How difficult would it be for you to relocate?

[Silent3]

When I was 19 years old I moved out of the house I grew up in and into my first apartment. The company I joined lent me the company minivan, which I drove from NH to NJ to load up with all of my worldly possessions. The sum total of those possessions easily fit into the back of the van. I was fully moved into my new apartment in one trip back to NH.

More recently, my "wife" and I (actually my ex-wife who now lives with me -- no convenient word for that) sold the house we'd lived in for 17 years (well, 14 years out of 17 for her) and bought a new house. We sold the old house while waiting for the new house to be built, and lived in a crappy apartment for about three months in between houses.

There were upgrades and repairs to be done on the old house to spruce it up for sale. There was scrambling to find an apartment with a short-term lease that would allow our four pets (two cats, two rabbits) when a rental we'd planned on fell through, leaving us little time to spare. There was moving some stuff out of the old house into the apartment. There was "staging" the old house for sale. There was worrying if the old house would sell quickly enough so that the money from that sale, desperately needed to make all of the whole deal work, would be available when we had to pay up for the new house. There was, after the sale (which thankfully happened quickly, very close to asking price), moving the rest of the stuff out of the old house and either into the apartment or a rented 20'x10' storage unit. There was extra cleaning and painting and patching to do once we started to empty the old house. There was monitoring the construction of the new house, which was very important for catching several mistakes early. There were hundreds of decisions to make about paint and carpet and tile and light fixtures and plumbing fixtures, etc., etc. There was shopping for a new mortgage. There was moving out of the apartment and the storage unit into the new house (via one big load with hired movers plus dozens of smaller loads transferred by car and small rented van). There was cleaning the apartment. There was paying for the apartment for nearly three months more than we lived in it because we had to agree to a six month lease.

The first move when I was 19 was nearly as easy as I imagine moving ever gets. The recent move was long, hard, back-breaking, very expensive, and something so miserable that I hope I never have to repeat anything like that process ever again. Even at that, we had some lucky breaks like selling our old house to the first people who looked at it, for a good price. Without that luck this last move could have been much, much worse. We have four pets, but no children to uproot. We moved a very short distance and didn't have to change jobs.

Why do I bring all of this up?

In a number of different contexts I've heard people here on DU very flippantly and casually saying things like, "Why don't you just move?", or "Why don't you get a cheaper house?". In relation to mortgage difficulties. In relation to commuting distance. In relation to local weather conditions and local politics and cost of living.

Don't the people who say such things have any idea how difficult, or even impossible, moving can be sometimes?

I didn't have to go through this last move to understand that. A lot of people are underwater on their mortgages and couldn't pay off their mortgages with what they'd get from the sale of their house, especially in this economy. Kids, jobs, schooling, and personal relationships can interfere in complicated ways. Any money saved by making a commute shorter or a mortgage payment smaller might be offset by the cost of moving itself. If the whole reason for moving is because money is tight then financing (especially now) for a mortgage or credit approval for a rental might be hard to get. How long it will take to sell a home can be unpredictable -- that was the scariest part of this last move that my wife and I made.

[billyoc]

1. I can relocate on a moment's notice.

It's one of the things I like best about my life. :hi:

[pnwmom]

10. You must be single. n/t

[Skittles]

2. considering I have moved over 30 times

not hard at all

[Silent3]

6. I've moved several times in my life too...

...but most of those moves were apartment to apartment. This last time I moved was the first time I'd ever had to sell a house, and it was a house I'd been in for 17 years. I knew beforehand that this last move was going to be an order of magnitude more difficult than any other previous move I'd ever made, and I was right.

[pnwmom]

11. Do you have a family and, if so, would they agree that it isn't hard at all? n/t

[Skittles]

26. my family doesn't live anywhere near me

and I grew up as a GI brat, moving every year of my life so I would just tell them to suck it up

[pnwmom]

29. I guess I'm glad you don't have kids.

Telling kids to just "suck it up" isn't a very empathic response.

