One of the most exciting and at the same time frustrating periods of my life has revolved around purchasing a house. Buying my first house was not as difficult as my second one. My credit was perfect at my first time buying and everything worked out for the best. I enjoyed that condo for a while. However, I walked away from that property after the ‘94 earthquake because of all the damages. Doing this made a negative mark on my credit report.

When I was going through buying my second home, I really had a difficult time. Things just were not going the way I wanted them to. There were a few items on my credit report that made it difficult to get a loan. I was getting rejected right and left. I remember telling my broker, who was working so hard to get me the loan, "Just tell them what a nice guy I am. Tell them what I do and how many people look up to me and like me." I even went as far as sending a magazine that had my picture on the cover along with my loan documents. It seemed that the loan companies were not interested in how nice I was or what magazine cover I had been on. What they wanted to see was results. I guess what they were trying to tell me was that I couldn’t talk myself out of something I had behaved myself into.