hahahaha HAHAHAHHHHH

[cimorene]

We just got a bill from the plumbers for twenty thousand euros!!

• Did we know to expect that much? Not really!


• Do we have 20k? Not at all! We have 2k left of the last loan Wax's mom took which was... I can't remember, 10, 15? Maybe? Or I heard the number 35 but maybe that was the total of both the loans for the renovation?


• Do we know where the rest of that loan went? Not... really? We've got to look into that.


• When is it supposed to be due? End of November!


• Is some of that stuff for stuff for Wax's mom, and some of it for work on our half? Yep, but they're all mixed together and we're not 100% confident of our ability to separate out which bits are which.


• Can't we theoretically pay those bits out of the estate? I think maybe we're supposed to, but we have no ETA on when the estate will be settled, so definitely not November, and nobody has started making an inventory of her stuff, even, which I understand is important. Anyway, there's no liquidity in the estate because she just took out some enormous loans for renovation.


• What are we supposed to do next? We can't even ask the lawyer, or a bank, or a financial planner???, about any of that until business hours again, so we've just been having a nervous breakdown since last night.

Comments

[tozka]

omg. I have no advice (no experience with this), but I do have internet hugs if you want! D:

[yvannairie]

Holy shit how does something like happen in this day and age? Didn't they give you any estimates for time/cost when the basement flooded originally?

[bonibaru]

My question too! Did you not get a written estimate? They can't just change things on the fly and rack up such a huge bill! This sounds to me like some kind of scam.

[yvannairie]

I wouldn't go that far, because miscommunication is just that much likelier, but damage estimates, iirc, are something you need to have done before you start fixing something because of insurance regulations. The fact that this came entirely out of the bushes for Cim and Wax means that someone didn't do their job.

[bonibaru]

Someone absolutely did not do their job. But I have a hard time giving an alleged professional company the benefit of the doubt in matters of home improvement and auto care especially when a bill arrives that so far exceeds expectations.

[cimorene]

Wax says this invoise doesn't even include the work from the basement damage, which insurance is going to divide up apparently.

[yvannairie]

... oh. Okay. Then that is definitely something that you should have known the cost of upfront, and something has gone really really fucking wrong since you didn't.

[cimorene]

Though I just looked at the invoice and it's closer to 11k after tax. I'm not sure why she said twenty. Not that it really matters since we have like two, but still.

[cimorene]

It's hard to say how much communication occurred before because MIL took care of A LOT of it and she and Wax were not great about sharing information promptly back and forth, plus the stuff that was related directly to her side of the house was her decision to make anyway and wouldn't have seemed as relevant to us.

But also, we talked about the likelihood that our side would be significantly more than hers, and it all kinda ended on well, at minimum we HAVE to make it liveable and do this much and if we have to take more loans we'll figure that out when it happens I guess! - Which was presumably possible while she was alive, since her pension alone was about 3x our monthly income, and because her summer cottage was paid off. But, well, you can't sell a summer cottage NOW even if we could get it ready to, and it has to be split among the siblings regardless, and her income... won't exist anymore... but we can't even really start a conversation with the bank because none of us has ANY idea of how dealing with a dead person's assets and debts like... works.

[yvannairie]

I'm really sorry about all of this :(

[vass]

It sounds like what you need most is to talk to a financial advisor.

[cimorene]

I think we do, but it must be premature when we don't have all the information from the estate being all up in the air still.

[vass]

I don't know if they can help you when you don't have the information yet, but... I think neither do you? Worst case, they say "call me back when you know more," and you could probably tell them you're not sure and ask if it's too soon when you make the appointment. For all you know, maybe this is exactly the right time to contact them, and there's some clause you can use in exactly this situation.

[mecurtin]

holy shit. Do you need GO recs to take you to Monday?

[cimorene]

No, thanks, I'm caught up and keep reading it all as soon as it comes out regardless of quality right now. What I really need is something ELSE to read, but I have been almost entirely monofannish for months and I can't really find anything else when I browse back through my bookmarks and tracked tags!

[mecurtin]

I'm pretty much monofannish these days, too, alas. I have a bunch of profic to rec, but that's not so handy for your particular circs.

Love you both.

[spark]

I've recently been binging on Riverdale fanfic which has a handful of talented writers, but note the good stuff is mostly het. If that works for you a couple of my favourites are https://archiveofourown.org/works/11179281, https://archiveofourown.org/works/10852491, https://archiveofourown.org/works/14825711, and for something more cracky, https://archiveofourown.org/works/12131742

[cimorene]

Thanks for these! I don't know if I'll be able to read them successfully in my current state - a bit hit or miss with unknown canons - but I'm willing to give it a try!

[spark]

Note Riverdale also has an awesome canon F/F pairing (Toni/Cheryl) that should inspire great fic but so far I haven't been able to find any really good stuff for it. Still hoping!

[laurenthemself]

That's. Um. Totally bizarre.

[copracat]

That is heart-stoppingly, paralysingly terrifying.

<3