[Skittles]

30. just saying what I was told

as a child, I moved back and forth overseas six times and attended over ten schools before going to three high schools :o

[pnwmom]

31. Sounds like you had it tough.

One of the challenges of being a good parent is not just automatically treating our children the way our parents treated us. The ways they were good to us, we should try to emulate. But sometimes, to be a good parent, we need to try to do better than they did.

Your parents needed to move, but they didn't need to convey the impression that your feelings didn't matter. I hope they didn't.

[Skittles]

32. with six kids and moving constantly

no, there was no time for any of that; we were told what needed to be done and we did it

[pnwmom]

38. Another thing not to emulate --

having six kids, if that means the parents don't have time or money to deal with children's needs and feelings.

You survived it, Skittles -- but I'm sorry that you had to.

[Skittles]

67. we were fine, and better for it

I can always tell who dealt with moves growing up and who didn't

[vadawg]

68. im one of 15 kids and we moved almost every month when i was growing up

usually it would take us about a day or so to pack everything up and off we would go. Now i just moved recently and it was a nightmare, so much stuff from my wife and kids, though i am proud to say all my crap fitted in my truck just like old times.

[sandnsea]

33. I did that too

Ten or eleven schools, and then three high schools. It was miserable and you know it. Why would you pretend otherwise.

[Iggo]

48. You suck and your parents suck too...

...for having 6 kids!!!

:sarcasm:

[givemebackmycountry]

3. Great post and timely as well....

I've done it five times.
Denver to Dallas - Dallas to Kansas City - Kansas City to Nashville - Nashville to Kansas City and Kansas City to freaking Orlando.
And that's all with the same company.

They paid to move me so it was pretty much painless.
I moved as the money moved.

There's a lot of that going on right now.

Couple of months ago they wanted me to move to Virgina.
I was like "you got to be kidding me".

As long as they are paying me what they are paying me, I'm all ears.

[AlCzervik]

7. that does make a difference, both our relos were paid for by the companies.

we even 5k bonus for selling our house in Texas in less than 30 days.

[Silent3]

8. It has to make it a lot easier...

...when someone else is paying all of the moving expenses and handling a lot of the details for you. I take it that either you were renting, or your company backed the expense of moving even to the extent of taking the worry out of how long it would take for your old house to sell?

[pnwmom]

12. Painless? Do you have a spouse and/or children? n/t

[givemebackmycountry]

27. No. And that's why I can go at the drop of a hat.

And that makes me sad from time to time that I have missed out on that for most of my life.
I was married a long time ago and it didn't work.
I was homeless for a while in Denver and remarkably one thing lead to another and I latched on to something good.
And I have made every move count and have been smart enough to stay one step ahead of every layoff for almost 8 years.
If I was still in Kansas City today I would be jobless.
Instead, I moved to Orlando and I found out last week that I had dodged the bullet again.

It's tough out there, with or without the spouse and family.

I wish I had one, even with all my good fortune.
I would trade it in a minute.

It's hard out here all by yourself.
When your scared you got nobody.

Different strokes, man.
Different strokes.

[deek]

4. Overwhelming

Being a single mom of an adult daughter with significant disabilities and medical needs, it feels impossible. It will be necessary soon. Don't know how I'll survive this.

[K8-EEE]

9. I hear you!

I have a teenager with disabilities who is all settled into her school program, social groups, and etc. It really is NOT easy to just pick up and move when you have somebody with special needs in the household.

When I was young and single I moved into my first apt. with a Pinto Runabout -- 2 trips. Alas life gets more complicated.

[glinda]

13. Why will you have to move soon? The economy?

My husband and I sold our old place two years ago and moved 3 hours south of there. It was hard. We had four moving vans, two large, two small, over a week and then our ten rescues. We are still not out of boxes. I want to move as I know we will not be able to afford this place if things keep going up. The lesson I learned is sell almost everything and travel as light as you can. We have started to slowly get rid of more stuff.

[deek]

34. The economy, plus tired of this area.

It's a very depressed, high crime, high unemployment area. I'd be moving 3,000 miles. Ugh. I've been here 20 years. Have had few career changes too. Lots of "stuff" and equipment.

[pnwmom]

16. I'm sure it must feel overwhelming, since having a support network

is so important to anyone with dependents, whether children or a disabled adult.

