I'm doing a thing that may be smart or may be stupid.

[feuervogel]

After discussing it with the appropriate graduate coordinators, I am applying to the MA Linguistics program here to get a dual MA in (hopefully) 3 years. I *think* the application process is mostly a formality, because I'm already enrolled in the graduate school.

My thesis advisor thinks it's a good idea and is supportive (he's both German and Ling faculty, so he's on the committee to select grad students there, too).

This ... changes a lot of things. Like I don't want to stay in this apartment 2 more years; 20ish months was going to be pushing it as it is. So that means I need to look for a place. Fortunately, now is a good time to do that.

But the wrench: I'd like Ben to move down here temporarily, because 3 years is going to be sucktastic (especially once I hit the "oh god why am I doing this" phase and am drowning in trying to get 63 credit hours in 6 semesters) and Meyrin is getting old. So I may need a 2-bedroom (more space + office room) vs a 1-bedroom. But I don't qualify right now based on income, and he doesn't have steady income-income (capital gains don't count for that, only paychecks apparently), so he needs a job. Fortunately there are potential jobs here or in ATL with possible part-time remote work/wfh, so he may be doing that.

But moving suuuuuuucks so much.

The bigger wrench: we own a house. Do we pack our shit up and put most of it in storage (or sell some of it) and sell the house, or do we rent it out once our shit is moved elsewhere? We have a LOT of shit after living there for nearly 16 years. Also we need to replace the carpet and fix up some grody stuff from cat pee and toilet floods and fix some toilets...

But *flail* 2 MAs. Then I will be qualified for pretty much any PhD program anywhere (perhaps overqualified), should I decide to continue. I have a pretty cool MA thesis idea that I'm really excited about, so maybe I can carry that forward.

Comments

[ruthling]

tough decisions. do you think you'll move back to the place the house is after? If not, sell it now before the market softens. If so, maybe keep it, so long as you can cope with being absentee landlords.

Long distance relationships and moving both suck, you have my sympathies.

[feuervogel]

Possibly? We really like the area the house is in, but if I want to get a job (or a PhD), we need to go somewhere else. Then I might find a job yet somewhere else... And if we go to Germany, having the house as a place to return to if we need to is really nice (also as a voting registration location).

Plus, assuming we can get renters, the income would be nice. We can probably rent it for 2-3 times our mortgage payment. Of which some would go to a local property management company and some into a fix-it fund, but more than our mortgage is still fine.

[ironed_orchid]

I rented out my place while I was in grad school, and now that I'm back in it, I can say it was the best decision ever.

The way things worked out I had just put a new kitchen in, and while I had tenants I replaced the hot water system and did some minor repairs. So that was lucky. If you have been there so long, you should be able to refinance to get some work done before putting it on the market, and as a result your mortgage may go down as payments get extended back out to 25 or 30 years. I also had a friend who worked in local real estate agent, and while she didn't do rental management, it was great having someone who could talk me through everything before I signed up.

I was pretty brutal with the amount of shit I purged, and I regret a couple of those choices, but it is so easy to accumulate junk when you have your own place. But I was moving 3000km away into a share house, so it was important to me not to cart around too much stuff. After living in Canberra for 9 years, I then purged a lot more stuff before moving back in.

In that time I had two tenants and I was super lucky. The first one moved after a year, but the next one stayed until I moved back in.

Whatever you end up deciding: GOOD LUCK

[feuervogel]

Thanks! I'm about to write an update on this. (Man, grad school sure eats up all my brain power. Maybe that's why I use tumblr all the time now. Reblog for pretty is so easy.)