Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Getting Settled (A Strenuous Task)

Day 8

I did it! I made it a week, all alone (well not technically all alone...but you get my point). No mother to cook for me, no sister to play Yahtzee! with and no niece to chase up and down the stairs. It wasn't an easy week but I'm proud of myself, nevertheless.

I believe the last time I wrote we were in the midst of a house hunting crisis, car-less and irritated, to say the least. Well, I'm proud to report our situation has changed immensely.
On Friday, Adam and I frantically called all of the houses within 30 minutes of his job. I was determined to get some appointments lined up so that we could at least see a house or two. We set up an appoint for a little townhouse. This one we had already called a few times but could never reach the landlord and never got any return calls. We were just happy to get to look at the house. We got a ride to Kaiserslaturen to check out the house.Upon arriving to the little neighborhood, I noticed that all the townhouses were really well kept. They were all painted light pastel colors; blue, green and yellow. Their flower beds were full of bright flowers and each house had its own garage (This is a huge perk in Germany and is often times the exception rather than the rule).

When we entered the house we were shocked, not so much by the interior but more so, by the huge group of people waiting to see the house. This is a real problem right now. There is a huge shortage of rental properties in Germany so every property generally has more than one interested renter. It is the job of the landlord to choose who gets the place.



As we went further into the house, I realized I loved it. It was three stories with hardwood floors throughout. It had 4 bedrooms and 2.75 baths. The kitchen was newly renovated and the living room was open to the backyard. Unfortunately, I was not the only person that loved the house. As we ended our tour, the landlord told us there were 6 families interested in the location. He said he would choose who got it and let us know.

Our 1/6 odds were a little disheartening but Adam and I prayed and decided to let the Big Man take it from there. We enlist the prayers from a few family members and close friends and waited to hear the verdict.

In the meantime, we decided to call and set up appointments for Saturday. We had to keep our options open just in case our dream house became another families dream house! We called about 50 people, which lead to 2 appointments. Obviously, Germans our not great about returning phone calls.

I also decided to call a realtor, Gudrun. She'd been referred to me by a Sergent Adam and I had met. He said she didn't charge too much and she could get us into a good house, quickly. I was at the point that I'd have spent as much money as I had to alleviate some of the stress of this move. She returned my call that day and sat us up an appointment to see 2 houses on Sunday.

It looked like we had a full weekend of house hunting.

Friday we decided to rent a car to get around until we could find something more permanent. We went and bought a Garmin, GPS, to help us navigate. This little thing is nothing short of amazing. It is my new....er...only German friend to date.

The next morning we got up bright and early. We went and got some food and while we were eating we found out that we did not get our dream house. I was pretty bummed about it but decided not to let it get me down. We had an entire weekend full of houses to see. I was hopeful that there would be the perfect one for us.


Upon arriving at our first appointment, we noticed that once again, we were not the only potential renter's. We waited at the first house for 45 minutes and the landlord never arrived. We had stacked appointments an hour a part so we ended up having to leave without even seeing the home. Apparently, its pretty common for Germans not to call and cancel appointments if the home has already been rented. They also don't answer the phone when you call to see if they are on their way...we unfortunately did not get this memo.

The landlord's failure to show at our first appointment made us a little late for our second appointment as it was 20 minutes away and we had gotten lost. We ended up knocking on the door of an elderly German lady who did not speak one bit of English. She looked frightened when she noticed us. She was gardening outside and came to a frantic halt as we approached her house. She kept repeating haus, haus....she probably thought we were burglars or something. We ended up spouting off "thank you" in terrible German and trying to find our way.


Once we finally made it to the house. There was a family that had beat us there by 2 minutes. Unfortunately, they signed their contract within that two minutes leaving us in the same exact shape that we were in the day before.


We left feeling defeated and bummed. We decided to go and have dinner and give up on house hunting for the day. We went to the Macaroni Grill to dabble in a bit of Italian cuisine. Once we finished we headed home and prepared for the last day of the weekend and hopefully a home-finding-day!


On Sunday, I decided to check out the house listings and see if we could possibly squeeze in another house tour. There was a new house listed in a town about 30 minutes away. The house was 4 bed room 1.75 bath and 1,200 square feet. Adam and I decided to check out any houses that seemed like they could work no matter how far away they were.


We drove down gorgeous country roads going up and down hills everywhere. The villages that we past were so cute. I really enjoyed the drive. We arrived at the house and were so excited from the outside. There were flowers everywhere. The front of the house was immaculate. We entered the house expecting the inside to be amazing. The view from the back balcony was great but unfortunately, the current tenants did not keep the house up. It was messy and cluttered. I could see the potential but I didn't think that it was worth an hour commute everyday.

We left the house just in time to meet up with the realtor for our first housing appointment with her. She brought us to an amazing house 15 minutes off of base. It was 1720 square feet, 4 bedroom 1.75 bath and had already been inspected per military guidelines. It had a huge living room, backyard and a wet bar. I loved the house from the first second we stepped into it. It was the best we'd seen yet. We could have this one without a doubt, which was relieving. Adam loved it and wanted to take it right that second. I wanted to wait and see the other house that Gudrun had set up for us.

The second house was pastel pink and right on the street. It was not that pretty from the outside but the rent was 300 Euro cheaper than the house before. Upon entering the house we saw an office on the right, hardwood floors, and a huge bathroom off the side of the kitchen. The living room was half the size of the house we'd seen before, but nothing we couldn't deal with. We went up stairs to a horrible layout of bedrooms, nasty carpet and no bedroom doors. I was ready to leave at first sight of the second floor.

I told Gudrun we were not interested in this house. She told me that these were the only to private listings available in our price range and that I could have the night to think about whether or not we wanted to take one of them.

Adam and I climbed in the car and started discussing the first house. We decided we did not want to risk losing it. I called Gudrun and told her we'd take the house. She was so pleased with our decision that she knocked 100 Euro off of her finders fee. We ended the weekend with a feeling of relief. We get our keys on August 4th and our furniture is being delivered on the 5th. It was definitely a successful weekend!

1 comment:

  1. Yay Steph and Adam!! I am so excited you finally found a house! I am sure you are so relieved. Unfortunately, I am sorry it has been so stressful for you both. I hope your move in is smooth sailing and you can feel a little at peace for now. Steph good luck on your driving test, maybe that was just what you needed, just an extra week to test out. I got your message about the discount, that is absolutely amazing!! I cannot wait to figure out when I should come. Trust me I will be planning as soon as I figure it all out. I am sure Debbie and/or Cooper and I will come down together. I love you both so much and adore your blog. Thanks for keeping us updated!! Much love
    Heather

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