My thoughts and prayers go out to you.

[deek]

35. Thanks

My support network has dwindled significantly. Chronic illness does that.

[AlCzervik]

5. we've relocated twice in the past 11 years, both big moves and we'd do it again

if we needed to.

once you make the big move away from where you lived most of your life the other moves get easier imo.

[pnwmom]

18. They don't get easier if you have children to uproot from school. nt

[AlCzervik]

19. i have a child and we have relocated with her.

[pnwmom]

21. As she gets older, it will become harder. I hope you don't have to find out. n/t

[Silent3]

24. If I had to move again soon...

...I don't think it would get any easier than the last move. One thing I discovered during this last move was just how bad a pack rat my wife is. Oh, I've got a fair amount of crap myself, but I'd originally figured that my wife had maybe 2-3 times as much crap as I do, and it turned out to be more like 4-5 times as much. It was only after we sold the old house that we began to dig deeply into closets and into the basement, and only then that I fully realized how cleverly she'd densely packed things into our former home.

We gave away, sold, or threw away quite a bit of stuff, but not nearly as much as I wanted us to get rid of. We've also acquired a fair amount of new furniture purchased just for the new house.

While we've got a decent amount of equity in the new house, and we wouldn't have to worry about being underwater by a long shot, I'd guess that we'd still have to eat a loss of a few tens of thousands of dollars to get this house sold. Since the new house was built for us, we had to lock in the sale price to get the construction started, nearly six months before the final purchase, with housing prices sliding downwards the whole time the house was being built, and falling further over the months since we paid for the house and moved in.

Then there's the matter that we really like this new house. We'd never find another house like it without having another house custom built. It would take either dire circumstances forcing us into another move, or so much money that we could afford to wait comfortably in this house while a new house was built, not stirring from this house or worrying about selling it until the new house was finished and ready to move into, with all moving handled by professional movers every step of the way, to get us to move again.

I don't expect either dire circumstances or vast piles of money to happen any time soon. In this shaky economy, however, I'm afraid dire circumstances is the more likely scenario of the two for convincing us to move.

[John Q. Citizen]

14. Moving is expensive and time consuming depending on a person's circumstances.

And it can be physically and emotionally draining.

Think of all the people who aren't moving back to New Orleans and the whole gulf coast. too much time, money and stress.


not since the dust bowl...


Stuff like Katrina and the Dust Bowl prod goad and force mass migration and lots never go back.


but i agree with you. The cost of moving has to be factored in against the cost of staying.

[Silent3]

55. I had the advantage of wanting to move rather than being forced...

...to move by bad circumstances. Even then it was, as you say, physically and emotionally draining. It's very sad to think how distressing this sort of move would be when it's forced upon you, when the place you're headed is where you have to go, not where you want to go.

When we finally moved into the new house, which should have been a very happy moment after making it through all of the trials and tribulations to get to that point, I felt depressed and overwhelmed. We now had a two-car garage instead of the one-car car port that we used to have, but it was filled with crap. I looked at all of that stuff, wishing I could just throw most of it away, but I knew my wife would never accept that, and that she'd feel persecuted if I got on her case any more than I already had about all of the heaping piles of stuff which, to me, was junk.

The rest of the house was filled with boxes and other assorted not-set-up, not-in-their-final-place things. There were many boxes of not-yet-built bookshelves and office furniture to be assembled. We supposedly had about 2/3 more square footage now than in our old house, but it sure as hell didn't feel like it.

On top of all of that clutter and looming work, it felt kind of odd to be living in the new house for a few weeks. We'd watched the house go from empty lot to hole in the ground to foundation to frame to finished building, but all of that time the house felt more like the builder's work place, a place we were intruding on when we visited, than it felt like our own home. That's a feeling it took a little while to shake.

Two weeks after moving in, with a lot of work still left to be done to get the house in order, I suffered a couple of gall bladder attacks and ended up having my gall bladder removed. The surgery was pretty damned easy as surgery goes, but I was nevertheless under doctor's orders to take it very easy for six weeks. That put a real dent in getting the house in order, although it was partly a blessing too, as my wife decided to hire a teenage kid from the place that she works and his brother to help clear the garage, build some of the furniture, and help with unpacking and setting up.

