| Rent To Own Homes-Anna and Larry |
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"Maybe that's why I got a little teary eyed at the end. I just could not believe that this was really going to happen. But it did." Anna and Larry Patton Larry and I have been married for more than 20 years. We have five children ranging from 10 to 20 whom we love dearly. It has always been our highest priority to provide a home for them and see them grow up into confident, capable adults. Larry has worked very hard as a plumber all of his life for us and I have been at home, raising the children.
We actually owned a home, in the 90’s. Larry had an opportunity to join a new company with a job opportunity that looked very promising so he switched. Unfortunately, his new company failed and Larry was without work for several months. As a consequence, we lost our home and began to rent. We looked forward to the day when we could get our own home again.
Well, with 5 children and one income it is virtually impossible to save for a down payment. There are always needs for clothing, school, doctors visits, etc., that come first. We had to move a few times too. Our landlords always wanted more rent and we could never fix the house the way we wanted to because it didn’t belong to us. It was tough on us, Larry and me, because we tried so hard to help our children have a stable family home where they could feel secure. Moving around a lot doesn’t help at all.
I was always wondering how we could get back into our own home. Larry worked very hard but every time we talked to potential lenders they were not very helpful because of the credit problems that resulted from the layoff in the 90’s. I didn’t know then that things would get worse before they got better.
Larry had to have heart surgery and couldn’t work for some time. That led to another tough time and our credit suffered again. He did get better but I had to sort of forget about my hopes of owning a home again. Housing prices always seemed to be moving away from any pay increases that Larry was able to receive. It seemed that there was no way to own a home again.
That’s when I read about your lease to own program. You read so much in advertising that isn’t really what you think it is so I had trouble believing that something like this could really be true. When I met with you and Annie Fredenberg from the Guaranty Home Sales Team I really couldn’t believe what you said at first.
I guess it was a little overwhelming. Someone was really going to buy a home for us to rent and give us an option to purchase the home at a fixed price within two years. We could pick the home that we wanted, in a neighborhood of our choice, in a price range we could afford. The children could stay within their school district. We could fix it up the way we wanted to. Someone would help us to restore our credit and we could move in before that was all done and actually just living in the home and paying our rent on time would actually help us to improve our credit which would actually help us qualify for a loan to buy the home!
Maybe that’s why I got a little teary eyed at the end. I just could not believe that this was really going to happen. But it did. It took Annie and us a little while to find the right home but we did and you made the offer on it. After some negotiating about the price, inspections and so on the seller agreed to your offer and my heart was pounding with anticipation. I kept waiting for something bad to happen…but it didn’t. Our investor offered us the lease with the purchase option. The numbers were pretty much what you told us to expect and it was something we could afford.
We are moving into our home soon. “Our home”. I like the sound of that. I still can’t let myself believe that it’s true…but it is. I hope that anyone else who needs this program will listen to you, too…and believe it. Thank you, Mr. Dallal.
Sincerely,
Anna and Larry Patton |
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