Storytime: The House the Jedi Bought (Patreon)

Over fifteen years ago, my wife and I decided we wanted to move her mother in with us, so we could help care for her. We did, and the house we were in turned out to be just a bit too small for all three of us. So, we found a better house, and applied for a mortgage.

Since my wife and I were both full-time freelancers, we worked with a mortgage agent to get a good deal and have help with the extra paperwork the underwriters would want since we didn't have paystubs to show we'd been working for some company for 2+ years. The mortgage agent found banks willing (on paper) to loan to people like us, but the mortgage underwriters just kept not being sure that my 100% freelance income could be considered stable or reliable enough to give me a mortgage. We tried to point out we had a decade of constantly having money and paying bills. But they disliked the fact that since we had (back then) avoided debt, and thus avoided things like credit card and car payments that boost credit reports, we did not have the history of credit they wanted to see.

Our mortgage agent got increasingly frustrated (with the underwriters, not us), and after weeks of this back-and-forth, and the underwriters asking for more documents, and that causing unexpected delays, she just asked if I could provide ANYTHING else to suggest my freelance rpg career should be considered more than a hobby.

Flippantly, I said the underwriters could do a Google search on my name, with both my middle initials included.

The mortgage agent raised an eyebrow, and I told her I was the first hit on Google with my full published name, and the first few results (at the time) would link me to official Star Wars products.

She did a search, sent an email to the underwriters, and we got approved within 24 hours.