Today is a sad day, but one that we have known for a week or more that my grandfather Urias Boyd age 99 was close to going home. This evening at about 7pm EST the lord called him home. He is now in a better place. His passing was a peaceful one at home in his sleep.

Very few people my age still have Grandparents. I am very thankful that I have three still living. My father’s parents are still living and my mom’s mother is still with us.

I will post a full bibliography and the video I captured earlier this year as he talked about his life. I am thankful to have those tapes to be able to pass on to my kids and future generations within our family.

I am sure he has scored himself a package of RedMan chewing tobacco and him and that my dad is showing him around heaven.

After 300 Plus homes and several false alarms I think we have found what both my wife and I consider to be an acceptable home. All I can say is thank goodness the hard part is over.

The house needs no work, we are pretty sure no termites and it will make a perfect place to entertain guest and not have to run the A/C 24/7 as it is at one of the highest points in Honolulu and is a corner single level home with 1600 square feet of space and I am pretty excited about moving.

Getting through escrow will be the fun part, the sooner the better

Well my Navy career is winding down, I have my papers in and am waiting for the formal approval to come back. I spent some time in NYC last week meeting with some media buyers to help drive the business of RawVoice along.

I am still busting out a degree and have 5 classes left which makes it nice to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Overall I guess life is pretty good. My mom is doing ok and my niece is on the mend from the accident that took my dad from us.

It is a truly a miracle that she is still alive. My grandparents on my moms side are not 98 and 96 respectfully and when I was home last week I set them down in front of a camera and recorded some family history starting in 1907 and getting through the mid 1950’s.

Those tapes are worth their weight in gold. Lots of interesting things going on almost to many to blog and some business stuff that I am pretty excited about as well.

We have decided to wait a while and hope that the housing prices here in Hawaii cool a little bit. A $4000.00 a month mortgage payment is so over the top I cannot even imagine writing the check for that amount each month.

I have neglected this space way to long but it is time to update it more often.

Shoko and I have been actively looking for a home here in Hawaii for about a month, and I will be honest with you. The situation here is absolutely out of control.

I have walked into absolute dumps that would be worth more burned to the ground listed for $650,000. I have walked into Town Homes that have less than 1100 square feet with three bedrooms for $600,000 with a monthly maintenance fee of $600.00. I have seen homes that were priced at a good value but in a school district that ranked at the absolute bottom of the scale.

I have walked through beautiful sub-divisions with model homes to die for that are listed at $550,000 yet the test drive to get to the main highway from the location averaged a hour plus an additional 45 minute commute. The distance travelled in one hour was less than 3 miles. Not to mention those homes are in another crappy school district.

Not to mention a Job market that absolutely does not support at estimated $4000.00 a month mortgage payment. Bankers are more than happy to finance you a home where they know you will be spending as much as 60% of your base salary on a mortgage payments.

Heck we have not even talked about Electric, Water, Sewer and Garbage. I’ll be honest with you, this is a housing market that is completely out of control and for the life of me I do not see how people are able to afford these type of mortgage payments based upon the economy.

So here I sit making a significant salary and completely demoralised that we are finding it near impossible in buying a home at our self imposed cap. Something has to give because if a guy like me that has significant resources is scared of the housing market then I cannot even imagine what others are thinking.

The state simply has to get off their ass and do something because as much as I love Hawaii the shitty schools and crazy home prices is making me look eastward and making me consider packing my suitcase and getting the hell out of of here.