For Young War Widow, Moving on Means Moving out

After Rosa Salgado-Vargas’ husband, Cpl. Julio Vargas, 23, was killed by an improvised explosive device in July of 2010, she decided to buy a Barry Street house they had picked out before the Afghan deployment.

The couple had saved up their money and chose the three-bedroom home with cherry cabinets and a large yard, in part because Julio could turn its garage into a “man cave.”

Rosa’s family wanted her to move home to Sylmar in the San Fernando Valley, but she decided on making the purchase.

“I kind of wanted to keep that piece of him and move in,” the 26-year-old said.

Marines of the 1st Marine Division’s 3rd Assault Amphibian Battalion, who served with Vargas, helped Rosa paint the garage’s indoor walls red to match the corps’ battle color.

The garage functioned as a storage area and contained boxes of her husband’s belongings that were delivered from Afghanistan. She couldn’t bring herself to go through the items, she said.

A year alone in the home meant for the couple was too much for Rosa. One added stress was that Rosa’s grandfather was ill and she spent a lot of time back home with her family. It was time to move out.

“It kind of hit a few months later that I would be living here by myself,” she said. “It was just the reality sinking in.”

While driving in town one evening last fall, Rosa saw signs for an open house and stopped to ask about the selling process. There she met Realtor Jessica Bottrell, who remembers Rosa telling her calmly about her husband’s death and her situation.

 “I was trying to hold it together while she was there, because she was so strong about it," Bottrell said. “The moment she left, I broke down crying.”

Bottrell went home and spoke to her husband, Jim, a Marine Veteran and the two quickly reached a decision.

“We refused to accept any of Rosa’s money and decided to sell her home for free,” she said. “Rosa had sacrificed enough.”

They listed the home in early January and found a buyer much more quickly than they had expected.

“We had a contract on it in nine days,” Bottrell said.

For Rosa, the dreaded selling process was not as tough as she had anticipated and she saved nearly $6,500.

“It just kept rolling,” she said. “Nothing was ever a stand-still. There were no guessing games.”

She moved to a smaller apartment in town with her cousin and a roommate. With the money from the sale, Rosa—who comes from a family of bakers—said she plans to fulfill one of her dreams—to open a mobile cupcake truck with her cousins.

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