It was only then that I finally was able to relax, stop feeling stressed, and really appreciate what a nice new house we had. In retrospect, I'd say it was all worth the effort, but it's a close call considering that I can't imagine wanting to put myself through an experience like that ever again.

[Maru Kitteh]

15. Very, VERY difficult. Neigh impossible excluding disaster.

[jamessmith]

17. Relocation

I agree that the repositioning is really a knotty task. For me it is completely something to get messed with. I think the best way to get impervious with it is to purchase your own domicile. Having your own domicile will let you to come out of the problem of relocation.


http://samsonblinded.org/news/ provides information on lots more on whats happening around the globe; more on this and other top news updates.

[sandnsea]

20. I'd sooner die than leave my kids and grandkids

What the fuck is the point. They need to do what is best for their families, no question. But I'm sure not going to be the one to pick up and leave.

[pnwmom]

22. All the cheery talk about how in the "new economy" people had to be ready

to pick up and move completely ignored the the impact of the instability on families. And all the special problems for two-career families, dual-custody families, extended families, etc.

It's treating people like interchangeable parts to be inserted into job slots, rather than as human beings deeply connected to other human beings. And it's sad.

[varelse]

42. treating people like interchangeable parts to be inserted into job slots...it's sad

Doubly sad to see this attitude toward others so blithely embraced by so many on a "progressive" message board :(

[Extend a Hand]

23. We just finished moving into a transitional apt. on Christmas Eve

It was extremely difficult to move.

I was laid off last year and my husband was expecting to be laid off this year. Here in Ohio it seems everyone is laying off. It is very, very difficult to sell a house and getting worse. I talked to our real estate agent the other day and he said our house was the last house he sold and that was in early Dec.

The offer we had was a contingency offer, our buyers had a contingency offer from their buyers, and their buyers had a contingency offer as well. It's a miracle that everything came together. I really think the only reason we were able to sell is because we were listed $100,000 dollars less than anyone else in our neighborhood and our house was in better than new condition when we put it on the market.

I spent almost $5000 and a full 3 months after I was laid off fixing everything I could find broken and updating the decor. Since I wasn't working I was able to keep that house absolutely spotless and ready to show any time. Had we not had savings for improvements, time to keep the house spotless, and plenty of equity to allow for a lower price, we would have been stuck.

[Silent3]

25. We moved out, into an apartment, before putting our old house on the market.

The idea of living in a house while it was being shown terrified me. It would have been bad enough trying to keep the house showroom-perfect while living in it at the same time under normal circumstance. Living with four pets, one of which is an old cat who decided with perfect timing to develop chronic diarrhea over the whole span of months while this transition was happening, made the prospect of living in the house while trying to sell it seem nearly impossible.

Since we were banking on selling our old house before our new house was finished being built that meant we needed to find an apartment for the in-between time anyway. It was more than worth it to us to spend a few extra months on apartment rent in order to be able to move out of the old house while it was being sold.

The fact that we sold our house to the very first people who came to look at it suggests that the combination of moving out first and "staging" the house paid off well. We sunk about $12K into repairs and improvements, thinned out our personal possessions by moving a portion of our stuff out of the house and into the temporary apartment, then decorated with a combination of our old stuff and a few new items that we planned to use later in the new house.

[Jeep789]

28. Awful experience for me

I don't even like moving from cubicle to cubicle at work. Moving from home to house is traumatic enough to leave me nearly catatonic which pretty much rules out me being of any help during the move.

[Vinca]

36. Our last move, about 10 years ago, was a nightmare.

It involved the careful scheduling of the sale of 1 house with the purchase of another because you can't find a rental that will take pets. We physically moved ourselves which included things such as filled filing cabinets for our business. I remember laying on the unmade bed at the end of the day thinking if I was ever going to have a heart attack it would have happened on that day. I vowed then that if I ever moved again, I would remove the items I want from the house and run a "come and get it for free" ad in the newspaper and let the people pick the place clean. Sometimes I look around and can't imagine how 2 people who started out with nothing - literally - could have amassed so much stuff.

