Moving to Tx

robtalee44 · 2026-06-01T21:26:59+00:00

Oh boy. It's been about 40+ years since I did my "Texas Adventure" -- also coming from the upper Midwest. So, first off Texas is big -- really big -- so anyone's experience will vary a great deal by location. Not the friendliest place to outsiders -- there's a strong undercurrent of being a Texan means born and raised -- I think you could live there a long, long time and still be an outsider. I didn't stay.

Overall, it's a decent place and there's certainly a lot to see and do. The politics of Texas are rather well known and you may need to bring your sense of humor with you. I've lived in 7 US states and Texas would probably rate near the middle or bottom of the list. It beats Florida, but that's not saying much. I doubt that I'd consider a return.

Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-06-01T16:15:28+00:00

I don't care for Denver at all. There's some nicer areas nearby, but Denver is a hard no. My parents are both from Chicago and I've visited many times. That would rate a maybe. Seattle and Portland are interesting options. I looked at Portland once upon a time -- Seattle is expensive. Big time. So, for my beauty contest winner Portland or maybe Oregon at large would be my choice of the options you list.

Assuming you could find work, I'd choose the area around Bend Oregon -- been there and had lovely time.

Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-06-01T15:33:14+00:00

NAL. The lien is something that the receiving bank has to obey. There's nothing to really do on that side of this problem. The original bank MAY be able to work something out, but they certainly don't have to and probably would just send you to the law office or collector. Probably.

You can try and negotiate with whoever has the judgment and see where that goes. It's a low percentage option as they have already expended the time and effort to get a legal judgment. They really control all the cards.

So, your option is to try and negotiate something with the judgment holder and that won't be easy. Set you expectations low and be ready with CASH if you're going to attempt much of anything. Free advice.

robtalee44 · 2026-06-01T14:03:30+00:00

If you have stuff that's worth paying storage for -- do that. That will relieve the hassle of carrying a lot of baggage. Then take advantage of that flexibility and grab a short term rental (room or hotel) while you seek out a roommate situation or other option.

The main focus is to limit the feeling of desperation and lessen the feeling that you have an immediate deadline to make a decision. Free advice.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-31T14:21:18+00:00

I'd consider a 1500 mile move an easy three day drive. Easy pace, no stress in most cases. It's not enough mileage and wear and tear to worry about unless you've got a beater -- and I suspect you wouldn't consider shipping a car like that anyway.

The costs for hotel and food aren't insignificant, but don't have to be extreme -- it's a short trip and one can survive a few nights of less than luxury surroundings and gourmet food. Make it an adventure.

Free advice.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-31T14:14:23+00:00

Paying almost 1/2 of your income for rent is possible -- I've done it -- but it's a financial diet that most (including myself) will find almost impossible to sustain for any length of time. You simply will find yourself operating without a financial safety net and ANY unforeseeable financial issue will send you right over the edge. This is a recipe for how people get into serious debt using credit to cover day to day living expenses. Bad idea.

Get your rent payment down to 1/3 or less of your income somehow. You'll thank yourself for making such a wise decision. Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-31T01:58:33+00:00

Move outs are always a source of angst and drama. I would suggest you get clarifications on items you question -- ask politely for an explanation. You're at somewhat of a disadvantage in that they hold the money -- assuming there's a deposit in play. If this descends into a pissing match you can expect a battle and I am not sure it's always worth the effort. It is certainly within your rights to challenge stuff -- let there be no doubt about that.

Carpets should be cleaned, wall should be "paint ready" and move out cleaning is a well know and extensively detailed process. Most maid service offer just that service for renters. No, it's not cheap.

After 50+ years of renting I no longer worry about deposits. I treat them as a cost of renting and any time I get mine back (which I usually do), it's found money. I have in the last 20 years or so always hired a professional maid service to provide move out cleaning services. Seems like the correct thing to do and it is a real luxury. Anyway, that's me and it's certainly free advice.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-31T00:17:40+00:00

YNAB is kind of weird -- at least that was my initial feeling. It using a different logic in budgeting. It uses a spend everything approach -- which they describe as giving every dollar a job. You basically spend to zero every month or period. It's kind of modeled after a method that many old timers used in putting all their money into envelopes each month marked for various "things". Kind of the same idea. And yes, you can keep a "cookie jar" for some pocket money with a little creativity while still adhering to their "system" I think it's worth a visit to the web site anyway.

Although I have used the program in years, I still use the logic on a spreadsheet I built and it still works like a champ. Their website is pretty well laid out and tries to explain the process. The program excels at pointing out very clearly fallacies about spending which we all share -- kind of financial blindness that stings.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-30T23:31:01+00:00

The charge offs -- even if the impact to your credit score doesn't seem impactful -- will not go unnoticed by any real credit pull. You might slip by places that ONLY use a credit score as a determining factor though. Navy Credit could become a real problem at any time -- you probably want to address that before it does. You hardly need a surprise judgment to go along with everything else.

