The Hunt For The House Begins

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

Half term. A Monday and I have the day off. It was the first time since the sale (subject to contract) that we as a couple could start seriously looking at houses. Wife was working but we had a viewing on a house that afternoon that she arranged on Saturday. I and daughter was going to pick wife up from her work and then drive to the place.

But first the morning.

We had the previous day gone through all the non terraced houses in our budget on a website. I was neutral on the question of terraced but the wife was arguing against it, mainly on the grounds of car parking and what do they do to take out the rubbish (she had visions of the refuse carried through the house on collection days). So for the moment terraced was not a consideration.

Going through the Penarth (for now) list online there were a number of houses that were within our range and my job for the morning was to make some appointments for Wednesday and particularly Friday when we were all going to be available.

So calls to Estate agents were made. Some were irritatingly friendly, wanting me to call them by their first name. Some wanted to suggest a financial adviser as well that they just so happen could offer. And there was one appointment I'd made when I saw a house on a drive through of the Penarth area on Saturday that wasn't on the online list. Only a few streets away from the actual house we were viewing. That particular estate agent seemed excited that I'd called. An appointment was made....only later did I discover that it was ninety five thousand above our budget (in my defence there was no way it looked it).

But appointments have been made. One for Wednesday with the scenario exactly like that for Monday and currently three for Friday though that might increase.

But that is for the future. Speaking for the past. I drove, daughter as passenger (blabbering on about Pretty Little Liars) to wife's work and then onwards we went to Penarth. The area we were going to see would be best described as Cardiff/Vale of Glamorgan suburbia. The particular house seemed at a guess sixties semi detached. Personally as long as all the bits are of working order and doesn't look stupid I'm not particularly bothered (with exceptions) by the exterior of a house.

The estate agent, a tired looking middle aged woman let us in. And well it didn't seem exceptional and it did seem dull which to me was not a problem. As I went through there were issues with the decoration but it seemed fixable. It was a maybe.

Wife however was against it and surprisingly so was my daughter. Wife noticed the cracked wall in the conservatory. Daughter noticed the aged electrical sockets. What it seemed to confirm was two things. One was that for the price being asked it was just not an option as work would need to be done on it beyond the cosmetic and two I needed to be lot more observant.

Later wife revealed to her brother that our house had been sold. His partner suggested to her that it could be that the rubbish on a terraced house is collected from the back. Terraced then is back on the table if the car parking issue could be resolved. Personally I'm happy about that.

And so it begins.

Until the next time.