New Life Project – Decision Time

On the two and a half hour return journey from viewing our potentially new property we talked about what we had seen and our impressions of its suitability.

The location was excellent. Only a short section of dirt road to manoeuvre, a social rural community, Access to plenty of facilities in nearby towns and villages as well as an active community hall.

The soil on the property was something we dream about. The access to one of the finest creeks ensuring limitless water. It looked pretty good after an extended dry spell.

The house was liveable although we would be silly to place any value on it when compiling a property value. Not having council approval for construction carries many repercussions. When it was constructed more than 20 years ago the compliance requirements were fewer than now. Every year new issues are raised and the standards altered. The rabbit warren design would create many irritations but as with all things time will force adaptation. Storage space was in shortage which would result in some pruning of possessions within arms reach. There were a lot of minor problems (such as the laundry on the veranda) but nothing that couldn't be addressed in time.

The workshop, a very large shed with full facilities including a composting toilet was very handy. The fact that it was a couple of hundred metres from the house a major inconvenience. Especially since the only vehicle access required leaving the property driving up the public road and re-entering the property. I'm sure this would drive us mad after a while. The agent mentions the building cost. It is very high as it was constructed as a commercial building not a farm workshop. The value to any new owner is far less.

The most serious problem is the existence of the spectacular vista from the unused building site another couple of hundred meters from the large workshop and even further from the house. We felt that we could live there without wanting to build a house on that site. This is the part of property searching that is intangible. The gut feel you get when standing in a place that makes you feel good. This was the what we were looking for in a property.

So we slept on it and discussed the dilemma many times over the next 24 hours. More comparisons to HHF and its short comings and strategies to rectify those.

One final question was would we be able to afford to buy and then within a couple of years build a small dwelling on the preferred site and possibly rent out the old house as a source of income.

Our real estate agent (and friend) comes tomorrow to perform an appraisal.