Movement

So here’s the story that I’ve kept close to my breast for a bit…

As you may recall, we were gazundered by our buyer.  He had made offer X, which we accepted, and then just one week before we were meant to exchange contracts, he offered X minus £12,000 - supposedly due to the market.

We got mad and we put our flat back on the market, all hopeful that some lovely person would come in and offer us X again (which was already quite a low price).  Well…no one came.  Not a single viewing.  Not one.  Even after ads, and calls, and the works.  Dead. 

So we re-thought our position.  Could we afford to hold on and hope?   There were a few things we could do:

1. Try to convince our buyer to go up and meet us half-way, but even if he doesn’t, still sell.
2. Keep it on the market and hope for the best.
3. Take it off the market and rent it out until the market went back up.
4. Take it off the market and live here.

Number four wasn’t really what we wanted at all.  We really wanted that garden space.  Number three was a no-no as we knew that renters might just ruin the place…or at least not care for it in the same way we did.  So did we want to hold out?  If we sold at 15% less than we were expecting, could we get something similar in buying a house…at least 10% or so? 

We decided to try to bargain with our buyer.  They wouldn’t hardly budge, but did move up a couple of thousand.  And so yesterday, they put 10% down and signed the contract.  I think we’re moving out in 3 weeks into my in-laws house until we can move into a house of our own.

Now comes the search for our new place.  The negotiations, the haggling, etc.  Now WE are in the good place to be.  Let’s hope it all works out.

We walked into the office and the personal assistant said, “Hello, may I take your name?”.  So Roy gave our last name, and then she said it…”So, you are married?  Okay Mr & Mrs X, please take a seat.”.  So strange.  Mr. and Mrs.  For the first time ever.  It was yet another step into being married.  One that I didn’t know existed.

You know it’s going to be weird the first time you say, “My husband” or “My wife”.  And it remains weird for a bit of time (good, but odd).  And then when someone calls you, “Mrs. X”, then you feel like you have to turn around and figure out who they are talking to. 

But being called Mr & Mrs for the first time, more than a year after we got married, sent a little shiver down both our backs.  It made it all so much more real.  And that’s the strange thing, see, that it hasn’t felt totally real even after a year.  I think because you have this perception of what a married couple should be like - all serious and polite to each other.  But here we are - farting in the bed, wrestling to see who gets the remote and making fun of each other on a regular basis.  But that’s meant to be dating…not marriage…right? 

So you take a step back and realize that marriage for you is a life-long date.  Sometimes it’s a good one; one of those ones where you end up with that frisson of excitement.  Sometimes it’s not so good and you feel like you have nothing to talk about.  And sometimes it’s like those comfortable moments after you get past those first few dates where you’re just trying too hard.  How cool.  Dating your husband.  I like it.

I sit in an office without any windows.  Nada.  It’s a box of a room, though decent sized. 

I have a large desk which contains my paperwork (usually) as well as a phone and printer.  Two plastic brains, some books, a box of tissues (always found in a counselor’s room) and a basket of sweets round out what covers every inch of space.  I have a side cabinet where I keep all my personal junk, from makeup to sweatpants to notepads.  I have a huge four drawer file cabinet where I put some stuff about my students, but more information that I use to teach my psychology class.  You should see the bulging files.

To the right of me on one wall is my bookcase which is struggling to hold my array of psychology and counselling materials.  On top of the bookcase are the toys which I let the kids play with or hold, and a picture of me and my hubby smiling.  Behind me on the last wall is a cabinet for more junk, such as plates and napkins or handouts about mental health information.  I have three beanbags which the kids love to borrow.  And finally a well pillowed futon for parents and kids to sit on to chat with me. 

Despite having no windows, I still have lovely things to look at.  I have a poster in front of me of a Carribbean beach scene.  To my right are the Rocky Mountains in Canada.  Behind me are the Colorado Rockies and the red rocks of Utah.  And to my left is a Travel Magazine calendar which currently has a picture of a lavendar field in Provence near Banon Village. 

If you walked into my room, you would defintely sense the ordered chaos that prevails.  But somehow it all appeals to kids.  I guess it’s what one would term, comfortable.  A neat freak would freak here…but more people just love the colours that I’m surrounded by.  I can’t see the outside world, but I certainly always have a bright inside.

I’ve lived in London for almost four years.  And every day I feel like I’m becoming more and more ‘British’.  I’ll never fully be there, especially working in such an American environment, but I’ll definitely keep picking up bits and bobs of the culture, etc. 

One such example is about the weather.  It’s been quite gorgeous for over a week.  Normally while living in the US I would be thrilled…and thinking, yup, spring has come and summer is on its way.  But here…I just wonder when it’s going to start raining again.  I feel a bit of anxiety that it’s still sunny and warm.  It’s weird.  And other people feel it too.

Another example are the words I use…or at least the pronounciations.  They are slowly becoming more and more British english than American english.  And I forget the American equivalents sometimes.  Like, what is clingfilm?  Oh yeah…saran-wrap.

And then there is that understanding and even playing cricket.  We have our first offical game today.  In the warm sun.  And I’m looking forward to it.  So very cool.

I guess the next thing in line will be to get my citizenship…which will happen in two years.

We’re going back on the market tomorrow.  The guy won’t budge and neither will we.  His loss…you can’t get a two-double-bedroom, two bath with a huge living room flat for the price he was originally offering anywhere else nearby - believe me, we’ve checked the websites.  He’s going to have to compromise a lot if he wants to spend less.  But we don’t have to compromise at all.  F-U Mr. H.  If you are bluffing, you’re gonna lose.

