less talk, more rock

It's been a frustrating week since the last time I posted. I didn't have time to work out last week because I spent basically every night after school working on arranging the UALPA test, which is our state's answer to No Child Left Behind's stipulation that all English Language Learners must be identified and classified. What it means for me is that I had to go through a list of about 300 students (1/3 of our school's student body) and check their paperwork to make sure it was current and up-to-date, then create a testing schedule for about 100-125 of those kids. It took days.
After that was done, I had to start administering the test, which meant coordinating 2 very reticent "assistants" and pulling kids out of their regular classes to take this test. It's literally one of my worst nightmares... ever.
That being said, I did a surprisingly good job of sticking to an eating plan. Usually when I get stressed I binge on any and every carb within a 10 mile radius. The damage this time was minimal, and I ended up maintaining my post-birthday weight. Not fantastic, but I'm proud of the small accomplishments I made as far as my fitness goes last week.
Regarding our recent Real Estate transactions, Luis got cold feet last week when he found out a house on a different block sold for nearly 50% more than we agreed upon. This scared me because last time he heard something like that, we put our house back on the market for a year and I had to waste away in limbo for most of 2009 not knowing where I would be living or working, or if I was EVER going to get rid of my long-term house guest. I know that sounds really selfish of me. The house I live in right now is AMAZING and we are so lucky that we can afford it during a recession. I just don't do well with uncertainty, and it really was one of the most stressful years of my life.
Luckily, his buddy talked some sense into him and explained that although 300% would be life-changing, a 200% return on a 5 year investment is something that you take. Period. Without worrying about what other people are getting. So the sale is still moving forward.
In my last post I mentioned we were looking at 3 different options; a new-build in Provo, a new-build in the south part of the county, and a remodel. Well, the more we look in to it, pray about it, and weigh out the possible costs and long-term resale, we feel better and better about the remodel. It's more square footage than we could afford with a new-build, plus it would cost much less. The resale values of the houses we are looking at to remodel are only slightly less than the resale value of either home we would choose to build, plus we will save money on carrying costs long-term because we can move into a remodel in a matter of a couple of weeks, whereas it could be next year by the time a new-build would be finished.
Anyway, we've only seen photos and the exterior of our number one choice, but we've got a showing scheduled today and if it looks good, we'll probably put an offer on a 5 bed, 3 bath, 3000 sq. foot home on 1/3 acre up in the Sherwood Hills subdivision on Provo's East Bench. It's about a mile away from Rock Canyon park, for those of you who know Provo. I'm pretty excited, to say the least. The house is ugly as heck, but you can fix ugly, as my previous ventures into the world of real estate have taught me.
And last but not least, all of this is going on while I'm planning a trip to California for my youngest ex-step-sister's wedding in San Francisco. This is also very stressful for me because I have to take off personal time during a stressful work/personal week... but maybe I need a few days off, anyway, and it's kind of a personal obligation that I committed to a year ago.
Anyway, that's me in a nutshell. What's new with you?

So we met with a builder yesterday to talk about the prospect of turning our hard-earned (cough, cough) equity into a new home. There's still a TON of options on the table, but we have it narrowed down to roughly 3: a. build a new home on the East Bench of Provo on a smaller lot in a nice neighborhood b. build a new home on a 2.5 acre mini-ranch in Genola UT, which is about 5 minutes south west of Payson (roughly 20 minutes south of Provo) c. purchase an existing home in the Provo Temple neighborhood and pimp it out with granite counter tops and a jacuzzi tub.
Luis's biggest concern is long-term investment potential. My biggest concern is NOT downgrading from the house we're in now. Either way, the plan is to rent and/or sell out our current property and move into something a little more cost-appropriate than what we're in now. If we can pull this off, I can quit my job as early as next year... or switch to part time... or go back to school, get my Master's and start teaching community college.
Sweet....

So in my previous post I mentioned that we are in the middle of trying to work out a Real Estate deal that could mean some major lifestyle changes for us. There's still a lot of loose ends to tie up, but the first part of the transaction is now underway- we have agreed to sell our rental property (our little 2 bed 1 bath starter home by BYU) to the local health mega-giant, Intermountain Health Care for an undisclosed sum. Yesterday we reached a verbal agreement with them. They are drawing up the paperwork, and we'll close in about 30 days. We're finally getting rid of that cursed piece of junk. Hoo-rah! (I will definitly NOT miss the snakes or the rats!)

Stay tuned for more updates. We're meeting with some folks on Monday to discuss Phase II of the whole operation.

I've been really bad at keeping up with the blog the last few weeks. There hasn't been much going on, and most of what is happening these days I have to keep under wraps- hence the excessive use of YouTube videos. I just thought you guys would be interested to know, however, that we have another Real Estate deal in the works. If this pans out, it will be the biggest thing to happen to me this year, but I don't want to go into too much detail because there are a lot of "what-ifs" and "maybe's" right now.
In the mean time, here's another YouTube video to keep you entertained.