Living in a House that cost $200 as a Teenager
When I was in middle school all three of my parents got laid off. Also in middle school my mom and stepdad bought a fixer-upper mobile home. The price they offered was $200 and it was accepted. We also had to pay rent on the lot, but the house itself was $200.
When we first bought the house we had the money to fix it up properly. Once everyone got laid off we couldn’t afford it anymore, but we also couldn’t afford to move anywhere else. The old interior of the house had been gutted, leaving only the framework covered by a leaky roof. We fixed up the master bedroom and bathroom of the mobile home so it was livable and my mom, stepdad, and brother lived in that room along with our cat Simba and three gerbils. Once our gerbils died we replaced them with a dog Lycos(named after the search engine).
We did not have a sink; only a shower. We had a microwave, a mini refrigerator, and a single burner. The bathroom doubled as a kitchen. We did not have cable so we borrowed lots of videos from the library.
We got unemployment money and I got free lunches at school. My mom applied to tons of jobs, but many said no because she has a Master’s degree.
My dad lived in a one-bedroom apartment a few minutes away. It’s lucky my divorced parents still get along so well because we would take our dirty clothes…