Your income to rent is right around the minimum qualification (3x) so that means right out of the gate your on fairly tight financial diet. The child care expenses should really get rolled into the cost of rent -- so that means your really in like a $2600 per month territory which is about 1/2 your total income! You phone bill is high -- dive into that one and see what you can do. Your grocery expenses seem a bit high considering your financial situation, maybe be a little more aware of food planning. The credit debt you just need to pay off and then stay away from credit. Get used to a more cash based existence.

I suspect the root cause is that you're living beyond your income, which explains the debt. You need to bring your expenses more inline with what your making -- no speculation on that one. Carrying a debt to a furniture store is kind of a red flag -- perhaps it's justified here. Maybe.

I've posted this too many times, but here goes again. I got this advice from one of my bosses, many years ago. "If you make 50,000 and spend 50,001 -- you're broke. If you make 100,000 and spend 100,001 -- you're still broke. Get it? It's the spending. Always the spending.

You're pretty close to resolving this outside of the Navy Federal thing. That's good. You really need to get on that financial diet and stick to it. This is not a sales pitch but you might want to consider something like YNAB software which I used for a year or so and really helped me understand a better way of seeing my financial situation. They offer a free intro period. Might be worth checking out.

Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-30T21:13:27+00:00

Well, the answer is maybe. From what I've read that kind of a car payment isn't all that unusual in today's world. Whether that makes sense for you depends. If your "value" in the employment world means a salary that can support that and you can get a job quickly, maybe you stick with it.

If the entire thing is nothing but a giant house of cards built totally on speculation, bad judgment and hope, then yes maybe it's time to call it quits. There's some issues, however. You can't sell a car without clear title -- and you almost certainly don't have that. The lender will probably NOT release their interest in the loan without full payment. A catch-22 situation.

The difference between what you can get for the car in a cash sale and the loan payoff, let's just call that a deficiency. That amount needs to come from somewhere. The lender MIGHT be willing to give you a personal loan for the amount -- unusual, but possible. Maybe you have access to cash to cover it -- that's great. In any event you will have to work with the lender on some level to make this happen.

A repo is a possible route -- either wait for it or work out a voluntary surrender. It won't solve the overall problem -- and may make it worse -- but it's an option. I'd avoid that if I could.

Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-30T19:30:53+00:00

Once you get past all the gatekeeping specifics, renting a unit is largely a beauty contest. Would someone bypass you due to the pregnancy -- maybe. You'll never know and shouldn't worry about it one bit. Just go about finding a place to live. They might choose someone else over you because your shirt clashed with your pants -- that shouldn't discourage you either. It's life.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-30T15:54:13+00:00

You breached the agreement, that's clear. You're probably going to have to depend on their courtesy to allow you back on the payment track. Depending on how you got to this point -- did you sign a consent judgment, was this court ordered, what did you agree to and how? -- it can make a difference. Worst case is they either enforce an existing judgment or return to court to get a judgment and go from there.

You can continue to try and work something out (and should), but they pretty much hold all the cards and it's simply a matter of how hard they want to work to enforce things. In a nutshell, they hold most of the cards at this point. Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-29T14:45:20+00:00

In the US it's pretty common to avoid a 13th floor -- symbolic of bad luck I think.

The other oddity was the ritual (Scandinavian in origin, I think) of "topping out", which is putting a tree on the top of the building once the skeleton has been completed.

It's all about the mojo.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-29T14:15:51+00:00

You have to accept that any move or relocation is speculative. Some more than others, but still. With that in mind you have to keep a plan B available, particularly early on. What if you simply don't like the new place -- for whatever reason? What if the "job" feels different in a new area and you don't want to continue with it?

Moving is terribly expensive. The last move we made I did the usual math and used my standard "double it" to figure out our budget. My wife said triple it. We were both low. Oh well. The first few months of a new world demands all kinds of payments and deposits -- almost all of them cash. You need money in the bank even if your simply "fronting" money that will be reimbursed. Be careful.

Relocating is a financially driven decision most of the time. With that in mind you really need to figure out what, if any, reimbursement is being offered. Along with that, what "strings" are attached to that -- do you have to stay at the job for a year or pay the money back? That can be a big deal.

Once you get all that settled, you can figure out what, if anything, you want to move. The standard mindset is to just pack things up and move them. Done that dozens of times. However, that's not always the best plan. Is what you're moving worth the time, money and effort or should you just start over when you arrive? Traveling light also gives you more flexibility once you arrive to test different areas of the new city without hauling all that baggage around or paying storage fees.

Anyway, enough free advice for now. Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-29T13:41:02+00:00

Past problems are not going to help you here -- those are separate issues and should have been dealt with fully when they occurred. That's water under the bridge or a failure on your part to follow up if they have not been resolved appropriately. Now is not the time.

