The wedding!

Well, its almost here. TD and I have been engaged for 18 months, and our wedding is finally here. We are beyond excited about seeing all of our friends and family, in our hometown.

We leave tomorrow--the weather is supposed to be perfect, all the details and set and we are ready to celebrate!

In the beginning, one of the best decisions we made was to hire a wedding planner. I was very uneasy at the thought of the expense--almost 10% of our wedding budget--but she has save us at least $2000 by negotiating lower prices, finding us deals, etc.

But the biggest part is that these last few weeks have been so nutty, that I would have been pulling my hair out and screaming at everyone. Instead I have focused on my interviews, TD has been writing his dissertation, and we've both enjoyed the little free time that we have. Meanwhile our planner has been behind the scenes checking everything to make sure that it will all go off without a hitch.

I feel totally confident, relaxed and happy. And that is priceless!!

House selling update

Our final hurdle for selling the condo was for the buyer to secure her mortgage (she is financing 80%). Unfortunately, the appraisal from the mortgage company came in low--$12K too low. According to my real estate agent, the appraiser was not familiar with the area and used some properties as comparables which were in a not as desirable neighborhood, and ignored some recent sales in our neighborhood.

We granted the buyer a 1 week extension (to April 8), and a new appraiser came out today. Hopefully the house will appraise for the listing price, and we will move forward with the sale. We are looking to close on June 1, which is a bit of a pain as its the Tuesday after labor day. I am not sure how feasible it will be to move this date, but it would be really nice not to have to move during a holiday weekend!

Net Worth Update

I just updated my net worth for the beginning of April. Happily, my investments have been doing well, so it is steadily increasing.

We have some big expenses coming up in the next few months (car repair, moving and honeymoon), but the move should be reimbursed by work, and the honeymoon is a gift from TD's mother. I save for retirement every month (right now just 7% of salary) but haven't been able to save much cash each month. Once the wedding is over, hopefully I can return to saving $300 or so each month in our emergency fund. Right now the e-fund is $9000. I'd like to have $15-$20K eventually, but I feel comfortable with it for the time being.

Living on one salary (since January) is doable for us, but we are looking forward to being a dual income household again. This should happen in the fall--fingers crossed!