Hard choice: keep the house or start over clean? Both hurt in different ways.

During my mediation last month in Austin, my lawyer laid out the numbers. Keeping the house meant $2,100 a month just for mortgage and taxes, plus repairs I never budgeted for when we split. Selling it meant splitting maybe $38k after fees, which would cover first, last, and a deposit on a small apartment. I kept thinking I was being smart by fighting for the house, but really I was just scared of losing the backyard my kids know. My therapist asked me, "Are you holding the house or is the house holding you?" and that hit me hard. Has anyone else chosen the apartment route and felt relief, or does the regret creep in after a year?

2 comments

2 Comments

gavin_kim2d ago

That therapist line about the house holding you, that's the real deal. But you're framing it wrong when you say selling means "starting over clean." There's no clean start when you've got kids involved, there's just a different kind of messy. I've seen too many guys keep the house, then eat their savings alive on a roof replacement or a water heater that dies at the worst time. The backyard you're scared of losing, it's not the yard itself. It's the picture of what you thought your life was gonna be. That picture's already gone either way. Apartment life has its own problems, sure, but at least you're not bleeding money on a place that's too big for what you actually need now.

wendy_lee482d ago

Damn, that hit different. So when do you actually know it's the house vs. the fantasy? Like, is there a moment you realize the picture's gone, or are you just stuck with it until the water heater dies?