. Each month, the outflow had to be set aside, and a few days later, a rent payment may or may not show up, dependent on my account balance with my property manager. It finally dawned on my what a snarl this was for my budget and savings goals, so when my current tenants decided not to renew, I contacted my real estate agent to get it on the market.
It’s been quite a journey, homeownership, and I feel like I’ve gotten to learn about all the aspects first hand, but I’m pretty much ready to be away from it for the time being. Writing this has definitely made me wistful in thinking back — I’m going to miss it, and everything it represented to me over the years.
It was a good little house.