Two jobs gone; money running out

It's 28 days until Ron Henson's D-Day, the day he can't make the mortgage. And Henson is ...

Surprisingly calm. You might even say upbeat.

"It's temporary," he said of the Kenmore family's current predicament. "That's all it is."

Here's a guy who's spent the last four months in an all-out job hunt — days, nights, weekends — ever since his contract job at RealNetworks ended. About a year earlier, he had done the same thing after losing his job at Washington Mutual in a mass layoff. Meanwhile, some are calling the economic climate the worst since the Great Depression.

Despite job growth, Washington's unemployment rate has risen to 5.8 percent. That translates to 44,800 more people looking for work here than a year ago.

All around him, Henson sees signs of trouble. He notices fewer and fewer job postings as each week goes by. His neighbors around the corner lowered the asking price of their home by $100,000.

For months, Henson, 38, his wife and their 11-year-old son have lived off of savings and $515 a week in unemployment benefits. Yet even as their savings dwindle to zero, he still believes that somehow, some way, D-Day will come and go and he'll make that $2,700 house payment.

"Everybody's always said things have a way of working out for me," he said. "I have no idea why, but I just have faith it will work out."

But what if — as they say about the stock market — past performance is no guarantee of future results?

What if D-Day arrives and a job doesn't?

Always a worker

Henson is one of those guys who always worked. As a teen, he had jobs at a veterinary clinic and a Dairy Queen, recalls his mother, Bonnie Pittson, of Woodinville. He managed a gas station, way back when a gallon was 89 cents, and he was just 19.

In his mid-20s, he became a loan consultant, working on commission, selling loans to home buyers, which often involved working nights and weekends. He ultimately realized you could be the best loan consultant in the world, but when the housing market slumps, so does your bank account.

In 1997, when Henson and his wife, Kimberly Tiedt, had a son, they decided she would stay home and he would find a less cyclical line of work.

He chose a field that seemed like it could never dry up: information technology. Then he set about learning IT on his own.

"I bought hundreds of dollars in books," he said. "It wasn't until I got on with WaMu that we got a computer."

At WaMu, he made a good living as a supervisor in the call center, which handled employees' computer problems.

"He was good," said Scott Herrick, a former boss, describing Henson's expertise at predicting call volume and matching that with staffing levels. "He can think outside the box."

It might seem that every company would need a steady supply of IT guys like Henson. But in recent years, many of those jobs have been outsourced to India, Henson said.

WaMu had big financial troubles, too, and the result was pink slips.

In April 2007 Henson was laid off. He had worked at WaMu for nine years. All told, thousands have been laid off from the company in the last two years.

In keeping with his personality, Henson took it in stride. In fact, he and Tiedt saw it as an opportunity: Maybe they could use the severance pay to buy a house, which they had dreamed about after living for 11 years in a drafty, moldy rental. Together with their savings, they had enough for a down payment, so long as they stayed under $400,000.

After two months of looking for work, Henson landed a job with RealNetworks. He was a contractor, not a regular employee, but he still felt confident about buying.

"I had never been out of work for more than two months," he said. Henson felt both prices and interest rates were good.

Henson's mother was concerned.

"Our feeling was maybe this wasn't the best time," she said.

Both had a point. Back then, some experts were predicting gloom, but others said economic conditions were fine.

Tiedt and Henson bought their modest home last February. The price had been dropped significantly, they said, to $387,500. It needed some work, and it backed up onto on a busy street, but it was "the best house we could get for the money," Tiedt said.

Using money they had set aside, Henson and Tiedt began fixing up the house. They installed a kitchen island, replaced the indoor-outdoor carpeting in the basement and began working on the living room, which was in need of new paint and furniture.

Today, the living room sits empty. It's obvious where the primer — and, not coincidentally, the money — ran out.

In June Henson's contract at RealNetworks was over.

Looking for work

Every morning, Henson sets out to work. His job is finding a job. He checks in with the employment Web sites — NW Jobs, Dice, Monster and others. He's got several versions of his résumé, which he tweaks for each job application. He created a spreadsheet of contact names and numbers. He set up a separate e-mail account just for the job search, so he could easily track who he's written and whether they've responded.

Over the years, he devoted some energy to networking, and he always thought his connections would pay off. Yet even his business-networking group, where he holds the position of secretary, hasn't been able to lead him to a job.

In the beginning, Tiedt recalls "we were pretty confident. He was applying to 10 jobs a day. Employers would say they were so excited about his résumé."

But "all of a sudden," she said, "things nose-dived. Now they're saying they don't have the budget to hire."

On a recent day, Henson checked his employment-search e-mail account. Since June, 602 e-mails have accumulated in the inbox.

Henson started out thinking his next job would pay more than his last. Weeks later, he ratcheted that down: Maybe he'd earn the same, he thought.

And down again: with no prospects, he set his sights lower. Now, four months into unemployment, he's willing to take $20,000 or $30,000 less than he originally had sought.

Tiedt has considered returning to work, but since she had been a stay-at-home-mom for so long, they agreed that if she did manage to find something, it wouldn't pay much.

"There were a couple of rough weeks where were all down in the dumps," Tiedt said. "He just kind of snapped out of it and said, 'I've got to get something.' "

The "no-frills" approach

In the past few months, the family has cut back: They buy generics, walk instead of drive, go to the library instead of buy books, keep the thermostat at 67 degrees. It's "no frills," Tiedt said.

Tiedt's mother recently sent them a big cooler of meat from Omaha Steaks.

"Even though our families are tight themselves, they are there for us," Tiedt said. "We're really lucky because a lot of people don't have that."

Four months out of work "hasn't seemed to dampen his enthusiasm for seeking a job," said Pittson, Henson's mother. "He hasn't thrown in the towel. He still thinks that maybe this is the one, this job sounds perfect."

Henson knows this much: When you're interviewing for jobs, you've got to remain upbeat.

"I've always been optimistic," Henson said.

"He is," Tiedt interjected, obviously not feeling exactly the same way.

"Change brings opportunity," Henson prevailed.

His wife tried to be positive.

"Someone, somewhere, is going to have to hire an IT manager one of these days," she said. "Hopefully he'll be that person."

Should D-Day arrive without a new job, Henson said he'll take anything, just to have some money coming in. A contract job as a systems analyst, maybe. Or something else. He's not quite sure.

Maureen O'Hagan: 206-464-2562 or mohagan@seattletimes.com