Where Is The Handyman?

Escrow is supposed to close on Friday. I met with my handyman two weeks ago to go over the work that needed to be done. He told me it would take 1 day and that he could start the following day. He did mention he would be on vacation last week, but that still left him a full week before his vacation to get the job done.

I've called him Sunday, Monday, and today. All I get is his voicemail and he hasn't returned my messages. I haven't had a chance to go over to the house yet, so I don't know if anything has been done. This will probably be the last time I use him.

Escrow On Track

I called my escrow agent yesterday to make sure things were on track for our closing a week from today, since I haven't heard anything yet. She said she had everything she needed from me, short of my signature on the closing documents. She is just waiting for some loan paperwork from the buyer's bank and then we'll be good to go. She said I could go ahead and come down and sign everything, but I said I'd wait until the buyer's docs arrive. No point in signing if for some reason, the deal falls through. I did ask for a copy of the HUD settlement statement to be emailed to me though.

I also called my handyman this morning to see how things were going. I got his voicemail and left a message.

New Rat Race Job

I accepted a job offer today at a new company and gave my two weeks notice to my current employer. I'm still in the rat race, but at least I'll be making a bit more money and have better benefits - plus the coolness factor will greatly increase since I'll be working at a company that makes video games. The raise will allow me to save more towards passive income investments, which puts me one step closer to leaving the rat race. It will be very tempting to spend the extra income (especially considering salaries at my current company have been frozen since I was hired almost 5 years ago), but I'm confident I can keep the spending under control. What the new job will mean, however, is less time available to research new properties. I'm currently lucky in that I have a fair amount of "free time" at my current job to do research. That will change. Unfortunately, I'm scheduled to close escrow on my current property about 10 days before I start my new job, so just when I'll be ready to look for another property, I'll not have much time to do so. Any Phoenix area birddogs out there?

Rejected For Lowe's Card

As part of my efforts to build credit in my company's name, I applied for credit cards at Lowe's and Office Depot, as well as the 3% cash back credit card offer I got in the mail last week. Today I received a letter from Lowe's (actually, from GE Capital Financial, who runs the Lowe's credit card program) saying my application was rejected because my company did not have a Dunn and Bradstreet credit file. Lowe's was supposed to be an easy card to get. Oh well! One down, two to go.

Truthfully, I think I am only trying to get credit for my company for purely academic reasons. Since this company pays for everything in full, it really doesn't have a need for credit. But learning the process will help me with future businesses that may need it and that is why I am trying.

Just As I Thought

When my handyman told me fixing the items on the buyer's Inspection Report would take 1 day and that he could start Tuesday, I knew there was no way that would happen and I figured it would really take him three days. Sure enough, late yesterday afternoon (Wednesday), I got a call from him saying he hadn't started yet, but he was going over there now to start. He asked again when escrow was closing and I told him a week from Friday, which is the 9th. Actually, it closes a week after that on the 16th, but I want him to hurry.