I’ve always championed retail therapy – but I’ve found a glitch in system. Buying property.Four months ago I was an eager beaver, armed and ready with my constantly updated Excel spreadsheet of inner west properties – their dimensions, stats and sale prices – taking charge of Boyfriend and my first steps onto the property ladder. Grandma was saving Saturday’s Domain section for me and I spent my evenings trawling through online realty sites imagining our lives in Newtown/Leichhardt/Darlington/Potts Point... We’d not been approved for our loan just yet, but I was confident.
And well I could be. With an overly generous monetary gift from my parentals we were only seeking to borrow 60 per cent of the mortgage – banks were fighting for our business. Lucky us.
So began our Saturday searches. Ever prepared I’d spent lunchtimes formulating itineraries, back-to-back viewings to ensure we were seeing all our market had to offer. With everything up for auction we jumped on opportunities for sale. One Thursday lunchtime I even hijacked a cabbie to take me to two inner city viewings, wait for me and take me back to work. Despite a few wrongs turns down the side alleys of Newtown, I arrived back to my desk on time and unscathed – convinced I’d found ‘the one’.
Spending the next week-and-a-half to all extents and purposes moving us in and renovating the 2-bed federation semi (in my head), Boyfriend and I viewed it again last weekend; a fresh pair of eyes helped me realise that this little project was more than just a lick-of-paint and backyard blitz.
Driving home with the sun blazing, burning our arms and thighs through the car windscreen, we were hot and bothered but not beaten. We collated our thoughts, went through the pros and cons of renovating and decided we should try for a place that had most of the hard work done already.
And we knew just the one: a gorgeous little terrace in Lewisham with a manicured secret garden and covered deck off the second bedroom overlooking said-oasis. Painted and primed we could move in and be blissfully happy. Now we just needed to nab it for $606K.
We scoped out an auction and scored oodles of advice – bid at the last hammer, up the last bid by $20K, make your final offer the night before – I honed all my positive energy into visualising our ‘win’. Then last night the realtor rang to say the vendors had been made an offer above their reserve and they were cancelling the auction; did we want to make a counter offer?
With a heavy heart I knew our offer wouldn’t make the cut. And while my head tells me it’s better to find out now so we’re free to spend Saturday looking at more realistic options, the ever-positive part of me that had already mentally moved my wardrobe into the master bedroom of Number Four St John’s Street took the blow to heart.
Never have I ever had so much money to spend on just one thing and never have I ever felt so low about it. Maybe we should take the money and run away to Europe, travel by gondola, eat and shop like the minted…
But we wouldn’t. So we wait the week out and march on come Saturday. Another eight places to view, another eight floor plans to rework. Yep, I feel the power coming back, my spirit rising.
We’ll beat the odds and find a place within six months. It’s just shopping, after all.
