Attempt number 2....

About 3 weeks ago is early Sept 2016, Michelle and I put an offer on this property in Morrisburg, ON, Canada. Before hunting for a new home, we were pre approved for a mortgage at the bank, so we thought that this should be the easy part. Our offer to purchase the church had four conditions.

1. The property had to be zoned residential. (Since we planned on living there eventually, and we confirmed that it is indeed zoned residential)
2. The property had to be insurable (It definitely is, albeit somewhat expensive)
3. A review by a strutural engineer had to determine that there were no crazy structural issues with the building. [A home inspection report was already available and highlighted extensive things, a few of which were beyond my skill, but the structural engineer green lighted the building and gave it a thumb up]
4. Financing. 

Now it was this last element that would trip us up. We were extremely disappointed when the bank informed us that they would not provide a mortgage (even though we were pre-approved!). Apparently, they do not provide mortgages to church properties. 

So we had to invoke the mutual release clause for the property and a deep sense of lose ensued. Neither of us could stop thinking about this building and what one could do with it. 

Yesterday we put in another offer, this time with a proposal to the church that we would pay them fully within the year by selling our current home and they in turn would provide us an open mortgage for the period of 1 year. This would get us into the church and they would have line of sight to selling the property.  All other conditions were removed. 

Being the long weekend in Canada (Thanksgiving), we aren't expecting to hear back from the church committee for at least a few days (Wednesday at 8:00 pm at the latest). To complicate the communication matters more, I'm traveling to Delhi, India today so I'll effectively be out of commission for a like 30 hours while I travel. 

Fingers crossed we will hear something soon. Very exciting stuff. Michelle and I are very hopeful that we will be successful and I have been tasked with creating a prioritized list of things we'll need to do once (if) we take possession on Nov 14th. 

Here are a few pictures....