Everyone Elena and I have a nickname for the house where we have lived for over 13 years, "Elena's Folly." We bought what was a very run down house in early 2004 as Elena was in her medical residency in San Francisco. Immediately the gas heater was "red lined" by Pacific Gas and Electric as very dangerous. We had to spend $5,000 to install a central heating system. We had to fence the back yard. The list goes on. As the real estate market went crazy, the house went up to $845,000 in value. We made the mistake of so many other people in that crazy time. We used our house as an ATM machine. Then the 2008 crash happened. We awakened one morning with a house worth $345,000 and a debt of $745,000. As the saying goes, we were "$400,000 underwater." Real estate professionals and lawyers told us to walk away from the house. It made sense to me. Elena would have no part of this talk. She was an Italian from Argentina. Both Italians and people from Argentina stand up and fight for their homes. We hired a great finance and legal professional named Alan Sherman. He was able to help us to settle the large second lien on the house and to get a loan modification. Someway, somehow with Alan's help, we found $200,000 in 2011 to fix the house up and make it livable. Redfin gave us the news yesterday that our house had, shall we say, "achieved a 7-figure value (over $1 million US.)
Elena you have the determination and vision of a Sir Winston Churchill. You took a giant risk to come to this country in 2001 at age 40 to start your life over. You took a giant risk to save your home. You have earned my respect and deep admiration. There is a folk saying from Brasil given lovingly to a very strong woman:
"Woman you have balls!"
No comments:
Post a Comment