"Let me take a long last look, before I say goodbye..."

There's nothing more humbling than a good plan quickly derailed.

So. Well, this is humbling.

My old house in Wayne sits empty in a stagnant market, an impending deadline looming large. My plan to sell it and move with my reputation—and credit—intact, something I once referred to as The Third Miracle, will most likely not come to pass.

It was a good plan, too, spurred by events in my life that were mostly beyond my control. I can't write about all of issues that led to this point because many of them are very personal and I need to protect those involved. But let me assure you that there was no deliberate attempt to skip out on a bad investment, take advantage of a weak housing market or to otherwise become part of the problem.

Let me tell you as much as I can of what happened, and let you be the judge.

I originally wrote about my need to move in an old post that I categorized under 'The Third Miracle.' Family issues trumped everything else. When the first two miracles fell in line—the new job, the new house—the plan was to keep up on the mortgage for the old house and pursue a short sale. I knew it would be difficult, bordering on traumatic, but I had an opportunity to earn some extra income through an online editing job that I could take care of at night.

Besides, I couldn't just abandon it, the way so many people on my block had simply left their houses. I had only lived in Wayne for about eight years, but still considered it my hometown. I felt responsible for it. I moved there because of the school district, the neighborhood in general, the proximity to parks—there three within a few blocks. Those things hadn't changed. It was still a good house (during our relatively short time there, we replaced the roof, the furnace and the electrical system) in a good neighborhood. And I still love the town; it's one of the reasons I get so irritated at the actions of the government there.

I also didn't want the stigma of a foreclosure following me, so I thought a short sale would be my best option (when the city bought and sold the house next door to mine for $11,000, it certainly didn't improve my property values). I had several people tell me for months, even years, ahead of time that walking away from the house was the best thing to do, but hearing it, saying it and doing it are very different things. I waited as long as I could and, with great trepidation, missed my first mortgage payment in order to make the property eligible for the short sale process.

Then, life happened.

Repeated trips to the hospital in Ann Arbor—the one not affiliated with Oakwood Healthcare—ate up so much time that I "lost editing privileges" on my late night gig. In other words, I got fired. I suddenly realized that I couldn't make up that missed mortgage payment—or keep them up at all. I have kept up the utility payments (although the water bill is currently past due), although that hasn't helped that much. On a trip to Wayne City Hall an employee there—someone I had considered a friend, and had had plenty of conversations with during my newspaper days—told me I was "shitting in Wayne and leaving." Another, whom I also talked with frequently, just glared at me and didn't even approach the counter. Some people in Wayne still shake my hand, but they don’t look me in the eye when they do it.

And so the stigma of foreclosure is looming down on me, after all.

I guess my plan wasn't all that good to begin with. Good plans don't unravel so quickly or completely after one or two hiccups. Perhaps I was just too optimistic in thinking that someone would quickly swoop in and buy up what is not just a move-in ready house, but one that won't require any serious work for at least a decade.

There have been offers. It is still for sale at the bank-approved price—which is more than twice what the house next door sold for. But a grim deadline spelled out in the pre-foreclosure sale agreement is fast approaching: I need an offer on the house by the middle of next month or the bank will take it back.

There's not much I can do now, other than to hope within the next few weeks that someone realizes what a great find it is and puts in an offer that the bank accepts. I am not sure what I would have done differently (or could have, for that matter). I haven't exactly given up on The Third Miracle, but I admit it's unlikely. Even so, I am still blessed.