{"id":9076,"date":"2012-02-20T15:24:58","date_gmt":"2012-02-20T22:24:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.backwoodshome.com\/blogs\/ClaireWolfe\/?p=9076"},"modified":"2012-02-20T15:24:58","modified_gmt":"2012-02-20T22:24:58","slug":"im-beginning-to-think-i-made-a-mistake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/2012\/02\/20\/im-beginning-to-think-i-made-a-mistake\/","title":{"rendered":"I’m beginning to think I made a mistake"},"content":{"rendered":"

Loud parties all over the neighborhood yesterday. Well, it’s Carnival. One loud week a year, no problem. A Fourth of July that goes on for two weeks, no problem.<\/p>\n

But the neighborhood of my new-old house is beginning to get me down. Badly.<\/p>\n

You buy in a poor neighborhood, you expect some stuff. And hey, I’m the person who once told a real estate agent I’d rather live next to tar-paper shacks than the McMansions he insisted on showing me.<\/p>\n

But on top of the Notorious Neighbor from Hell, the quality of living here has deteriorated in the last year (and in the last 10, other neighbors say). There’s been some disturbing sh*t going on. Like kids throwing stuff into my backyard — including things that could hurt the dogs. Like kids climbing the rickety fence into my backyard to retrieve soccer balls from their games in the empty lot behind my place (I’m always glad to get their arrant soccer balls for them, but it embarrasses them to knock on my door to ask.) Like more litter than a landfill. Litter I pick up all the time but can’t keep up with.<\/p>\n

This is the house directly across the street:<\/p>\n

\"House<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Beer<\/a><\/p>\n

That’s its permanent condition, too, not just some temporary post-party rubble.<\/p>\n

No, I don’t think litter police should intervene (though if I were the landlord of the horde of young men who live there I’d be on their ass right now<\/i> for treating my property that way).<\/p>\n

But I am beginning to wonder why I’m spending so much time and money fixing up my own place if this is what the neighborhood is becoming. And worse, I’m beginning to feel like some officious old crank, fretting about what my neighbors are up to instead of minding my own business.<\/p>\n

I’ve been looking at real estate listings and have sighed over a couple that have crappy houses but a couple of acres of land. But it’s not likely I can move any time soon unless I luck into a deal like I got on this place — rock bottom price with seller financing. Or get a lease-to-own deal, since any FRNs I have are tied up in this place. (Don’t even say the word “rent”; not with three dogs and a cat; besides, rentals are way higher than my payments here.) Even then, there’s a lot of fixing I still have to do before this house can go up for sale. And in this market, properties are sitting for a loooooong time.<\/p>\n

I suppose an alternative might be to organize some sort of neighborhood pride movement. But that is so<\/i> not me. And although there are plenty of neighbors who keep nice little homes, I wonder how much success anybody would have persuading boozy young renters to clean up their act.<\/p>\n

Maybe I didn’t really make a mistake buying here. This house was my opportunity to get back to the NorthWET, after all. And I love<\/i> the house itself. I love what it’s becoming.<\/p>\n

But the trash and noise and rowdy behaviors are getting me down. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Loud parties all over the neighborhood yesterday. Well, it’s Carnival. One loud week a year, no problem. A Fourth of July that goes on for two weeks, no problem. But the neighborhood of my new-old house is beginning to get me down. Badly. You buy in a poor neighborhood, you expect some stuff. And hey, I’m the person who once told a real estate agent I’d rather live next to tar-paper shacks than the McMansions he insisted on showing me. But on top of the Notorious Neighbor from Hell, the quality of living here has deteriorated in the last year…<\/p>\n

Continue readingI’m beginning to think I made a mistake<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-home-improvement","category-rural-and-small-town-living","ratio-natural","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9076","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9076"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9076\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9076"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9076"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9076"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}