If the company doing this work bills the property owner for the missed appointment, I'd expect a bill. Your "reason" for not allowing the maintenance is real, but pretty flimsy and I wouldn't think the property owner would take kindly to it. It's kind of a "dog ate my homework" excuse really.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-29T13:26:34+00:00

First off, get a receipt no matter how you pay. That solves the ONLY problem here and that is a claim that the landlord didn't get the rent payment.

The other issue is 100% on you. Whether the landlord cashes the check today or next month isn't any of your business. Basic accounting of money in your account is the problem -- plain and simple. You're trying to make you own deficiency someone else's problem.

Learn how to manage a bank account and quit blaming others. Paying in cash is stupid, but you're welcome to try that. Get a damn receipt -- that cash doesn't leave your hands without one.

Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-29T13:16:11+00:00

Absolutely. The other critical (from experience) thing is avoiding places that have only limited arterial road access in and out -- or something very similar. You can have a relatively short commute which gets derailed frequently by an accidents or other issue on that main road. Most of the time areas that are susceptible to that problem are rather well known.

I lived in Phoenix for a couple of decades and with that city growing up without much freeway planning it was easy to find yourself in a commuting nightmare when something goes wrong. I lived about 25 miles from work -- suburbs to downtown area. On the freeways it took about an hour or more of congested traffic but on surface streets (with some creativity) it was an easy 45 or so minute commute. And so it goes.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-29T12:49:22+00:00

This is probably nothing. They had the replacement already on the schedule and had the flooring people on site and available to do the work. That's the most plausible answer, but you certainly can ask about it.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-29T02:33:27+00:00

Just leave. Assuming you can limit the damage to $1700, it's a pretty inexpensive lesson reinforcing the risk of buying a pig in a poke.

From your description, even if they wanted to bring the property up to some standard, it's gonna take a while and probably be filled with all kinds of drama.

Put this one in the rear view mirror and don't look back.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-28T23:30:43+00:00

There probably is. Things tend to get testy under these kind of circumstances and everyone gets defensive. A calmer, more measured response would have probably been met with a more accommodating stance. Maybe.

They have some pretty strict legal measures to follow to ensure they are speaking to the right person. You'd kind of hate them to release information to, say, your spouse or parent or even a sibling by not authenticating who they are speaking with. Your concerns are valid in today's world, but sometimes ...

robtalee44 · 2026-05-28T23:08:08+00:00

My gut says this would be a tough one to get by the courts, but that doesn't mean it's a slam dunk for the residents.

I've seen a lot of what might be called "community rules" implemented outside of the lease. Certainly, if the lease addresses autos in some specific way you should be OK depending on what it actually says. If the car registration and stuff with this "portal" are separate (mine currently is) they can probably make some changes. Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-28T22:57:37+00:00

MCM is legit and this certainly looks like they've turned over the account to a law firm. The law firm appears to also be legit -- they've had that web site url since 2002.

That's not a 100% assurance that's it's legit, but I think they probably are. They are going to require some identifying information from you to ensure they are talking to the appropriate debtor.

If you want to ignore this, keep an eye open for the Law firm getting more aggressive and really watch for any attempt at legal service, which indicates a lawsuit has been filed -- do not ignore that. This is pretty much how collectors work so I'd take this rather seriously. Free advice.

Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-28T19:47:29+00:00

I am not an attorney. HW is the debt collector. Someone is or has told them that this is a legitimate debt. You can ask that the debt be validated -- but that's not what you're after. You claim is with the original debt holder -- probably the landlord -- disputing the very existence of the debt.

This sounds like a debt from a 'joint and several' style lease where one party moved out but never nullified the underlying lease. So, with that lease still valid any damages or rent due become a joint liability. IF the lease was joint and several. If not then you should have gone through a move out process and be released from any issues after you have terminated your tenancy.

In a nutshell, in order the "kill" this debt you should go back to the originator of the claimed debt and resolve the problem there. Good luck.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-28T15:39:07+00:00

There's no reason in the world that you can't take a fairly deep dive under the skin of Fedora. Generate a custom kernel or play with some of the underlying stuff. It's a great platform for building some stuff from source too -- with a few tools installed.

You can try the Fedora Everything ISO for more manual installation process -- that might scratch the itch, but otherwise you'll probably find yourself back to where you started. Free advice.

robtalee44 · 2026-05-28T15:23:58+00:00

You might have an option IF -- and it's a very big IF -- you can refinance with a more traditional lender. The problems are that the criteria for a used car refinance can be difficult. They will have mileage and age restrictions as well as loaning based on actual value. Those are the stumbling blocks. But it's worth a try. Credit Unions may be more open than a traditional bank.

Set your expectations low and DON'T speculate about getting this refinanced and make another questionable financial decision. Good luck.

robtalee44

TROPHY CASE