Well...

The other bidder wouldn’t make a counter offer, so ours was the highest bid and it looks like we MIGHT be the new owners of The Sinking Houses. But let’s just say there are a lot of IFS right now as we are just beginning to understand the incredible number of differences between buying something in Norway and buying in the U.S.

If we buy the houses in our name, the taxes we’d have to pay every month would put us in the red as they only allow a tax deduction of 30% of the interest paid to the bank. It’s one thing to pay taxes on money we make, but it takes on a whole new feel when we pay taxes on money we LOSE every month. We heard from cousins that if we set up a sort of limited partnership first, and buy the houses through the business, then we can deduct 100% of the interest paid AND we pay zero taxes on any money we make until the time comes that we take cash out of the business for personal use. So, that was the route we were planning to go with this. But then when we called the banker and talked to him in greater detail about our plans, things started getting blurry.

It seems if we take out a personal loan to buy the houses, we can get a rate of 4.35% but if we have a loan through a business, we will pay 7% interest. So that changes the monthly payment significantly and pretty much busted Kory’s bubble and his desire to buy these places. But my take on it is, when God opens a door, we always walk through it to its logical conclusion. The door didn’t slam shut in our face today, as it could have if another bid came in, so it’s still open. I would very much like it to close, but more than anything, I want to do what God wants us to do. We have yet been involved in a real estate transaction that we have felt good about, but in every case, God opened the doors and it was a good thing he did. When our house in Mount Vernon “came” to us, Kory was adamantly against buying it because it was “a can of worms” and needed so much repair, but we let God open or close doors accordingly. No one was more surprised than we were when all the doors kept opening and we bought it. And it’s been a huge blessing to us and many others the last ten years. And buying our condo in Norway was a total fiasco and neither one of us wanted to buy it, we couldn’t afford it and we knew we were in over our head, but we prayed and asked God what we should do. Basically he “forced” us into buying it since it was going to be for Aunt Ruth, but He has provided every penny we’ve needed to keep it for her these last ten years as well. So we’ve learned the lesson well that we don’t react to what we FEEL about something like this, instead we pray specific prayers for God to guide us through the process. So we have prayed that if God wants us to buy these places that by Monday morning we will have verbal commitments from four people to rent from us, that the estimated up-front costs to fix the houses up would be under ten thousand dollars and that we would line up a property manager and fix-it guy for when we are not here. Nothing is impossible for God. We shall see.

Legally, we are not bound to buy these houses. They have a completely different system here. Our offer was accepted but we still have the right to walk away and they still have the right to sell to someone else. It’s a bit strange, but it is what it is. So we have two more days of watching and waiting to see what God will do.

And on another front - we had a Christmas party for our last day of school today. The entire school was invited. The school I attend is the largest one in the area as it caters to a variety of students. The largest portion of the student body is foreigners trying to learn how to speak Norwegian, but the school also has a department for disabled Norwegian adults and one department that helps adults to get a degree similar to America’s G.E.D. (a high school diploma). So we were all together today under one roof having a very international party. The party was basically a type of talent show in that any student that wanted could perform something for the other students. Our class had five students read poetry in their native tongue. I prayed a lot before I read the words to “Mary Did You Know.” Afterwards, many people came up to me and said how beautiful that poem was. A woman in my class (that is a Jew) said everyone felt “strong emotions” when I was reading it, so I say my prayers were heartily answered as that’s just what I was praying for. Hallelujah. Some of the other performances were pretty funny as one oriental woman sang Silent Night in English and somehow, it just didn’t sound right. Another woman from the Ukraine did a very sleezy dance that was more suitable for a nightclub than a party at 10am but the guys really liked how revealing her outfit was. There was a beautiful dance by two women from Thailand and they even had the traditional costumes to go with it. One guy from Burma sang “Feliz Navidad” and it was anything but “feliz,” as the beat was very slow. I thought the whole thing was a blast and made for great ending to our semester. Kaleb on the other hand, spent his last day of school in church, and I can’t think of a better place to be right now but I’m so tired, I’m just going to go to bed. My brain hurts.

(The photo today is Kory’s drawing of a photo I took that I posted on Dec. 12th.)