*UPDATE*

Well, things just didn't work out with timeline, the requirements, the sellers, and the lenders. We had the option to extend the contract a few more months, but didn't want to be in this situation again with a 1 month newborn baby, so we opted to just move.

We looked at local houses, but couldn't find anything decent and the idea of living in the same town as our lost home and seeing other people buy it was heart-breaking. Plus, we figured, if we were going to have to leave our son's school district and pay more in rent for less in the same town, we could start looking for possibilities in other towns. We looked at Overland Park, KS, but then began to wonder about something outside of Kansas altogether. While Kansas is a nice place, there really isn't much left here for us. We don't want to backstep, and we don't really want to make a lateral move. If we are forced to make a move, we want to move UP!

So, we are currently looking at Portland, Maine. That might seem like a drastic change in direction, but it makes a lot of sense. A place that has frequent White Christmases, an Art Scene, is near the ocean, has forests, great schools, great stores and culture, great dining, and just about everything we could hope for. It's also close to NYC (publishing companies), Boston, Baltimore, Canada, and lots of big comic book conventions. Closer to airports. It's a place for our children to live a richer life. It's safer. And, surprisingly, is not that much more expensive than we're paying now. Just an overall better quality of life.

We found there were more reasons for us to leave KS than to try to stay in the house, even if we were in love with it. So, we're looking at this as an opportunity for us to move on to bigger and better things rather than dwell in the sadness of losing our home.

Thank you to everyone who cared enough to listen. If you'd like to still help, every order or donation will now be helping us to make our move and get settled in a new place in Maine. Maybe it will all turn out to be for the best. Might be a blessing in disguise.

If you're new to the site and have no idea what I'm talking about, read on. :o)

Thank you all so much for your caring and support. It means the world to us!

~Ray, Renae, Tycen, Baby Belly, Indiana Jones (dog), Olivia & Aubrey (cats)

About Us:
Renae De Liz and Ray Dillon (that's me) first met online at DigitalWebbing.com, a Comic Creators community, then in person at San Diego Comic-Con 5 years ago. She lived in Oregon as a struggling single mom and I lived in Kansas developing an art career and caring for my elderly parents. We were on totally different spectrums of life, so despite an immediate connection, neither of us thought too seriously about a relationship.

But we kept talking and after a long period of "long-distance" I finally grabbed my savings and hopped on a plane. We got a U-Haul, packed her and her son Tycen (3 at the time), and started the loooong trek back to Kansas. We didn't have a lot of money, KS was much cheaper, and we got a deal on the first months rent. But it was a very terrible house and neighborhood (I should know, I lived there 15 years). But, it was still wonderful just to be together.

Now, this will sound like a sob story, but I'm trying to get the facts down, tell you what we've gone through, and how we feel. Hope that's understandable.

The Old House - images here
You can see a picture of the old house to the right. It was pretty terrible, on a busy street, and with no yard whatsoever for a 3 year old to play in. But we thought, "Hey, it's just temporary, right? And Tycen is too young to do much playing outside anyway." So, we kept on keepin' on. Our careers were doing fairly well and we were going in the right direction. More images of old house & old neighborhood here.

Identity Theft
One day, after getting a pretty good paycheck for a comic project, we went to buy ice cream, just a few dollars, and the card didn't work. Um, weird... Come to find out our account had been hacked (or whatever term should be used) and our funds were frozen. Then our account was locked. Then the bank had to reissue a new account through the state capital headquarters (or something...very confusing). A month had gone by and still nothing. To make a long story short-ish, once this cleared up, it happened again 2 more times, totally wiping out our funds and destroying our credit. Credit score from 700-something to 490. YIKES!!

"Only Temporary"
Suddenly, we realized that nearly 3 years had gone by. Tycen was older and really wanting a yard to play in and a sidewalk or cemented driveway to learn to ride his bike. We began to notice just how bad it all was: Dilapidated house, basement wall collapsed resulting in floods & giant spiders. The neighborhood was full of drug abusers and we were literally sharing a driveway with them (which happened to be where they stood smoking, cussing, and playing loud music every day). Several instances cops surrounded the block.

It really began to wear on us and our family spirit. We had to get out of there.

