The ups and downs of buying a house

There is a house that my wife really likes, in fact, so much that it was called the perfect house. She saw the house online and really liked it. We planned a special trip to check it out.
On Wednesday, before we went, our agent told us that the house had an offer on it, but the seller was waiting for us to see it.
On Saturday, we saw it. We liked it. That evening we wrote an offer. We were excited.
On Sunday morning, we got the call from our agent that not only was there an offer, but the seller had counter offered and before our offer got in, the seller accepted their offer. Quite the downer.
We continued our house hunting trip, but never found the right house. We weren't ready to settle, so we found an apartment and made a backup offer on the house. A long shot, but we weren't going to be making any offers on any houses since we wouldn't be there, but it made us feel a little better. On the off chance that their deal fell through.
Yesterday, I got a call from our agent that their deal had fallen through. She had to switch calls and so I called my wife and told her the good news. She was quite excited.
Then, our agent called back. The deal had fallen through, but then the buyers wanted back in. It was probably ours, but there was some legal wrangling to be done. Downer.
I got called today at work, at about 4:30 with a "no-change" update. Lawyers were being consulted and they should know an answer soon, but no specifics.
By the time I got home at 7:50 (working late and stopping by Taco Bell for my dinner), my wife had gotten the call. The lawyers had reviewed it and the house was ours. Excitement again.

I recently read an article that outlined the stages that people go through when buying a house. They were right. It is an emotional roller coaster.

With the prices of houses in the Bay Area, buying and selling houses are huge transactions. A small house sale and step up purchase can easily become a million plus dollar project. When you really think about it, that is a large project and not every Tom, Dick and Harry are ready to take on that kind of a project. Dealing with deadlines, being professional, sound decision making and understanding timelines and inter-related tasks aren't quite as common skills as I would like believe they should be. Gosh!