Wanting to Retire to Centralia, Illiniois

[centralia62801]

Me in an apartment? Never. I refuse to rent. or to live in a trailer lol. I own my home in Centralia. I'm not about to down grade.

Things will be fine for the mean time. I'm starting Kaskaskia College Aug 22nd. In two years I will hopefully graduate and they're going to do "job placement" so everything should fall into place after that, then I will think about moving out of here.

I do like Odin though, I like the "Country setting". I like the idea of Odin being a bedroom community. That is what I want. I want an OLD home, I love fixer uppers, being able to remodel the home the way I want, but the older the home the better.

I never understood why people "rent" when there are contract for deed homes, or foreclosed homes. The house payment is cheaper than paying rent. My payments were $98.00 a month. You can double your payment and they don't charge an APR on the extra payments

[Dolly]

I hate to discourage you but it is much more difficult to get a home loan these days and if the picture I am getting of your financial situation is that you have less than a swiss bank account tucked away somewhere, you may be in for a surprise in getting a mortgage. The banks are running scared right now with all the foreclosures and if you are a college student and are unemployed or underemployed, you would not be a prime candidate for a home loan, whether you own your own home at present or not. I would suggest going to your lender and trying to get pre-approved before you do anything else.
As far as old houses in Odin, there aren't many left. Most were torn down in the 60's when ranch style houses were all the rage so that is pretty much all the rehabbing needs you will find are ranch style houses. There are a handful of the big Victorian or country style homes left there but none for sale that I know of. Many times in Odin, if someone dies, the home goes to their next of kin who move in rather than sell it. I only know of one larger style home in town that is an older home with a lady in her 90's who has no children. As far as renting, I have said that too but life sometimes throws you a curve and you do what you have to. We currently live in a double wide (AKA trailor), not my choice of a dream home but when we lived in a rent house in Odin, our landlord decided to put it up for sale and we had about 60 days to get out and found nothing for sale that was decent and that we could afford. The double wide was our only choice if we wanted to have a roof over our heads. As far as KC, sigh . . . most everyone we know who graduated from there is now working at Wal-mart or has moved out of the area to find jobs. I wish I was kidding but I am not. Education does not guarantee you anything anymore, we both have Master's degrees and can't find work. KC can set you up as a student worker while you are a student for a job there. Then you are pretty much on your own, despite what they tell you. I find it interesting that other colleges do surveys that indicate what percentage of students find jobs in their chosen field within 6 months after graduation. KC's surveys are "what percentage of students are satisfied with the quality of their education and how safe they feel on campus. Then they pat themselves on the back because those numbers are fairly high. I bet if they actually did a survey on how many were working in their chosen fields after graduation, the numbers would say something dramatically different. I spoke with a lady in her 40's at the KC career center back in April, who was employed as a student worker there. She was worried because her job as a student worker was ending soon and she still hadn't found a job for after graduation. While I was sitting there looking up jobs for myself and my husband, with our Master's degrees in tow, unable to find work locally, all I could do was smile at her and think of how we could continue this conversation when we all met up at Wal-mart since that is the only place around that is hiring.

[centralia62801]

There is a "first time home buyers" thing that small local banks do. I had really bad credit. Since I was a first time home buyer they had *ignored* my credit history and gave us the loan Anyways I had found a home in Odin already, older style, but I'm not ready to move yet. I told my husband I can deal living here until I graduate.

I don't really expect to be hired "immediately" it's only common sense to know it takes time and patience to find a job. I had the chance to go for my Bachelor's degree but those are useless since I don't plan on going to a yr college any time soon. An Associates degree allows me to learn necessary subjects in order to work for a tax/accounting firm. I've done research and I would even be allowed to work solo if I started my own business. I don't expect college to "make me rich, or even wealthy" I do know that with my determination and positive attitude that I could find a small job and work my way up the ladder, unlike Wal-mart where you're the one who holds the ladder.

I don't expect a huge change, but I expect to make use of what I learn at KC. I cherish the opportunity to be able to have my GED, to have the opportunity to go to college and learn more math. I LOVE all sorts of math.

How your life turns out is in our own hands. The saying "when opportunity knocks.." Well, why wait for it? I am making my own opportunity, I also know that I refuse to give up.

I do thank you for sharing your wonderful opinion's though. Yet, everyone's ideal of life and education just isn't the same all the time. You have to be optimistic and roll with the punches. --Lisa