[Silent3]

53. "...because you can't find a rental that will take pets..."

We did find one such rental, but it wasn't easy, and it wasn't pretty.

Originally we'd planned to move into a rented house. A friend of the builders building our soon-to-be new house had purchased an old farm and was willing to rent a small house on the farm pretty cheaply (we never found out exactly how cheaply) for a few months while he did some other development on the land. It wasn't a great house, but it wasn't terrible, and it was roomy enough for two people and four pets and a fair amount of the stuff we'd need to store during the transition from old house to new.

We kept waiting for the go-ahead to be able to move into the farm house. And waiting. And waiting. Meanwhile our old house still wasn't on the market, because our plan all along was to move out before preparing the old house for sale, and the time when we'd need to cough up the money to pay for the new house was drawing closer.

Then we find out that the farm house failed a septic system inspection, and won't be available for another 4-6 weeks. We were already a month behind when we wanted to move out of the old house at that point. This put us in desperate scramble to find an alternative quickly.

Rental by-the-month was impossible to find anywhere but a place like Residence Inn, which was pretty expensive and, although they have units where pets are allowed, we weren't too hopeful they'd take us with two cats and two rabbits. Most landlords wanted nothing less than a full year lease. We almost lost out to another couple for the apartment we ended up with, because they were willing to sign up for a year. Only our better credit rating and my willingness to cough up four months rent in advance, and to agree to pay for a full six months (which we ended up having to do) if the landlord didn't find another tenant sooner, got us that apartment.

In hindsight, after ending up paying a full six months plus one week's rent to live in a crappy apartment for a little over three months, Residence Inn might have been the better deal, at least if they'd been willing to accept us with all of our pets. The landlord who did rent to us might have lost out too -- the last time we checked he still hadn't managed to find a new tenant.

We definitely moved down in lifestyle before moving back up. For the same money that covered both the mortgage and the property taxes on our old house, a nice house in a good neighborhood, the quality of rentals was pretty sad. The place we settled on was right on main street, with noisy traffic and noisy upstairs neighbors (with bratty kids who couldn't seem to move a single step without literally stomping their feet as they moved), but even that was nicer than the other dives we looked at, not counting one nice but more expensive and pretty small apartment we briefly considered, but which would have been two crowded for us and the animals we live with.

[trotsky]

37. Incredibly difficult.

Having kids in school is the #1 factor. Very difficult to uproot them - especially were you to try it during the school year. So that eliminates about 9 months out of the calendar year for a window in which to move. Plus all the re-registration for the new district.

But as you say, the logistics involved in selling a house make it very tedious. Fixing all the little things that you could tolerate but a potential buyer might be turned off by. Inspections, appraisals, showings to disrupt your daily routine, just a major pain in the ass.

Like you, I remember fitting everything I owned in the back of a hatchback car. OK so in my case it would take 2 or 3 trips since it was a small hatchback (Plymouth Horizon) but still, I could move myself in less than a day. Those days are long, long gone.

Good post.

[pnwmom]

39. For once, we agree, trotsky. With a family, moving is extremely difficult. n/t

[TBF]

40. It was even hard for the Obamas -

remember the news stories about how they had to stay in a hotel, and then moved into the White House? Obama was annoyed enough that he even made a comment to the press about it. When you have kids to enroll in a new school, and so much more to carry (you need a lot of stuff for kids even if it's inexpensive stuff it still has to be moved), it's just a much bigger job.

I've in 5 states & probably moved at least 15-20 times since leaving home at 17. Now I am married with someone who has to be licensed to practice law in whichever state we live in. Moving to Washington DC is probably our only easy option outside of Texas, because waiving into the bar there is routinely done & we have family there. Other than that it would be much more difficult unless his firm was moving him.

[varelse]

41. It's the S.E.P. syndrome

Someone Else's Problems are always simple and easy to solve (when they're not just plain invisible).

[raccoon]

45. Never heard of that, but I like it! nt

[varelse]

66. I "borrowed" it from Douglas Adams

;)

[Ohio Joe]

43. Right now, moving would be easy

I can hold everything I own at the same time. The only advantage of having everything else go up in flames.

