Starting Over on the American Dream.

During the first quarter of the year, properties identified in the survey as "lender-mediated listings" represented more than a fifth of all houses on the market and more than one in four home sales in the 13-county metro area.
— "Distressed properties dragging home values down," Star Tribune

First, we just wanted to get into an apartment where we couldn't smell some one else's cooking and didn't hear the couple downstairs fighting. We found one, and the landlord let us refinish the floors ourselves.

Then, it was to own a house with the same classic wood work and to stop having to park on the street. It seems incredible today, but the owner let us in before the closing to strip the wallpaper and window coverings and paint.

Next, a little cabin up north, designed by a friend (now architect to the titans) for $400 and built for less than $20k.

A nicer house in a better neighborhood followed. We fixed it up more to our liking.

Having learned a lot, we repeated the remodeling process over time with a solid, inner suburban ranch on a creek. Unloaded the cabin.

Finally, we built a house from scratch, the way we wanted, near family out west. It's designed so we can die, dry up and blow away there.

We've been more fortunate than most Americans, steadily improving our living circumstances, always in a place we liked and could afford. Maybe the housing situation now is just having a stutter step, or maybe the change for the next generations will be more profound as they try to move up from humble circumstances.

Recently, a lot of people have gone backwards. Or maybe they were heading backwards all along and just couldn't see it as the housing market escalated toward the bubble. Now, they're starting over, or worse.

Yesterday, I realized there's a rung on the dream ladder we'll never ascend — scraping a $3.5 million house off a corner lake shore lot and starting over.