It is mid August, when Pat our landlord asks me if he could come upstairs to talk – I feel that he doesn’t want to talk about the weather.

Indeed, the sad news is that they have decided to sell the house. Prices in UTC have gone up by 24% in the last 12 months and he would like to take advantage of it.

Pat’s decision to sell the house took us by surprise – I’m sure this has been in the making for quite some time – unfortunately, they didn’t tell us which is very, very disappointing – enough said!

The plan is to do a “pocket listing” for the first month to see what happens. A couple days later he tells us that the realtor and the photographer will come by. This makes me thinking: why the photographer when he is not listing the house yet? I ask him and he tells us that he had to change the strategy. To look credible and to be able to put an offer in for their new home they need to show that they are serious about selling and have to officially list their house.

That was on Tuesday, on Thursday they had the Open House, on Friday they had a cash offer on the table and on Saturday the buyer with his whole family comes to look at their new home!

In the coming week the house would be upraised, repairs needed to be done, maybe even termite treatment (tent), etc…..

This is all too much especially for Marco’s deteriorating lower back condition so he decides on that very Saturday morning that we will be out of here by noon!

I start packing and he goes to get a U-Haul trailer, we realize that we have way more stuff than we thought we have, so it takes a bit longer but we are driving off at 3pm first to Enrique and Alicia where we take a moment to breath, then we hit the road towards Las Cruces. We make it to Tucson, AZ, that day and arrive in Las Cruces, NM (meanwhile our second home) on Sunday. Luckily, our lovely friends Elina and David offered us to stay with them until we find some ground under our feet again.

Since Pat announced his plans we have checked ads for apartments and have looked at some places, but we have to realize once again that the rents in San Diego are ridiculously high. Private home owners and landlords who do shorter term rentals are asking “vacation” prices and official apartment communities are trying to lock you in with one-year leases.

Since neither is an option for us we probably need a bit more time to find something appropriate. We will keep looking from Las Cruces, NM.