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So Louise and I are looking for a house together.
Somehow I've managed to reach the grand old age of 36 without ever having to buy a home. I've rented, I've house-shared, I've sponged off relatives and (of course) my parents, but I've never been a mortgage slave. There's no putting it off any longer...
I'm fortunate that Louise is an old hat when it comes to house buying, that she understands financial and legal matters better than most people, and that she has a good, practical, problem-solving approach to life...
...because frankly, the whole experience is just bringing home to me just how stupefyingly clueless I am about, well, everything. I'm starting to wonder how I've survived in the world as long as I have. It's frightening. And quite exhausting too.
But it's strange, the experience of looking round other people's homes while they're still living in them, keeping up the 'ooh, lovely' face even when you've decided the place isn't really fit for slaughtering pigs in.
"Oh, I especially like the group of chavvy skate-kids you have hanging around by your bins, the delightful aroma of stale Brut 33 in your bedroom, and the burnt-out car on bricks just outside the back door - oh, do tell me the burnt-out car on bricks comes with the property! No? What if we increase our offer...?"
And this is only the beginning!
THE ART OF RACING IN THE RAIN by GARTH STEIN
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*Inspiring! Uplifting!* It's the next [fill in the blank with a comparable
former bestseller here]. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll want to run hug
your d...
29 minutes ago
19 rants and reactions:
You should have said you were coming round my place Rol.
I wish you all luck with the house hunting - it can be as rewarding as tearing up tenners in a solicitor's office, but there is a certain frisson the first time you insert that key into a door that is yours.
You CAN'T move!
Do you realise how long it took to memorise your current address?!
haha oh dear, I don't think anyone is going to envy you the househunting lark. Although at least you are only buying, not selling as well.
I remember once going around a house and they had gone to a lot of trouble to make it tidy and smell nice - fresh coffee brewing, flowers on the table - and there, right in the middle of the lounge carpet, was a huge pile of vomit. They didn't comment on the vomit so we pretended not to notice it (as you do) and all stood in a little circle around it at one point, admiring the view from the window.
You should be able to get a bargain at the moment as it's not a good time to be a seller!
Good luck!
Brother T - seriously, how much for the burnt-out car?
Nige - don't worry, the old address will still be in use. (That said, I haven't a hope of remembering your new one!)
RB - unfortunately, Louise has to sell hers, so I get secondhand stress from that.
It's not as bad as you think it's going to be Rol - rent or mortgage; your money has to go somewhere. At least with a mortgage is isn't disappearing into a bottomless hole (even though it seems that way at first). Karen and I took the plunge about 12 months ago - the first 5 years are allegedly the worst - but I've not regretted it so far. As Brother Tobias pointed out... arriving home to a house that's yours... you can't beat it. Good luck.
We've got to attempt it at some point, which I'm dreading, as house prices are absurdly high down here, simply because Audi Bankers from L*nd*n think this is their second home playground and drive the prices up.
I'm half hoping that Golden Brown picks Brighton as one of the sites for Labour's new nuclear power stations so all the twats will bugger off again.
Then we can buy a house and slowly die of radiation poisoning knowing that we'll be doing it in our own home.
Anyway, good luck Rol!
Cheers, guys.
The burnt-out car on bricks could make a lovely guest house.
By the way, I added you to my Google Reader after reading your post on Dan's blog. Can I now be considered intellectually superior?
Be my guest!
(As long as you don't mind staying in a burnt-out car on bricks.)
Good job you have a sense of humour, you'll need it. Hopefully you and L will be able to agree on what you both want in a place (running water and electricity is a good start)....I have just been helping my brother and his wife with their househunting. Basically I sat in the car with the engine running most of the time and places we went to...
It wasn't a car on bricks, was it?
haha, in some parts of town you're lucky if they leave it on bricks!!
What you should try your hardest NOT to think about when you are walking around these houses is what natural scents the Brut might be covering.
And you may have prompted me to post about the nastiest houses that I ever looked round... hmm.
It's a horrid process, that puts you in contact with two of the most expensive and worthless services that exist - Solicitors and Estate Agents.
I don't envy you. And I think we're doing this next year, ourselves... Shudder.
"the delightful aroma of stale Brut 33 in your bedroom"
You're being rather rude about The Ghost of Electricities cousin Pete of the mobile disco here, Rol.
As always, any insult is completely unintended.
Except when I actually mean it.
I got my first place at 36 - just a park home alas, but after two alcoholic/psycho housemates, it has changed my life. And very much for the better.
Good luck on finding something reasonable within your means. You sound like you've made a wise choice in partner with strengths to complement your otherworld writerliness! Well worth a lifetime investment, for all the downside of being a mortgage monkey!
Rol, either you're 20days late with your prank blog, or you've been taken over by those pesky wonky fingered kids off of The Invaders.
Buying a house. With a woman. You'll never fool me, Skrull boy
Gad. Thank heavens those days are well behind us. I remember going to one house I swear was a House of Sin (no, I'm not religious, I just didn't want to type "Whore house"). Oh, crap. I did anyway.
Well, the red velvet wallpaper and strange smell turned me on my heels the moment I walked in.
That was 20 years ago. We built instead and this year, we are burning our mortgage. Woot!
Laura - "with strengths to complement your otherworld writerliness!"
Ah, what a nice way of saying "uselessness."
Davey - you got me, I'm a Skrull. Now try and work out when I was replaced.
Maureen - hello on congrats on being mortgage free... the world is now yours!
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