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 |  is paved with good intentions... |
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** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Hi, I'm Elle. I'm based in Auckland, New Zealand. I'm the mother of two young adults, the wife of an entrepreneurial gamer and the Queen of Unfinished Projects. This blog will contain poems, short stories, possibly photos and book reviews if you're lucky, and my thoughts on a variety of topics. Hope you enjoy it. |
| Dad, Steve and I went to Tinopai on Saturday to look at a house there. Steve and I had been discussing our budget a bit further in the prior days, and we'd decided to lower the amount we were willing to spend. Yeah, there's something to be said for maxxing yourself out to get the best property you can afford, because over time you will gain back disposable income. However, it leaves no room for error. We do NOT want to get stuck in a position where we can't pay our bills. So we have put some thought into it, and reduced the max limit we're prepared to spend. Which meant that the house in Tinopai was too expensive for our new budget, even if Dad contributed. The house itself was lovely. In really good, modern condition. Large, with plenty of useable land space. The problem definitely wasn't the house. The problem was the town. Tinopai is very small (approx 400 permanent residents, with an additional 600 holiday-season residents). There are no shops. None. You can't buy milk or bread or anything. The beach is not suitable for walking (it's a mangrove estuary really). There are no nearby walks. There is nothing to do. Yes, we would spend a good portion of our time there in the house itself, which was lovely, but there was literally nothing else to do. So even though it was outside of our budget, it wasn't a wasted trip, because it solidified a few more things in our minds. With our new thoughts in place, we reviewed the house in Rawene again. We could potentially get the house in Rawene within the revised budget we've set ourselves, but whereas Rawene has shops (a small grocery store, an art gallery, two cafes and a couple of book/craft stores), there isn't much to do in Rawene either. Again, no beach to walk on, no walks to do. But it's quite near some decent beaches. The house is very small, which is fine because we don't need a large place, but they're asking a lot of money for it. So we haven't ruled it out 100%, but we're definitely leaning toward a no on that one. Too much money for too little. I think if we'd bought it, we'd have been happy with it. But we've seen other places since that might offer us more. We've asked our mortgage broker to see if we can get approval for a place in Bayly's Beach. It's significantly cheaper than the Rawene property, but that's because the land is held in a trust. Rather than owning the land outright, you'd own 17% of a larger section of land as part of the trust. The real estate agent said we wouldn't get approval from the bank for it, but we've asked anyway. We haven't been to see it yet, but on paper it looks really good. It's literally on a white sand (west coast) beach. The beach itself is 100km (62 miles) long, so that's a HUGE stretch of walkable beach. There are also loads of walks nearby, including one that starts immediately behind the house we're looking at. How perfect is that? And the house comes furnished, so we wouldn't be scrambling to get furniture for it. We'd be able to slowly swap things out over time and make it our own, but we'd be able to use it immediately. There are some small shops (a convenience store for milk, bread, etc. and a takeaways) in the town, and a supermarket just 15 minutes drive away. So yeah, we're super keen. But the real estate agent was very skeptical that we'd get approval, so we'll have to wait and see if we do or not. So that's where we're at right now. Waiting for the bank still, but with different properties in mind than what we were looking at originally. |
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