If I had to pick an exact starting point for our home owning journey it would probably be the moment I snapped this picture.  A little over two years ago I started looking for apartments for Josh and I to live in once we got married.  We were both in school at the time a decided to spend our summer after we got married in South Africa doing mission work.  To be able to have a home when we came back to school I had to find somewhere to rent for the summer.  Saddly our small town had very few options, and we had even less money.  I had a part time job coaching gymnastics when we were coming back and Josh had VA money for living expenses.  In a month we paid for our plain tickets to South Africa and a WHOLE summers worth of rent to hold our apartment.  At that moment I realized I was poor and so thankful that I had an academic scholarship and Josh had the GI bill to cover school.

Soon after we got one of the sketchiest apartments in town I came back to my home town to get married.  We went on a honeymoon close to home for a few days and then flew out the next week to South Africa with no money to our name.

We decided we wanted to have a house and knew that to keep from having to pay PMI we would need 20% down, so we saved.  Sometimes it would get frustrating seeing people go on crazy vacations or eat out all the time, but we had a goal and we kept looking at the prize.  At the end of the year we moved back to my home town and started the apartment search again.  This time we decided to spend a little more money so we were scared we were going to get shot.