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People Across The Country Are Feeling The Effects Of The Partial Government Shutdown

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

As the partial government shutdown drags on, people across the country are feeling the effects and not just federal workers who aren't getting paychecks.

ASHLEY HINSON: My name is Ashley Hinson. I'm from Calais, Maine, and I'm a web designer.

KELLY: That's eastern Maine on the border with Canada, a very rural part of the country which is key to this story.

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

See; Ashley Hinson and her husband were days away from closing on their first home.

HINSON: It was a little bit out of town. It was on the water. You could go fishing off the dock in the backyard, and it was a good size for us - not too small, not too big.

CORNISH: The rural location qualified them for a special loan guarantee program under the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The financial benefits seemed worth all the extra hoops they had to jump through, including inspections of their well and water. Hinson says they thought it would all be over on New Year's Eve, their closing date. And then came the government shutdown.

HINSON: About three days or so into it, I called our loan officer to say, is this going to affect us? He got back to me in about 24 hours and said, no, you know, we think your file is going to be fine. So we proceeded with our move out of our apartment, and about three days before our closing date of the 31st, he called and said, actually, they do have to sign off on the final documents, and we were not able to extend the closing date. So it just all kind of fell apart on that day.

We were definitely disappointed. You know, it was a real good plot of land, and we had already bought things for the House and envisioned ourselves there and everything. And it being our first house and having a baby, it was - you know, we kind of had that vision already in place. But, you know, we actually put in an offer on another house today, so we're hoping that this one works out because we're staying with my parents, and so we're obviously eager to find our next home and just kind of hoping that everything comes together in Washington.

KELLY: That's Ashley Hinson of Calais, Maine, on how the partial government shutdown is affecting her. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.