[raccoon]

44. Very. At nearly 60, it would be difficult for me to get a job in good times, and

as we all know, these ain't good times.

In some years, optimistically assuming I can retire, draw a modest retirement and SS, I might be able to relocate to a low COL area. While I'd love to live in a more progressive area, I'd hate to move away from my family members that are still around.

[1776Forever]

46. I am a Senior but I had to move last year. No alternative. It turned out to be a good move.

Not that it wasn't painful but it had to be done. I left my rose bushes and my community but I found anther one and I am doing pretty well here. But I still want to return to the place I left. Why? It was a better climate and the resources there are very good for our situation. Do I want to move again? Hell no! I just know at my age you do what you have to do to survive! Things change and nothing stays the same. It will take some time but I hope by this fall I am back in the Southern breezes again and my roses will be growing all year round!

Best of luck to you.

[pipi_k]

47. My situation sounds a bit like yours

When I was younger and didn't have much, living in apartments and all, it was a pain to move but not as much as now.

Now I own a house that would have to be sold. It's not a prime location. Anyone buying it would either want it for vacation home or would really need to love rural living.

Years of stuff would need to be moved out and stored...it would take a lot of cleanup to make the place look good enough to compete with other homes being sold in the area. Add to that mix two very old dogs and two rather young gray geese (pets).

Mr P and I have talked a bit about what we would need to do when the time comes that we can't take care of the place...do all what needs to be done for upkeep of the house and grounds. We have started to look at other homes closer to "civilization" (i.e. necessary services like stores, hospitals, etc) and we have a general idea of where we'd like to move TO, but again, it all hinges on being able to sell this place.

There's also the emotional aspect of it - for me anyway. I've moved around so much that I never spent more than three or four years in any one place. I've been in this house for 13 years. I absolutely LOVE the area...the woods...the wildlife, peace and quiet...the whole lifestyle. If and when we have to move, I know it's going to break my heart.

Absolutely.

There are so many factors involved in relocating...

[progressoid]

49. Did it about a decade ago and it was a pain in the ass.

I don't really like where we are currently living but the idea of moving is one of the factors keeping us here. Although, we are thinking that maybe in three of four years we might move.

Even though we would like to be in a different place, there still is this idea of home. A place you feel safe and comfortable. A place to lay your head. A place to call your own. That's a hard thing to change.

[pipi_k]

51. I read your second paragraph and immediately thought of

Dorothy in the "Wizard of Oz".

I've seen it at least 25 or 30 times, but each time it gets to the end and she's trying to get back home and clicking her heels together and saying, "There's no place like home...there's no place like home".

That's when I start to cry.

There's such a sense of safety attached to home. I never knew it as a child, but I do now...

[NMDemDist2]

50. here's one thread of many on my last move

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=236&topic_id=23567

and getting the house ready to sell

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=287&topic_id=2803

[Blue_Tires]

52. easily...in fact, i'm LOOKING to go overseas

or wherever the jobs are...(and yes, I'm single and have very few 'roots' left in this area)

[cascadiance]

54. I just did relocate last November, and am *still* relocating!...

:)

I'd not relocated state to state for around 24 years, and hadn't even moved at all since 2001. When you are doing it on your own too, it really is hard to do, especially in a time where the economy's down, credit cards don't like when you add moving expenses so they cut back on your credit, etc. and places like California DMV's try to take an extra month or so to get your car vehicle title so you can get your car registered on time in your new state. Trying to get newer doctors to follow up on older medical conditions, finding a decent specialist only to learn they just switched from being in your PPO network. Working a lot extra remotely, since you've been "distracted" by so many other things as a part of your move the last few months in addition to the heavy weather conditions. Tons of stuff like that. Yes, it's a royal pain.

Ultimately, I think it will pay off. But it's certainly not easy. And it's hard to anticipate all of the different difficulties and to be systematic about doing the move.

[closeupready]

56. It would be more difficult than when I was younger, but I could do it.

Under the right circumstances, I would even be happy to. I don't feel that I need to be here for any particular reason anymore.

