She Who Waits

08/04/08

by Stephanie

Categories: Military

Calling experienced milspouses ...

Can you make heads or tails of this? It's making ZERO sense to me at this point. :crazy:

I. Hate. Moving.

June 17th email from our housing contact:
I am sending you the application, check list , pro-rated rent policy and the pet policy. Please fill out all of the information and please send it back by e-mail or fax. This way I can make sure that I put you on my list for housing. There is not a wait list at this time. Please don't send the wait list back its yours.
If you have any question or concerns please call or e-mail.

Thanks and I am looking forward to working with you and your family and have a great day.

Cool, we have housing. That works great since we're going to be there for all of five months and looking for a place to rent to us for that amount of time off post would be a pain. Not to mention the added cost, especially considering that we're trying to rent our house here out and taking a monthly loss to do so.

July 30th email from the same contact, after asking if we can do a door-to-door delivery of our household goods:
Hi Sir,
Well currently we are completely full on Officer Housing. We are working at this time to get more available. We have just had so many come in these past weeks. You can come down early however you must be cleared from your last duty station to accept housing here. Hope this helps.

Huh?! |-|

Email from hubby to contact:
How long is the wait for housing currently? What I am trying to figure out is if I need to take leave and clear my current post early so that I can have housing before my school starts. If I do need to check out of here earlier than planned, I need to figure out exactly how soon I need to check in there in order to get a house in time.

Reply from contact:
Hi Sir,
Again we are working on getting everyone in so there really isn't what we consider a wait list. You need housing around September right? Just as long as you have cleared your current duty station you can come early as long as your orders authorize. By September we may have more homes available. That is why I just need to go ahead and have an appt. set up. Have a great day.

What the hell?! What part of "I NEED A HOUSE ON X DATE" do they not get? This is making NO sense to me. She has a copy of the orders. Is there a wait list or isn't there? Will we have a place to live or will we be stuck in a hotel with two dogs (or paying for boarding) and no household goods for an unknown number of days? This maybe crap is not cutting it with me and I'm not comprehending what difference sitting in front of the woman is going to make!

Can one of you experienced milspouses please explain this to me before I make a nine hour drive to stand on someone's desk? :gaah:

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Comment from: Momma Mary [Visitor]

· http://mommamary.blogspot.com

Question for you... Are you PCS'ing to Monterey? Because that sounds like the typical run-around. If so, email me. I can give you the correct information you need to have, and give you the 'ins and outs' of the system here!

Permalink 08/04/08 @ 18:36

Comment from: Stephanie [Member]

Now that would be entirely too easy, wouldn't it? :**:

Unfortunately that isn't where we're headed but thank you so much for the offer! :sneakyhug

Any general tips?

Permalink 08/04/08 @ 18:46

Comment from: loquita [Visitor]

· http://gringaloquita.blogspot.com

Holy shit! I want what those people are smoking! :crazy:

:-p

Sorry couldn't resist saying. hehe

All I can think of it to try to find some spouses who are located where you're going, on a message board or something, maybe? And then try to get the scoop from them. Or does your hubby happen to know any of the other guys going to his school? Then maybe you can double-team the housing people and confuse them into making sense. :giggle:

Permalink 08/04/08 @ 19:16

Comment from: Sis B [Visitor]

· http://sissyben.blogspot.com

Um, she sounds like she speaks English as a second language. I'm not trying to be mean, but it sounds like she doesn't even know what she's saying.

In the Army, you can get a "sponsor" at the post you're going to, which is pretty much a volunteer who knows the ropes and will walk you through it. You can get them (sometimes) before you reach your destination, so I would check and see if there's something like that where you're going. We go to ACS (Army Community Service) for sponsors, so if you have the equivalent, go there.

I went with my husband to the housing office once. When the woman starting asking him questions he didn't know the answers to, I started talking. She told me that when the servicemember was available, they had to get information from them and not spouses. So my husband told her to talk to me because I knew the answers. She refused. So she would ask him a question, I would tell him the answer, and he would tell her.

I cannot tell you how incredibly frustrating it was.

If possible, try to call someone higher up than this woman. Or call the generic number and pretend you don't have the process started yet, and ask them to walk you through the steps on the phone. You can always ask to speak with an actual military member--NCOIC or OIC, who (in my experience) makes things happen. You have the emails to show them the runaround you've gotten, so that's a good thing.

Moving in the military is fuuuuuuuuuun.

Permalink 08/04/08 @ 19:38

Comment from: dutchgirl [Visitor]

· http://thedisplaceddutchican.wordpress,com

Unfortunately, you have run into one of the many joys in dealing with housing. With our last move I had a fantastic experience where they did hold a house for us, but it's a privatized post which made a big difference. When the Army used to run things, it was very much like you are describing. Many times they will not promise you anything until you are physically there. Even if you went there now, unless your dh had cleared already they wouldn't give it to you. Basically they won't hold anything unless you are ready to sign for it and start paying BAH. It's one of the nervewracking things about trying to get on post. (I have two dogs, so I feel your pain about staying in a hotel).