Stuck!
We began looking for rentals and houses to buy. But since we had pets (pictured at the left), and bad credit we had basically no options. Even being self-employed played against us sometimes. Not sure why being an artist would make someone not want to rent to us. We decided to just dig in, fix the credit, save up a ton of money and make a big leap a year or two later. But, the idea of staying in that house, especially until Tycen was 8 or 9 really did break our hearts.

The Dream-Home - images here
One day, Renae came home and said she'd seen an amazing house that she instantly fell in love with. It had pine trees (which she desperately missed from Oregon), a big yard for Tycen, and a wonderful neighborhood. It was even on a pleasant sounding street: Cloud.

The look in her eyes and hope in her voice saddened me, because I knew it couldn't work with everything playing against us. But, she wanted to look into it. It didn't really get us anywhere, but to keep our sanity, we tried going on a lot of open-houses so we didn't get too addicted to the first house we fell in love with.

After tons of these open-houses, we happened upon the real-estate agent listing the house on Cloud Street. We decided, what the heck! Let's ask about Rent to Own, thinking it couldn't work. Actually, she was very receptive to it and said they'd been considering renting because it sat on the market so long. WOW!

To top it off, the price of the house is very affordable. The mortgage would be less than what we've paid in rent for the last few years.

We're In!
After an extensive bout of negotiation, they decided to let us rent for 1 year while we fixed our credit. YAY!! We moved in and instantly our lives and attitudes changed. The last year living in this house has been amazing! I've personally never lived in a house this nice (you saw the neighborhood I grew up in), Renae is much happier, and Tycen loves it. Hearing a kid talk about how nice their house and room is frequently is so wonderful! We've had Christmas here (plenty of room for a tree now!), celebrated Thanksgiving in a real dining room, have a driveway and garage for the first time in my life, finally have an art studio, and the baby boy on the way will have his own room that we're all so excited to decorate.

Where are we now?
For the last year, we've paid off all of our debt (including interest accrued for all the identity theft nonsense). We've worked with the credit bureau to adjust entries on our credit that shouldn't have been there, which is truly like "pulling teeth." Our credit score is now right at the 600 mark, which is over 100 points from where we started a year ago.

But, we've come to find out that the housing industry has suddenly changed their standards. The loan we could have gotten a year ago with a 600 score and only 3% down now requires something in the high-600's. The loan that's available to us right now with this credit score requires $11,000 down. WHOA!! The sellers are getting very anxious, which keeps us worried because our deadline is now up, and we only have a portion of this saved up. We're afraid any day now a For Sale sign is going to show up in our yard!

Now, we DO have some advances coming in for projects, which are going to help, but we're still pretty far away from the goal line. Thousands of $ away!

We aren't really poor (though we do live check to check), we certainly aren't rich. We just need some help over this last hurdle to stay afloat and give our family a nice life. Neither of us have family who can or want to help.

How can you help?
We aren't the type to just look for handouts. We're hard workers. If you follow my twitter you'll see I work on a ton of projects and barely ever sleep. I grew up very poor and had to fight and work hard for everything I've attained. We're at a crossroads right now and I can give my wife and kids a better life.

So, while Donations are GREATLY appreciated and really the best way to help, that's not all we're after. We're willing to work for it, too. So, you can hire us for projects if you're willing and able to pay an advance on it. Same goes for commission pieces. You can also order some of our products such as sketchbooks, prints, original art, etc.

In terms of donations, every little bit helps. Seriously, we'd appreciate $1. And for some of the larger donations, I'll keep a list and as soon as things settle, I will be happy to go down that list and draw something for each and every one of you. Even if it takes a few years to get down the list I will not forget any of you.

Ideally, since I am a full-production artist (pencils, inks, colors, letters, design, web design, painting, etc.) if just a couple of projects would come through with an advance of a few issues ($2500-5000), this would solve the problem and you would have one incredibly motivated and appreciative artist on your hands.

Renae is also taking projects, but since she is pregnant right now she doesn't want to get too overloaded. So it would be into next year before she could work on it. But if that's okay with you, let us know.

Spread the Word!!
Best way to help, especially if you're struggling yourself and can't afford to help, is to spread the word. Tell everyone on your Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, message boards, email lists. It would be so greatly appreciated! Connect to us on the social networks, too! See bottom left.

Questions?
If you have any questions about this or the legitimacy of it (we know there are scams out there), please email or call and I'd be happy to explain more.

Ray & Renae Dillon
404 E. Cloud
Salina, KS 67401

rayd@goldengoatstudios.com

785.643.9002