And I’m freaking out.  Neither hubby nor I have heard from our agent.  We still are in the dark as to whether our flat is going on the market or if we’re exchanging contracts next week.  I don’t like feeling like I’m not in control.  I SWEAR we will never do this to another person.  We may fight to get a price we want, but we’re not going to gazunder anyone.  I hate this.  A lot.

Gazundering entails the buyer stitching up the seller by waiting until everybody is poised to exchange contracts and then lowering the offer on the property.  We have been the hit by this.  Today we spoke to our estate agent when we went to see a property with him.  And low and behold, he said that our buyer has asked us to reduce the price by TWELVE THOUSAND POUNDS.  He already had twenty thousand less than the asking price and now he wanted to go down a further twelve.  Not for any good reason…everything he said he already knew about when he came to see the flat TWICE.  The survey came back saying he was getting the flat for a good price in the market.  So the guy is trying to be a complete shit. 

I’ve read about this.  But most online sites that talk about gazundering talk about ONLY doing it if the person is in a chain.  We’re not.  And so we’re prepared to PULL THE HECK OUT…if he’s not ready to play ball.  We can stay here.  It’s okay.  Disappointing, but okay.  And we’ll put it back on the market.  And we’ll get another sale eventually for the exact same price.

So that’s my stupid news for the night.  I’m not happy.  But I’ll hear the final results tomorrow - the agent is going to tell him to basically shit or get off the pot…so a sale will happen next week -or- we’re back on the market.

p.s.  We loved the house we went to see today.  Irony.

I know.  I haven’t posted in a while.  It’s been a bit crazy.  But I am keeping up with my 365 blog for the most part, though I’m two or three pics behind - I keep forgetting to bring the plug between my computer and camera.  So if you get bored, check that out: http://lianes365.wordpress.com.

The house-hunting continues.  We put an offer in for a house that needs tons of work.  It was a very fair and good offer and it was rejected.  She’s in for a long wait to get that extra £20,000.  We then were REALLY interested in another that was under offer but taking a long time…but just as we were about to put in an offer, the contracts were exchanged.  We’ve now found another house that might be a good one for us and we’re heading there tonight to check it out again and take our in-laws along.  This one is very reasonably priced, has three large bedrooms and an extension - though they didn’t do as much with it as they could have - so their is spec for improvement and making it the way WE would like it.  The downside is a smaller back yard (garden) - but ya can’t have everything can you? (not with our budget!)

School is keeping me busy - I’m in the midst of grading hell.  Only 3-1/2 more weeks of teaching and then it’s exam time.  And then…drum rolling…SUMMER VACATION!  This means a visit from my dad, step-mom, bro and sis-in-law with my nephew.  I can’t wait.  And hopefully doing some painting and other decorating of a house.

Cricket has begun - we had a long practice/training session on Sunday.  Four of us at a time were a batting group (for 16 overs) and the rest in the field.  So we were pretty much ‘on’ for about 5-1/2 hours.  A LONG but so much fun day.  I felt it the next day and yesterday!  We had training last night, which was only about 1-1/2 hours…sun, or lack thereof determines the length.

So that’s it from boring me.  I’ll try to keep on writing.  But my mind is just on making babies, buying a house, school and cricket…yeah, thrilling…I know.

Well…we put in an offer on the fixer-upper that we love. 

We looked at the Land Registry prices for the last few years.  They update it every month up to two months prior (so we had up through March ‘08 listed).  After getting all the house info, we walked around the neighborhoods and checked out the houses that sold - did they have a garage?  an extension?  a loft converstion?  Then we went back home and figured out how much the house was truly worth.  As not a single house in the category (house with garage but no extensions) went for more than £400,000, we decided that this would be our TOP possibility.  The place needs serious painting, carpeting/flooring, a new kitchen and some other bits and bobs of work….so it’s not even really worth THAT much. 

So Roy called the lady who is not going through an agent.  And they talked and ‘discussed’ for over an hour.  But we didn’t get it.  She is convinced that she ought to get more, because another house she is selling got an offer of £430,000…but the offer fell through - probably because the bank looked at it and the comparible ones and said, nope, we’re not giving you that mortgage as the house isn’t worth that amount of money. 

Roy is convinced that in about another month or so, she’ll come back and ask us to buy it.  Cause there really aren’t many mortgages out there to get (we’re in good shape) and the best offer she ever got for the house was £400,000 from developers.  She just doesn’t get that this was a good offer.  But she will…and we might no longer be interested.

So we’ve seen about ten properties so far.  We have at least two more this weekend.  It’s tiring and interesting at the same time.  You envision yourself in the property - what would you do to it?  What changes would you make? 

What was good about the fixer-upper?  It had a garage on the side - which means you can extend your house out that far on the side.  And then again upstairs.  It has some really good basic bones - larger rooms than many of the other houses we saw and a decent sized back garden (yard).  The neighborhood is particularly quiet.  And we’d be able to put our own mark on it fully.  If the owner accepts the lower bid, then we might have to live with some imperfections for a while, but we’d still have enough money to do a bit of what we’d like - new kitchen, carpet, painting and wardrobes.

But if we don’t get that, what shall we do?  Well…there’s one other house that we really like right now - it’s had a bunch of work done on it (walls taken down that we would have wanted), but we’d need to decorate.  It’s not as large and doesn’t have the extension potential, though we could go up into the loft.  But we could move in right away and just decorate as we wanted…cause overall it’s quite nice.  And - it’s much less expensive and the owners HAVE to sell as they are moving overseas in July…so we could get a bargain.

What to do?  What to do?  It’s on our minds every night.  Lots of food for thought.