Aug. 25th Spending and Housing

Total spent...$7.05 on dessert and a curtain. Weird combo, I know.

Hubby and I decided to have a date night, so we ate dinner at home and headed over to TGI Friday's for dessert. We choose there since we had a $10 gift card. Our bill came to $10.05, so we dropped $2.05 cash for two absolutely yummy desserts. After eating so much I told hubby we had to walk it off, so we went to the local outdoor mall to window shop. Pier 1 Imports had a huge sale, so we decided to wander through there and do a little dreaming and drooling. Well amidst that I found an absolutely gorg curtain! It was blue and brown striped, with different sizes and hues. I wish I had a place to hang it, but alas I bought it to use as fabric. Where else can you get over 2 yards are lovely fabris for 5 bucks?

I've mentioned before that hubby and I have the house bug. We have conseded that the earliest we can buy is next summer, and even that may be pushing it. Since we have almost a year we decided to start doing research and learn as much as we can. We have a few friends in real estate, so we pick their brains on occassion, as well as reading up on it.
Here's what we've come up with so far:

• The housing market has NOT improved, contrary to what some may be saying/seeing. The Spring/Summer always leads to an increase of sales, and when that is factored it, the housing market is still following the trend of below average sales.
• It may be a buyers market, but it is also a sellers market. Sellers aren't naive to the fact that buyers are getting $8,000 cash back, so they raise their price to reflect that. So a house that would go on the market for $190k, would be listed as $198k. Deceptive, huh?
• There is a good chance that they might not only extend the $8,000 credit, but may actually increase it!
  

Hubby and I are praying that things will work in our favor and the housing prices will continue to drop next year and that we will be able to get and even bigger tax credit. How sweet would that be? Either way, it's highly unlikely for the price to rise as high as they were a year ago in the next year.

Here's to saving more money for a down payment!!!