Most landlords and rental companies don't find it financially worthwhile to pursue getting back rent if you move out of state. If this is a low-end place, and it sounds like it is, then they probably won't bother. They can use your security deposit to repair any damages you caused, but they'd have to prove you were responsible for problems they caused due to not maintaining their property. Unpaid rent doesn't normally go on your credit record. You have some choices. 1. If you had stayed, the correct procedure would have been to complain about the needed repairs (including spraying for mites and other bugs) in writing. You'd have given them a date by when you expected the repairs to be done, say a week to ten days. Then you'd have withheld rent. This won't be 100% correct, but you could write that you're moving out because of the maintenance problems and their refusal to work with you. Keep a copy of the letter. Give it to them when you hand them the keys. Then if anything shows on your credit report or some landlord database, you can say you disputed what is owed because they didn't maintain their property. 2. You can just hand them a letter saying you're moving out on whatever date. Say in it that you are unable to pay the rent due to job loss, and that they have refused to work with you to find alternate solutions such as subletting. (Believe me, they will rent the apt. once you're gone.) 3. Just drop off the keys so they know you're gone. Do not in any case give them a forwarding address. They can't sue you if they can't locate you. If you're moving back home and they have your home address and phone as contact info, make sure your family knows not to let them know you're living there. You won't be able to use them as a reference. Once you are working again, when you go to rent an apartment, you can list them and explain why you had to leave or you can claim you lived with someone else. You'll have to decide this.

comkow some ideas to think about. are you going to be replacing appliances also? If so check to see if the credit card you use automatically extends the warranty when we bought the washer,dryer and fridge for our new house we put them on our Amex even though we had the cash.(we paid the bill in full when it came in) 3 months after the manufacturer's warranty expired so did the ice maker Amex paid for the repair . it seems that Amex doubles the original warranty. Most of your platinum cards offer this service I have saved allot of money using the card instead of buying extended warranties that only give me an additional year Another idea would be if you can estimate the time frame of the various stages of the remodel you might be able to put the money in short term CD's for example: you know the tile will be installed in 2 months and will cost $1000 put the $1000 in a 2 month CD. The appliances will need to be here in 3 months do a 3 month CD . so after you charge the appliances to your card that extends the warranty the CD will come due and you can pay off the card with the cash. We did this with the money we put aside from our income tax refund to pay our property taxes. We pay our taxes in December to get the discount so we have the money in a 6 month CD. that way we know our tax money is there we are earning a higher interest and most of all it removes the temptation to use it lol Karla p.s. my husband tells people my favoriate things to talk about are credit,greyhounds and plants. tee hee

DH & I also have several cards with no balance on them. We will be applying for a mortgage soon, so I asked my banker this question. He told me to cancel the majority of the cards, but to keep either a couple with fairly low limits or one card with a pretty decent limit. He said that banks like to see someone have $30,000-$40,000 worth open credit on cards (depending on your income). He says that lets them know that you have a source of available money that you can access quickly. He said they don't like to see huge amounts of open credit because that shows the potential for a problem. We pulled our own credit reports & they said that the amount of unused credit we have may actually be hurting our score. We have only a tiny fraction owed but a lot of open credit. Another thing my banker & the credit report mentioned was the ratio of how much you owe to the amount of open credit. Example: If you owe $5,000 & have two cards with a total credit limit of $20,000, cancelling one card that has a $10,000 limit can actually hurt you. Instead of having a balance that equals one quarter of your available credit, you will now owe an amt. equal to half of your available credit. If you want to cancel, make sure you write a letter to the credit card company & keep it & proof that you mailed it on file. Make sure to request that they note in your file that the card was cancelled at your request. Having a lender cancel your card can hurt your credit score. If you won't be applying for a loan any time soon, you can just leave them & they will drop off of your credit report after a few years.

Hey thanks for your concern, Ed - I do appreciate it, really. Yes, it is my emotional side feeling wary, however, I'm more practical/logical than emotional, and I'd feel pretty weak if I let my emotional side win out. I'll be just fine - that emotional "conflict" will keep me in check while I'm starting out - which is a good thing. Sometimes mental conflict is a good thing, as it allows us to grow. :-) My vacation was...well...work, of course, since we were cleaning out a house to get ready to sell, and I was cleaning and such at my house as well. But all went as planned, and it was a very productive week. And of course, it was nice to actually *do* something other than sit at my desk all day for that week. If labor jobs paid more, I'd be almost tempted to switch. LOL As far as finances go, we've talked about that a bit. Dear Fiance is better at long-term planning than I am (he's been saving for retirement since he was 18), so he's in charge of long-term and retirement accounts. Through my 'bouts with debt and such, I've gotten *very* good at budgeting and paying the monthly bills on time (something he's not so good at), so I'm in charge of that aspect. He'll have some imput into the budget of course, and we'll each have our separate accounts as well as joint "household" checking and savings accounts. All income will be put in the household account, then portioned out according to need after bills and savings are taken care of (that way he always has enough for his golf games and nights out with "the guys", and I'll have some extra for my crafts and hobbies that we can spend without consulting each other). He brings home about the same amount I do, but he'll get more because he likes to spend more - I just don't need as much, which is perfectly fine with me. We've got it pretty well figured out to my satisfaction (and his), so while I'm sure there will be a little "tweaking" necessary once we actually put things in place, I'm pretty confident that we'll do just fine with it. :-)