Thursday, February 19, 2009

Linking In on Linkedin

It's time to get serious about our future; the time keeps on passing and I am not sure what our plan is in a couple of months. Short of spending my time packing, I still don't know whether we're moving into an RV, an apartment, or a house. Sigh.

So, today I'm spending a few hours trying to get LinkedIn. Hopefully my SCA network up in Oregon will assist in finding a job or an internship. I do see jobs on craigslist, but without a contact, I understand I won't even be called. My alternate plan, if we move up there and I don't have a job, will be to complete my Paralegal Certificate that I've about half-finished here in Cupertino. I always enjoyed being a legal secretary way back when I did it, and I look forward to extending the responsibilities I had back then.

We still have no firm decision on the trip. We want to go, but we haven't really come up with a good compromise plan that we're both satisfied with. Jeff suggested we travel during the summer and use our SCA gear. While that's probably a great idea, the thought of actually camping all summer is a little intimidating to me. Okay, while it's not exactly roughing it, we would still be setting up, taking down and dealing with dirt and bugs. Not exactly the plan I had in mind when I agreed to the trip last fall.

I continue to peruse the Portland MLS and have a few options I plan to check out when I visit next, assuming they're still on the market. I have probably set the criteria too high, because I'm really not finding a lot of good options, despite thousands of houses for sale. While I have about 40 houses charted out on a spreadsheet, most of them are either too expensive for their condition or they are in less than ideal locations. I know of 3 I'm likely to see right away when I get there. Other than that, we are waiting for sellers to recognize the world economy has changed. I found a report yesterday which notes Portland has record-high inventory of houses for sale right now; that should work in our favor.

I received a list of sold house listings from my Laurelhurst realtor for East Portland and it was very instructive. There were some really stunning markdowns on the listings that actually closed last month. There was one house we looked at last June that would have been tempting but for the $450K price tag; it actually ended up selling for $319K. It never occurred to me to make an offer so far off their asking price, but I guess that's what you do in this market. The realtor also told me that a lot of sales continue to fail due to inability to get financing.

I guess we just keep working towards finishing projects and packing and keep watching the market. Maybe something good will come up and we can pounce on it.

2 comments:

  1. I'm sure your good credit will work in your favor. If you haven't already done it, you should get pre-approved for a loan in your price range. It sure would be nice to have you back in the Kingdom! Good luck!

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  2. Well, with any luck, if we have to borrow money we'll borrow it from family. Easy approval and no loan docs! =)

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