Trimbathcreative's Blog (Tom Trimbath)

My Money Lost In The Wire

You Can Not Make This Stuff Up

This is one of those things that is supposed to be funny, maybe in a year or more. This was supposed to be a post about the new great episode in my life: moving into a tiny house and being debt-free. That may still happen, but as I type this, it has been one of my most traumatic days in years, maybe decades. As you read this, hopefully, it has all been resolved, and laughter will ensue. I type it now, during a lull dictated by the close of business on ‘Wall Street’ because I don’t want to forget too many details and how it feels. The courageous may read on.

Today was the day when the funds from my house/home sale were to arrive; one part to the sellers of a tiny house, the larger part to me. Finally, Debt-Free Again. Weirdly enough, I am debt-free, except for a massive credit card bill I’m building as I live in a motel. My house sold. The funds were dispersed. Everything looked headed to a nice dinner this evening, keys tomorrow, finally having a new address and getting things out of storage.

1) The mortgage and the home equity loan are paid off. Celebrate the retirement of over a quarter of a million dollars in debt.

2) I signed all the right forms. So did everyone else, evidently. The first escrow company split the funds into two transactions: one for me, one for the seller of the tiny home. Nice. All the seller had to do was sign, and we’d exchange keys – which, as I write it, sounds like innuendo.

3) Time to take a nap in celebration before heading back over to Whidbey Island, where I had lived, from Port Townsend, where I was moving to. 

4) But first, the phone rings. Wiggle through this and re-read as you wish.

The seller received their money. Yay! But not all of it. Evidently, the amount sent to them was a little less than they expected – and they were right. 

No big problem. I could pay the difference from what I received, which would be appropriate; but I received nothing. Zero. No money. No notice.

Could I pay the difference by credit card? I want the transaction to complete so I get the house and they can close that episode in their life. No.

Pardon me as I check my notes. It was about now that I started taking notes, possibly missing a step or three.

5) Call escrow #1. Can they reconcile the difference? They sent the wrong sum. Can they correct the error that way? No. The funds have to come from the transaction and 100% of the funds were dispersed. I should check with my bank (Schwab) to find when the wire transfer will be recorded.

6) Call Schwab. They have no record of even an attempt at a wire transfer. They step it up a notch. They can’t find any wire transfers anything like something coming to me.

7) Eventually I convinced the escrow company to talk to Schwab because I have no access to any of the pertinent information. Besides, they know the official terms. I don’t. It looks like it should’ve worked, but it didn’t. For a while there we were in three-way conference call that confirmed that nothing was wrong or inappropriate. There’s no evidence of any tampering, either. 

8) Somewhere in there, I backed out (not blacked out, but backed out) because there was nothing I could add.

9) Eventually, I get brought back in so they can give me the latest news. Still nothing inappropriate and no record of any monies in transit. As anxious as I already was, I was startled to learn that they had elevated it to a three-way with the Fed, and the Fed couldn’t resolve it and actually elevated it to an Incident Report. That is so uncommon the reference number is smaller than an old-time phone number. 

Somewhere along the line, another bank was brought in as well, but I couldn’t keep track of calls I wasn’t in.

10) Worrying about the seller had a corollary. If they don’t get their money, I don’t get their house, and I don’t have an address – except for two packed storage units, and I am not allowed to sleep there and the sanitary facilities don’t exist. Renting is not an obvious option in this market. Buying a place takes weeks. What am I going to do? Except replay that in my head on a quick repeating loop. 

A heck of a day, and dealing with all of it from a motel room where almost all of my office records and supplies are in storage, including the unit on the island.

I say ‘a heck of a day’ because, even though we’re in the same country on the same continent, it is a big country and a big continent, and the Fed closes on East Coast time. Three more hours added to an interminable (hyperbole) wait time. The world’s enormous economy, but we’ll wait on bankers hours. One reason I am typing this is to keep me occupied until 9PM, which is midnight East Coast, which is one of the possible times the funds might transfer (magically?). 

Sip a beverage. Breathe. Shake out the fingers. Return to typing.

This may all resolve with waiting and patience. One reason I’m making this life change is because I’ve had financial stresses for too many years, over a decade. It is affecting my health. This isn’t making it better. 

What has been making it manageable has been friends and those involved who have listened. Trying to manage this alone would feel like suddenly being poor and homeless and alone – and that happens. I don’t think it is going to happen to me, but I understand and feel that possibility.

It may just take patience and waiting.

It may just require giving patience another day for waiting by asking the seller for an extension.

It may just require giving patience another week for waiting by asking the seller for an extension.

The funds are under the FDIC limit, so I ‘should’ be insured, but I doubt those funds would arrive in time. Does insurance ever work that quickly?

And some friends have mentioned lawsuits, but they take much too long; and are hopefully unnecessary.

Assurances are welcome, but learning that the Fed, The Fed!, said there was no evidence of theft is an authoritative assurance. That doesn’t resolve anything, but at least we’re more likely talking about bureaucratic actions, not criminal ones.

I intend to only post this after the issue is resolved. I have no doubt that I’ll learn a clearer version of the story eventually. My mind was in resolution mode, not documentarian mode. You may not be surprised that my handwriting became hard to read as emotions rose as complexities rose. 

