Although the television commercials about mortgages are filled with smiling couples, life isn't always like that. Actually, maybe life even shouldn't be like that. Life is best experienced as a smorgasbord. Indeed, real life is not the stuff of commercials and every couple does not smile all the way through the mortgage process. (In fact, maybe no couple ever accomplished that).
Now a frown or two does not mean that they do not "feel the love." It is simply a fact that getting a mortgage is a stressful time for couples. Sometimes people forget that positive things in one's life come with their own type of stress. The healthy form of stress helps us to meet challenges. Understanding stress is the key to differentiating between good stress and bad stress.
Significant events in your life can bring about this natural response. During the process of getting a mortgage, however, stress levels can go though the roof. Couples can be torn apart at a time when they should be working together.
How To Save Your Marriage and Your Mortgage
1. Understand The Process
Couples must understand that the process of buying a home takes time and patience. It is normal to feel the pressure but your spouse didn't create the system. Sometimes people get annoyed with the process but complain about the socks on the floor or the dishes in the sink. Really, your partner is not to blame for the long wait, honest, trust me! Of course, couples know that, but it's easy to loose sight of what's important when your dream home is nearly – but not quite – in your grasp.
2. Don't Confuse The Dream With Reality
Without a doubt, go for your dream, but maybe you can't get it today. Anyway, a dream without effort seems rather unreal – sort of forever like a 'dream' – but a dream achieved through effort is a dream come true. Maybe you might like the 'penthouse' but your budget screams "small home". When the dreamer marries the practical person, however, a mortgage could be a nightmare but only if they lose their way. Once they remember that a marriage is about a team effort, things get back to normal in short order.
3. There Are No Winners
Don't get too focused on specific things to the exclusion of what matters in life. The – "I have to have" - statement can meet with the reply from your spouse – "But I don't want that." Individuality is admirable and nobody should lose themselves in a partnership. The problem arises, however, when one or both make it their mission to be the winner. They end up living in a house where one half of the couple may not feel at home. I forget; what did the other half win anyway?
4. Know Your Finances
If a couple doesn't know the real state of their finances at the beginning, there is bound to be stress down the road. Couples must determine if they can afford the whole package – the mortgage payments, the maintenance, and other expenses involved in buying a home. A couple might love a house, but if they can't afford it in the long term, it won't feel like a home.
Talbot Boggs wrote recently in the Canadian Press - Mortgages a tricky, scary business.
Mortgages are tricky and they can be scary but being informed gives you a definite advantage. For couples, remembering that, hopefully, the marriage will even outlast the mortgage helps them to put their priorities in order.
Daniel Huerta has some great advice for couples buying a home - The First Five Years of Marriage.
Do You Have Any Advice For Couples Buying A Home?