[azmouse]

57. It would be gut wrenching.

I love my home and neighborhood. I've moved plenty in my life, from PA to AZ to CA and back to AZ.
I just don't think I have another move left in me.

[wryter2000]

58. Impossible

My mortgage is $285K, and my house is worth $246K. I can't leave my job because I could never find another one as good. Plus, I have excellent health coverage because of my job, and I may need back surgery soon.

[Silent3]

59. When we purchased our first house...

...my wife had been suffering from "house hunger" for years, and even though we could only put 5% down, we bought the house anyway. We rolled the taxes and fees we had to pay into the mortgage, so we essentially started with no equity, negative equity when you figured in the taxes and real estate fees we'd incur if we sold the house. Shortly thereafter housing prices dropped and stayed low for several years (we're masters of timing!), so as I liked to say back, we didn't own the house, the house owned us.

This time we started with nearly 50% equity, and here in NH housing prices haven't been hit quite so hard as in other parts of the country so far, but I'd guess we're closer to 40% equity now, given that the price we paid was locked in back in March of last year.

[blue_onyx]

60. I guess it would be pretty easy

I'm out of college, no mortgage, and nothing really forcing me to stay. I've thought about moving out of state but there's nowhere I really want to go. The main thing that may make me move is that I can't find a job. If it comes down to taking a crappy job with no health benefits here or moving for a good job, I may have to make the move. I hope I don't have to leave because I'm happy here and would like to stay.

[northernlights]

61. I moved here feeling foolishly optimistic

it was hard, hard work to move, all by myself, a small household of rescued birds,bunny and horse, built up over 17 years. But I felt optimistic, escaping harrassment by a registered sex offender, and starting over after hi-tech crash/post 911 layoff with no turnaround in the horizon... Sole loss was a little starfish from my seashell collection, broken while packing. So it was physically hard work, but do-able, and emotionally exhilarating as everything fell into place.

6 years later, having failed to get my new life off the ground, the target of white collar criminals, blue collar criminals, state government criminals, neighbor criminals, contractor criminals... I'm facing selling my home and moving again.

To where, I know not. I don't know where I can find any kind of prospects. 6 years, hundreds of rejected resumes and applications, few interviews, my life savings depleted, no jobs in sight. I'm hoping that if I move to a more moderate climate with lower taxes and downsize the house and property, that the 1st year of reduced costs will offset the moving costs. Nothing will bring back the tens of thousands invested in this little farm.

I started trying to lighten the load last summer. Day before yard sale, sold a piece of jewelry. 1st day of yard sale, sold york rake and some small stuff. 2nd day of yard sale, robbed by 2 teens and their middle aged mothers. 3rd day, nobody showed. Next week, sold garden tractor. No time for planned yard sale in fall, to try to sell snow blower. Maybe I'll advertise it on Craig's list this week. Advertised guitar at university last fall. University counselor called, pretending to be in market for guitar, but actually trawling for clients. No lie.

Anyway, at this point I expect this move to be total hell. I fully expect to be robbed of another bazillion dollars. Some how, the home on which I've spent around $200k will net me zero, I just know it.

[Dukkha]

62. I would've left this country long ago if I could

and still would now, but locked in a mortgage on an unsellable condo and a wife who's attachted to two step children.

[Blue_In_AK]

63. I've moved many, many times in my life,

but I've owned my current home (a duplex) since 1990 and I'm not going anywhere any time soon. My mortgage is low, since I bought during the last economic downturn here, and my tenant pays most of it, so there's no reason for me to leave, even though with the current economic situation this place is still worth at least twice what I paid for it.

But beyond all that, it would be emotionally extremely hard for me to leave Alaska. I've been here since 1975. This is home.

[slackmaster]

64. It would be psychologically devastating for me

After almost 50 years here, I've got some deep roots.

[KamaAina]

65. Well, I am a single guy without even any pets...

...but it would mean returning to the frozen tundra known as the continental U.S.

Check back with me in a month or so, maybe. :-)

[GOPisEvil]

69. I just relocated across the country.

I *could* have done it without company assistance, but it would have put me into serious debt. Thank goodness my company either paid or reimbursed all my expenses.