The sub-prime mortgage collapse has helped make many Americans hesitant about buying a home. Frankly, I've been way ahead of the curve. I've always been hesitant. Even after I joined the great American suburban surge. But it wasn't the mortgage payments that worried me. It was the hardware bills...!
When you make a commitment like a home, you owe it to yourself to at least know the difference between a chisel and a crowbar. Between a gas line and a water line. If not, you are indenturing yourself for life to your local hardware man. And that, my fellow-suburbanites, is an investment likely to send his kids to the university and yours to the community college.
Not that cash-strapped consumers need any more warnings, but here are five that may scratch that itch to buy:
* Your house is like your body -- it keeps aging no matter how many times you re-paint it
* Your crabgrass is like your in-laws -- you can never ever be free of it
* Your furnace is programmed to go out every winter and your air-conditioning out every summer
* Your electrical wiring is exactly where you can't reach it
* Your neighbor's darling kids begin playing at precisely 30 minutes before you have to get up in the morning
These are among that relentless parade of problems that is sure to march you down to your local hardware man time after time. He's the only one with all the right materials and tools, so there's just no way of surviving without him. Oh, one thing he can't do for you. He can't muzzle those darling kids. That's something you have to find the materials and tools to do all by yourself.
I'm wondering where in the President's new mortgage recovery plans they intend to list these warnings. In any case, Ray my friendly hardware guy doesn't much care. He retired on my money to Marco Island years ago!
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