Finding a new home !!

As I had mentioned in my previous post, I and my wife went through some sleepless nights when confronted with the fact that we had to move to a new home, contrary to my plans and expectations. In April / May 2006, after I got married, I was in search for a new apartment as I did not want to disturb my roomates, the search went on for two long months with no luck. I applied for nearly 20 apartments and got declined for all of them, with declinal reasons ranging from,

Rank 1 – Your application was not suitable.

Rank 2 – The owner has made a final decision and your application was not selected.

Rank 3 – No particular reason.

Rank 4 – We have just released the home for lease and we are expecting more applications.

At this point in time, I did not have my name on the rental agreement, I had it amended immediately.

With such reasons, naturally, I was blaming my fate and my luck in finding a home. Luckily, my roomates found an apartment that they can move into and I was glad to stay in the same home and in the suburb (which meant a lot to me because of the convenience). This happened in Aug 2006 and then my wife came from India and everything was going well, until Deepavali 2006. After that event, a SMS came from my ex roomie, who was on the rental agreement, informing me that the land agent wanted to see the home due to “Selling of property”. We did a quick clean of the house and agents came along to see the house, and informed us that we have kept the house in good condition, except for the bathroom, which had paint peeling from the roof. The agent was not unduly worried about it, as it was widely prevalent in Melbourne that due to cold conditions and us using hot water all the time the moisture sticks to the roof and that contributes to the paint getting peeled.

When I asked the agent on what the owner was thinking, whether she wanted to sell the home or not, he replied that it could go either way, sell or probably no sell as well. With my luck in house searching, I could only assume the worst. Then two other events happened.

The owners wanted to see the house, two ladies came along, saw the home, and were very appreciative of the fact that the house was in good condition, again the bathroom paint factor was discussed. No issues there. Just needs a little bit of paint work, I was informed.

The other event was that the Reserve Bank of Australia raised the interest rates by 25 basis points, which caused most home owners on mortgages to struggle with their repayments. It was widely reported in the media at that time, most mortgage holders are selling their properties to move into rental apartments, thereby causing a flurry of applications for every decent rental apartment. Where there was 7-10 applications for a 2 bedroom apartment, there were 15-20 applications. Apartments that came up for renting were quickly snapped up.

But, in the meantime, I received no notification from my land agent or the owners as to what was the status of the apartment, but still we had initiated our home search, and the same luck continued. All of a sudden on Nov 14, we received a letter from the estate agent asking us to move out, within 60 days of receiving the letter as the owner has a made a decision to sell the house. The holiday season was fast approaching and there were no apartments on the market, again we had a few sleepless nights.

But Lady Luck did appear on the horizon, we looked at an apartment on Nov 18 and was approved by my own estate agent within the next two – three days.

“Veettai katti paar, kalyanam panni paar” (Build a house, conduct a wedding), that statement in Tamil is not in vain.