Carelton Sheets Can Kiss It

Our buyer got qualified, so our house situation is concluded. At least on paper. We kicked around the idea of renting our current house and had two people who actually said they wanted it--not the same as writing us a check, but still--and then the original buyer got his financing and as we signed the contract to sell it to him, I could feel the tension drain from my husband , seeping away like beer from a bottle that's gotten knocked over in the grass.

See, I've never lived in a family with a rental business, except as an in-law with absolutely no responsibility or financial stake in the enterprise. I think to myself, "What can be so hard about it?" Especially with renters practically falling into our laps like they were. But Jade was never on board except to let me have my way. And that's not a partnership I want to be a part of.

And another thing: having two houses would have stretched us financially so that we would have needed some income from me every month. And not just to go to the movies or use for latte money either; we would have needed it to eat. As I cut away at our budget to accommodate the larger and larger payment on the new house, I cut away at our quality of life. Not just by denying ourselves, although there would have been plenty of that, but by making every single action significant in terms of dollars and cents. One load of laundry a day or two? Heat set at 65 degrees or 68? Give the kids a snack now, or wait until they're really hungry and I know they will finish it all? These kinds of decisions could have made us or broken us as we built our real estate empire.

Becoming a landlord was tempting to me because I see people with real estate investments who are living a quality of life that I envy. The envy is an ugly emotion, and I thought maybe I could placate it with the ol' If You Can't Beat 'Em, Join 'Em. I thought we could scrimp for a couple of years, "gut it out" so to speak and then reap the rewards. But the bottom line is, I don't want to pay what it would cost, financially or otherwise.

What made it o.k. for me to walk away was thinking about not only scrimping by each month, but also the not-so glamorous tasks of landlording, like cleaning out houses after a renter leaves--even good renters leave their own grime behind--finding new renters, reminding people to pay on time, or fixing little things that a homeowner would most likely just live with. What made it more than o.k. was remembering that if I want to clean up a bunch of problems caused by other people, I can always go back to corporate practice. Spending the physical and emotional energy that a rental would entail defeats the purpose of staying home to give my kids a good life. Or to give Jade and me a good life.

So, we are but lowly homeowners once again. And probably forever. We will have some breathing room each month as we transition into a larger space and I will have time and energy to focus on other pursuits. Whatever those pursuits may be, they won't involve carpet steamers or eviction proceedings. And that's fine by me.