We left our house on June 8. We'd gotten many notices, letters, etc. telling us that the house would be sold at auction on June 8. We were exhausted when we left. We left several things behind that we would have rather taken, but didn't have the time, energy or truck space to really take them into consideration. I went back to the house once, to see if my work portfolio was there. It was. I drove by once or twice more, to check the mail - make sure nothing was in the mailbox that missed being forwarded.
There is a scrub oak out front. I grew it from an acorn. Its parent plant was at our house before. It had its first acorns the summer we sold it. I germinated 5 acorns, kept one and gave the other 4 away. Only mine survived. This spring the oak tree flowered. I was very excited that there would be acorns on my last year there. During one of my stops by the house, I saw that someone had mowed the yard and swept the driveway. Then I saw the oak. Gambel's Oaks grow like a gangly teenager. First they send up a long stalk, about 3 feet long. Then the next year that stalk branches out. My oak had sent up a stalk the summer before. This summer would have been the spreading out year. But whoever tended to the grass didn't realize this. They pruned last year's growth off, thereby pruning off all but one of the acorns. I was crushed. But, I decided to check on that last acorn in August.
Saturday I was coming home from my brother's after a couple of days there and a long motorcycle ride. (The BMW Club's 100,000 foot ride - over passes that total over 100,000 feet in elevation.) I checked on the acorn. It was gone - probably lunch for a squirrel. While there I noticed that there were many, many pieces of paper tacked to the house and there was a UPS overnight letter behind the storm door. The letter was to us, from the lawyers representing the mortgage company. The notices said that the house was going to be rekeyed and we could contact the realtor to either drop off a key or collect anything that was ours in the house. The letter said that the house had been sold on June 22 and that we had until August 11 to voluntarily vacate the house. And, if we left it "broom clean" we could get $500. I certainly wish that I had known we could have stayed in the house for another 2 months! No one I spoke with, nor in any letters told us what the procedure was. We assumed that the sale would happen on June 8th and that we might even be visited by the sheriff to be sure we were out. If they had let us know, we might have left the house broom clean. Instead, they get a house with things we didn't want to take, or couldn't take, with us. They get a house with food in the fridge, to which I had the power turned off. They get a house that needs to be cleared and cleaned.
So, if anyone out there is looking at foreclosure, check with a lawyer to see what the timeline really looks like. You may have a lot more time than you think.
I wouldn't have wanted to wait until the very last day. (Which is what we thought we were doing, but that was because we hemmed and hawed on our course of action.) My family gave up weekends and drove lots of miles to pitch in. We stressed and left a lot more than we'd wanted to, all because the lawyers didn't think it was worthwhile to let us know what would happen. But, I'm done now. I will not go by the house again. That part of my life is closed.