It’s before 8PM. I won’t type for the sake of typing. My fingers would complain. I’ll log in at random times, I’m sure. 

One thing struck me, and I usually don’t use that term. I realized that I had done nothing wrong. A mistake was made at escrow, and funds were dispersed so expertly that they couldn’t be recovered; both things leading to putting my home purchase at risk and my heart rate climbing to uncomfortable levels. And here’s one point I wanted to make to anyone who has read this far: weird things happen, even when there’s no one at fault. No malice. Just a simple mistake in a complicated, possibly-too-fast world. 

I hope to get the keys tomorrow. If I do, I’ll open the door, say hello, walk back and forth once or twice, then free the houseplants that are sequestered in my car, get the frozen (ha!) foods into the freezer, make sure there a towel, soap, and toilet paper in the bathroom – and take a break. Getting the futon mattress into the bedroom – that may be a separate story for the blog I plan to start about life in a tiny house for man who is 65, over six foot, and overweight. Stay tuned.

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The Next Day

Ah, CitiBank, Schwab’s bank, held the funds for some reason. Two of the world’s largest public financial institutions are getting in the way. A reason to work with smaller companies?

Oh, add a layer of “You can’t make this stuff up.”

Keep in mind the people you can’t see and aren’t hearing from: numerous employees at two brokerages, two intermediary, banks, two escrow companies, Schwab, and the buyer (me) and the seller. Multiply the hours by the people and witness thousands of dollars spent because one bank did something random. An the American economy is considered efficient?

Here comes an analogy. 

You probably know about the security lines at airports. It has been years since I’ve flown, but I recall them. There’s a purposeful random element. Randomly, they pull some luggage, and sometimes a person, out of the line – just to check. Organized crime doesn’t like randomness, I guess. Imagine how that person’s day went, even if they were completely innocent. And do you still assume it wasn’t completely random?

Schwab’s bank, Citibank, did that to my money, as I understand it. I have to emphasize “as I understand it” because Citibank is so far removed from me that I could only hear what others heard, who then passed it along to someone who could tell me. Personal service? 

There was no fraud alert, because there was no fraud. There were no reports in the regular channels, as I understand it, because the monies were shunted off to an investigation unit. It was simply random, without warning. 

Hours of phone calls and a few in-person meetings came down to everyone being told that they couldn’t do anything except wait. Nameless people held people I know hostage to an unresolvable issue that directly impacted whether I would be without a home.

Fortunately, I have an understanding boss, and they have a new hire who is excellent.  (Ironically, it is for a non-profit doing what they can by actually building affordable housing – in a county I just moved from because it is too expensive for me to live there. Applause for Island Roots Housing in Island County, WA.)

My houseplants will spend another day in the Jeep, their temporary greenhouse. 

I’ll see what food I can salvage. The ice packs and styrofoam coolers should help.

I hope to get the keys to the house because…the story so far is about the money.

I don’t get the house yet.

There were two wire transfers, you may recall from reading what’s above. The other one was for the bulk of the purchase price of the tiny house, but the transfer was for the wrong amount. It was shy by so many thousands of dollars that I needed the money in the other transfer. It has been a cascading financial fiasco. (Thought up that term and had to use it.)

The good news is that Citibank finally released the funds! Schwab passed them along! I can get the extra money to the escrow company so they can pay the seller, and I can get the keys – after I wait another day.

Citibank/Schwab delayed the wire transfer so late in their East Coast bankers hours that when I submitted the extra wire transfer, it was past the deadline for a transfer within the day even though the West Coast business day wasn’t over.

Enter the brokers who now run around getting a document signed to extend the transaction – hoping that the wire transfer gets to the seller’s escrow agent in time to get me the keys before the end of the week. It would be really handy to get the keys because contractors are scheduled to arrive to hook up some utilities.

You may not be surprised to learn that my assessment of the credibility of the system has drastically diminished.

I expected to complete this story and post it, but without the keys, the story isn’t over. 

At least I have the funds and reasons for hope.

Much of this day’s chapter was written from Mom’s Laundromat in Port Townsend. I could hear my Carhartts bashing themselves against the dryer wall. I’d been living in them most of the week as I moved. Almost everything I own is in storage. My Jeep is large enough to hold four houseplants, one large cooler of food (that’s warming), tools, and the last boxes that are filled with the stray things that weren’t packed during the more organized part of the move. But hey! I found the charger for my old iPad so I can at least read some old books. (The Rincewind arc of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series. 

Is there more to say? Always, but I’d be amazed if you haven’t heard or read much more than enough for now. The local Thai restaurant served such large portions last night that I have leftovers for tonight. 

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The next morning

Even before the Port Townsend bells bonged out the 7th hour, I received an email declaring the second wire transfer to be complete. Considering everything else that happened, I’ll wait until the escrow company says so, too. After that are the official recording with the County, me getting the keys, and a new set of posts starting up about My Tiny Experiment.

(Let’s see. Get keys. Get internet. Get domain name and URL. Get web site. Write and post and chronicle one story about finding affordable housing, frugality, and simplicity.)

The plants seem to be recovering well. I hope that happens for all of us. Now, to set up a cot until I have time to set up a futon until I have time to buy a Murphy bad. This place is tiny!