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Unexpectedly my husband is getting transferred and it is happening quickly as in by the end of July if things work out. It was mentioned last month but he said no and his company said ok. But Monday bosses changed their minds. He had made a trip to the new office to work for two weeks and was given the normal expense per diem. Hotel and rental car were put on credit cards meals were paid for with cash. We have $3,500 left and the hotel and rental car bills totaled just under $2,000. We were going to of course pay the credit cards for the hotel and car before the transfer came up. But our neighbor told us it would be better to pay off a loan that we have 11 payments left on because it would free up $355 a month and would look better to the underwriter. If we used all of the money to pay down credit cards it wouldn't change our monthly minimum payment. My husband thinks we should pay half of what he charged for the hotel and car and keep the rest so we have more than the pitiful $3k we do in the bank now. [Pitiful when you are thinking of moving 1,100 miles away and buying a house but at least it is better than nothing I guess.]
Whine time. The plan was to transfer NEXT summer because the loan would be paid off, and a credit card that we did a balance transfer for zero interest would be paid off freeing up $655 a month and other credit card balances would be lower too. And we would have had more time to work on the house and lawn. Oh well.
Isn't your husband's company reimbursing him for the hotel & car expenses?
Either way, with only $3K in the bank, and loans and credit cards still to be paid off, you are in NO shape to be purchasing a home. Rent for a year so you can get acclimated to your new place of residence, as well as get more financially stable by paying down your debts and saving more $$$. As well, since your husband seems to be working for a company where he can be involuntarily transferred without much notice, you'd be better off maintaining flexibility by renting as opposed to purchasing a house you may end up selling within a year and taking a bath on.
Thanks for all the advice - what I asked for and what I didn't - and love on what has been deemed a disaster post. Sorry the thanks are a few days late but we had a death in the family and had to travel out of state.
We have looked into renting but with 3 inside kitties and 3 inside pupdogs that is pretty much a no. No down payment needed as we are going VA. To all those who are groaning, it is what it is. We have never defaulted on a VA loan, we pay 2 - 3 payments extra a year and at least $100 extra each month, we don't pay PMI, and even when we just had 2 inside kitties it still was a hecka lot cheaper for us to buy than to rent. Yes it is true my husband could be transferred at a moment's notice but not very likely until 3 or 4 years after a transfer. They put too much money into each transfer to move people around sooner than 3 years normally. They pay our closing costs as sellers and buyers, sellers agent's costs, 1 point on the house we buy, if our house doesn't sell they buy our house for what we paid for or it appraisals for whichever is highest, 3 appraisals and presale inspection on the house we sell, and they pay for movers. [Yes I know it shows up as income and we pay taxes but we still make out pretty well.] Everything including the relocation bonus is taxed up. They pay airline and time off for the 2 weeks housing hunt, and $ for food, lodging, and rental car. So I don't think we will be moving again anytime sooner than 3 years. We've been where we are at now almost 5 years. Plus we are pretty certain this will be his last move. The plan was to do it next year, things happened this year instead due to a couple of unexpected retirements.
FYI the advice to keep any extra money was exactly what the lady told us who pre-approved my husband for a loan. She said even for the itinerant coverage money to just pay the minimum for now. And disaster a post as it was, my husband qualified for $350k, we won't look over $250k but prefer to stay around $220k, [We would do lower but with the VA loan we were told we can't go much lower than $220] , a decent interest rate - at least for us we have never had one under 4 before except a refi last summer - and around $22,000 from the sale of this house which will go for savings and to pay off a few of the higher interest bills. His credit has went from the lower 600's from when we bought this house to the upper 700's today. So we might be disasters but oh well. We think we are doing ok and striving to do better.
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Oh well.
