She'll Need a Credit Check

Beth has been a little worried about what she's going to do if we have to move. She doesn't want to move, because she doesn't want to leave Tim. But if she stays here, she can't continue to live at home and can't rely on us to take care of her. Of course, she was going to move out as soon as she turned 18, so I don't know what she's worried about!

I think she realized how good she actually has it here - no rent, free Internet, satellite TV, a car to drive, etc. But, if we end up moving, she's going to have to give all that up, or figure out how to get it on her own - or with Tim, as the case may be. She's figuring out everything they absolutely need to live, everything they need to buy to set up a household. Not only that, she's looking at houses to buy because she hates the idea of paying more per month in rent than a house payment would be. They've even got an appointment to see a house (mobile home, actually) tomorrow night, and she's getting all excited.

If they could get something like this in the price range they're looking at, it would definitely be better than paying rent somewhere, but before she gets too excited and ahead of herself, I told her she needs to get a credit check and sit down with someone to see if they would be able to get a loan. It sounds like Beth is handling her credit card (the one with the $15,000 limit) very responsibly and should be building her credit record, but is it too soon? And is it really a good time to be buying something? I really don't know. We didn't look into getting a loan and a house until we'd been married for 6 years, and Jeffrey was 30 and working full time. I guess everyone has to start somewhere.