Life is a roller coaster

Uncategorized   |   Oct 27, 2017

Life is a roller coaster sang Ronan Keating. Such a cliché but oh so true. Over the last couple of months we have had our fair share of dips to the bottom of the ride with an occasional soar to the top. Although we received the offer in principle from the bank we knew that the survey was a hurdle that we had to overcome. And we weren’t wrong. We have learnt that commercial surveys give you three valuations – the market value, the ‘if you need to sell it in 6 months’ value and the ‘sell it tomorrow’ value. And to our shock and surprise the lender made the offer based on the worse case scenario, apparently influenced by Brexit. We held our breath. How will we now manage? Is our dream achievable?

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My little car sandwiched by removal vans

In the meantime our sale was progressing, not as smoothly as we may have liked but definitely progressing, exchange of contracts on the 9th October. We were elated! Three days later we had news on the valuation. We were deflated. After much hard work moving our house and garage into storage, (and quite a considerable amount to the dump!), we completed on the 16th October. Such mixed feelings – gone was the excitement. We even wondered whether we were doing the right thing, so many ‘what ifs’, along with no front door key of our own. The evening before moving day Andy and I were still going at 1am, taking apart our bed ready to sleep on the floor. We maintained our sense of humour as we took it in turns to use the allen key, that neither of us could see properly because we were just too tired. Up again at 7am to do the last load, shift and clean – we finally completed at 3.15pm – both shattered, aching and covered in bruises (me!) We finally finished moving all of our essentials (including the tumble drier) into Claire’s at 10pm. So four people and two dogs into a 2-bed flat does go – albeit a little cosy and ideally only temporary

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The empty garage!

But what next I hear you ask? Well we are still not 100% sure of anything really. We are keeping everything close to our chests, again being superstitious. On one side we have our bottle of Moet at Claire’s ready to celebrate at exchange of contracts, but on the other we still keep looking at each other, waiting and almost expecting yet another ‘gotcha’. What else will come along to catch us out and make us doubt our plans once again? We have a strict bathroom rota on days when we all need to be leaving the flat by 8am. We try to stay positive; developing our ideas. Planning our afternoon teas, New Year special break, Valentines and much more. We are desperate to put it all into practice. Become the best guest house owners that we think we are capable of. If you uncrossed any of your fingers, arms, legs after my last blog – please cross them again for us and watch this space! When and if we drink the champagne I’m sure you will hear us cheering!

PS – Our life isn’t all gloomy – our gorgeous grandson Alex George was born on contract exchange day. Got to be a good sign.

 

 

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