Normally if it's a school situation, they will find something for you, but it might not be the most desirable choice. If you know someone at the duty station already, sometimes they will let that person sign for it for you ahead of time, but from the sounds of it they are not making life easy (and it sounds like they are trying to cover their butt in case they run short on houses). If possible I would definitely try to get there early. It stinks, I'm really sorry!

Permalink 08/04/08 @ 19:49

Comment from: Stephanie [Member]

Sis B - Um, wow. That's just ridiculous.

:roll:

Unfortunately we're dealing with privatized housing, rather than the base itself. DH just put in a call to the Marine Detachment on the base and they are going to follow up on it. The school is cyclic, so they are supposed to have a certain section of housing set aside. One group vacates, another moves in, every 5-6 months. Shouldn't be that darn difficult ...

We'll see.

Thanks for the tips and the empathy, ladies!

Permalink 08/05/08 @ 10:44

Comment from: Erin [Visitor]

· http://erinlive13.blogspot.com

We just had a similar experience of sorts. We are PCSing to Ft. Bragg the end of this week, but only for one year. We got ourselves on the housing list back in June when we got our orders. Everything was moving along, and we were sure we would get a house way in time for the move (in fact I was worried about getting it too early). We were told that we could accept the house up to 2 weeks before our move date. Now keep in mind, we are Army and our on post housing is privatized (not positive how it works for marines). Anyway, I called last week and was told that they were now looking at up to a 6 month wait!! However, the rep said that it could be sooner. I had the same difficulty with communication (and this lady was definitely an english speaker!). All I wanted to know was what the real deal was???!! Basically the same problem of "please tell me what I need to do, so I can make different plans if necessary?" She kept saying the same thing over and over again, and just didn't get the fact that all I wanted was a better idea of what the actual wait time and if it was at all possible that we would get a house anytime soon (if not, we would make other arrangements). No such luck. Anyway, we called back this week, and were offered a housing that we can get into in 10 days, and they are allowing us to confirm for our house via email! I guess the moral of the story is just keep calling them!I am pretty sure that we were not, in fact, next in line for a house so apparently, in this case, the adage of the squeaky wheel gets the oil works.

Good luck on the move!

Permalink 08/05/08 @ 19:14

Comment from: Momma Mary [Visitor]

· http://mommamary.blogspot.com

I have lived in housing twice, and both times it was a hassle both times, and each time for different reasons. My advice is to call and talk to someone on the phone. Document who you are talking to, ask to speak to managers, etc. Privatized Housing has ruined everything.

We are only living in housing now, because when we moved, the housing out in town was way more than we were going to get from BAH, etc. So, yeah. I'd look into the private housing market if you can... Or, Pray. Do lots and lots of praying!

Sorry I can't help. But there's some good advice above too!

Permalink 08/05/08 @ 21:16

Comment from: A Soldier\'s Wife [Visitor]

· http://www.quietmomentsbusylives.blogspot.com

Steph,

First of all, every situation is different. One person's answer will not necessarily be the next person's same answer.

If they never stated to you that they have a house for you and an address (pre-leased), then they were just giving you the availability at the time, given that this is the busiest PCS time, it is not unusual that they are short on housing now. The the remaining emails sound as if they are playing catch up because of the incoming personnel. Housing changes every day and unless things have changed recently, you are placed on the list effective the date you sign out of your losing duty station, but unless they pre-lease, you can not go on the list until you get there. So if Soldier Joe leaves on August 10th and you leave on August 24th, and you both arrive the same day, he will be placed ahead of you on the list.

Our last on post house was pre-leased to us.....we called and they had the housing available (actually we had two at two different bases because we were unsure which Battalion we were going to, it did not matter that we had pinpoint assignment, the guy that he was replacing was not leaving) anyway, we were preleased a house at two different installations, but that was because they had housing available for us....it depends on a lot of other factors......housing is based on the number of dependents you have, their ages.....

AND it depends on the privatized housing company. Pinnacle was easier to deal with then GMH (they have a new name , something like Balfour Beatty Communities, some company from Europe bought out GMH)....anyway, the situation will change each day. I also hate to say that door to door does not mean it will happen either. We had a door to door to our new house and it was in storage for 3 weeks...because no one called the gaining duty station to ensure they had the manpower to deliver it.....go figure.

Good luck, try not to let it get to you....it will all work out, I promise!

Permalink 08/06/08 @ 00:40

Comment from: Marine Wife [Visitor]

· http://cooksrok.blogspot.com

We usually end up living in housing and this sounds pretty typical. I've learned that the waiting list means nothing. They can say it's a year wait and then a week after you're locked into a lease, they'll call and tell you that a house has opened up for you.

But back to your situation, if it's a school situation, more than likely, you will have something when the time comes. Usually, so many units are set aside for the school house. But the housing office may not know which or how many units will open up or when b/c they haven't been notified yet. Frustrating, I know.

The other issue is that most Marine bases won't even let you get on a wait list until you physically check in at that base. Which is also frustrating.

If you want, drop me an email and I'd be happy to talk about it with you over the phone.

Try not to stress too much. It sounds like she is trying to make sure you'll have a place to live.

Permalink 08/06/08 @ 18:10