The Joys of Home Ownership

I'm supposed to be happy that I own a home. Building equity and all that. But it often feels as if home ownership actively works against you. Let's say, for example, that a year and a half ago you bought a home with a really old refrigerator, so old that it's a lovely harvest gold model. You think, "I'd like to replace that one day," but you don't, because the old refrigerator still works, and you have other ways to spend your money. On occasion you look at the fridge and think, "One of these days, when I can afford it, you will be carted off and a stainless steel Kenmore Elite with french doors will occupy your spot," but then you finish your coffee and get on with your life.

Your old fridge will soldier on until, two days before you are expecting guests for the weekend, two days before a weekend when you will have no time to sit around waiting for a delivery truck, two days before you need things like ice and cold drinks, it will silently die. It will die at exactly the time when carpenter bees have decided to invade your wood deck, necessitating an expensive visit from the exterminator. It will die at precisely the time when you can least afford the Kenmore Elite of your dreams. It will die on the day you are paying your monthly bills and feeling poor. It will die at the worst, the absolute worst, possible time.

A year ago, your washing machine conducted a similar assault on your morale, leaving this world right in the middle of a spin cycle that included all of your underwear. Although you've never done anything but clean and gently use them, your appliances appear to hate you. The carpenter bees clearly hate you. The US economy definitively hates you, although the chances are that the refrigerator that you must now rush out to purchase will probably be on sale, which is the one bright spot in this saga.

Aren't you glad you're not a renter?