No real change

No real change this week. We had our call with A, the family rep, yesterday, and that went well. It was a bit humorous, as I think we told her more than she told us, simply filling her in on a lot of background.

As much as Katie is bringing her baggage with her, there is still a lot of starting over right now. She is still out of Orange, and slowly accumulating points. She is working on her homework for the next seminar - well, except for working on earning her level - as she has to be at level 3 to attend it, regardless of what homework is done.

We haven't heard from her in a couple of weeks as well, so hard to judge based on her letters, since we haven't had any.

She does have a rash, and I have to call today to give the insurance info to a dermatologist for her to see. I should have done this last week, but I kept leaving the number at home (and of course I need to call during the day to set this up). But I have it here now, so I can get it taken care of today.

Then next week one of the more fun parts starts again - it is time to apply for a third loan to keep her there. This part makes me real nervous - are we going to get another one, and for how much (i.e. how long?) I've estimated that it will be another $72,000 to keep her there until her 18th birthday or so - which is slightly less than we've already taken out. From what I know, my credit is pretty good anymore - the biggest concern is how much we owe - that is why the last loan was only enough for six months instead of a year. However when we did that one we were in the process of consolidating a bunch of other stuff - so all of it would have been outstanding at the time. With all those other things (car, gutters, credit cards, etc) paid off on that second mortgage I hope that it will go better.

It makes me feel a little bit like Oliver Twist though. "More please?"

I am really hoping I can do it without anythign else, but I do have some other ideas to help if they turn us down. I don't know if they would work, but it is better than nothing at all. I think, worst case being that we couldn't get any more loans, that I could come up with something like four to six months worth (via tax refund (that we are hoping is really good) and 401K loans), but it would really leave us hurting, especially because the payments on that option would be as much or more than what the education loans would be. Then there would be the straight 401k hardship withdrawal after that - which would not directly hurt so bad, but really hurt retirement, especially because I would have to stop contributing to it, which means I would lose the company match, which is the only retirement money they are providing any more.

But who am I fooling with that? The way things are, I can never retire anyway. I have to work another 30 years to pay off the loans I already have.

I do figure that once they are all done I can consolidate all of them into one, which should make that part a little less painful each month.

I sure hope Diane manages to sell a lot more houses this year - it would make everything a lot easier if we were a steady two income household. Last year she went from for over six months with no closings. Overall she didn't have a bad year (August was really good), but it wasn't consistent, and wasn't great.

Ok, this is depressing enough for one day.