‘The home we sold is now going into foreclosure, but it’s way out of our price range. To say the market is disappointing is an understatement.’ Dear Quentin,

I wanted to share my experience with the current housing market and ask for advice on my next moves in a seemingly impossible situation. Let’s take a trip back to 2017. I was married at the time with three young children, and my then-wife and I were renters. We both worked the best jobs we could for our education and experience, which was not much at the time. 

She brought home $2 per hour, plus tips, waiting tables at a nearby restaurant, while I worked at a marine store for $500 a week. We rented a very small manufactured home in a mobile-home community and paid $800 per month in rent. We were able to save for a year to take our next steps toward home ownership in 2018.

We found a home through my wife’s former colleague. It was a three-bedroom, two-bathroom 1,400-square-foot home on 1.53 acres of land. We obtained a price of $145,900 from the seller. We were approved for an FHA loan at 3.5% down and a 4.625% interest rate. This was all our savings, but we took a leap of faith and agreed to move forward. 

A single father paying all the bills

We closed on the home and lived there for three years. We had some relationship troubles along the way — mostly about finances, as we were now paying $1,053 a month for a mortgage — and we decided to divorce. As a single father in the home, I was left with all the bills. With hard work and dedication I prevailed. It was tough, but not impossible.

In 2021, I changed jobs and was making $23.10 an hour, working 60-plus hours a week! Life was looking great. I was saving money, able to make repairs on the home and provide a Christmas for my children. I met a woman and we had a blended family of six children. We moved into the house together at the end of the year 2021. 

Last year, our world turned upside down. My second wife was let go from her manufacturing job and began working in the only area in which she could find a job: home-to-home sales. She has an associate’s degree in accounting, but for months she could not land a job. So the bills began to pile up. Our credit-card debt rose and we started to drown. 

‘Stopped dead in our tracks’

We decided we could sell our home and walk away with more than we would need for 20% down on a new home. So we listed our home for $300,000. We sold it for $296,600. We began our journey toward buying land to build a barndominium, our dream home. But our joint income was not enough, and we were stopped dead in our tracks. Moving in with my parents was our only option.