Tuesday, November 30, 2010

The rest of the story . . .

When they posted the eviction notice (for lack of a better term), it mentioned that there was a cash incentive for vacating the premisis quickly, and that we should not pay our rent to the landlords because they no longer owned the house, the bank did. That makes sense to me. Thankfully, we had totally forgotten about our rent because we were very busy at the Maui County Fair. We knew this was coming anyways. We could tell the landlord was in trouble financially. Unfortunately, we found that out AFTER moving in! We still lived in the house a full year so no great loss.

So with this financial incentive clouding our minds we set out to find a new home to rent ASAP. We wanted to make sure we moved as quickly as possible because the sooner you moved out, the higher the incentive . . . up to $3500! What did we have to lose, right?

We found a place only a mile down the road in Waikapu. It didn't have any other people living on the property! (a big plus considering we've had another person residing in the houses we've rented, although seperate living quarters and entrances, since moving here!) And there is space for gardening!! YAY! The downside is it costs a little more, and the electricity was not included. This could be a problem considering that Maui Electric Company takes the highest ever month of service at that residence and doubles it as your deposit amount! Ummm, yeah. The first house we checked into getting the power in our name the deposit was going to be $1000! The second time we checked, which was at the last house we were renting, it would have been . . . are you ready for this? $1600!!! Yup, you're reading that right. Thankfully, our electricity was included in that last rental. But you can see how we might be a little worried about hooking up electricity at this new place, right? Thankfully, because this was a fairly new house and it was only a 2nd home to the owners, and they were hardly ever there, the deposit for the electric was only $175! Woohoo!

Unfortunately, at the time we were searching and found our new house to rent, the foreclosure market went into a freeze. And we were in such a dither about getting moved, packing, organizing people to help and all that, that we signed the lease on the new place BEFORE getting a contact signed promising us the incentive! (cue the "wah-wah-wah" loser noises). That's right - no incentive. DRATS!

It's a good thing we didn't pay our last month's rent at the old place. BUT, because we didn't, they didn't give our deposit back either! REALLY? *sigh* (taking deep breaths to calm down) Our only alternative was to "occupy" the premisis to the last possible moment through the rest of the month. We used that time to move the smaller stuff slowly and to clean at our leisure. They probably spent our deposit money long ago and didn't even have it. This would make the second time that has happened to us here!

At the same time this was going on, Scott was due to get his bonus for completing 2 full years at the hospital. However, when they finally got around to paying it, they lumped it with his regular check which threw him into a different tax bracket altogether and ate up practically HALF the bonus. SERIOUSLY? You would think that people in the financial/human resources would know not to lump a bonus with a regular check! *SIGH*

After all is said and done, we will be ok! I feel that our little "roller coaster ride" has come to a stop and we're back to normal life. We pulled through just fine.

Now let's all tip-toe very quietly away from "Murphy" and his "law"!