Official renters

Today we pay off our mortgage! Woohoo yeah, right on. Well its temporary :-(

We settle on our unit today and begin our rental agreement.  Our purchasers had their final inspection yesterday and the rental agent also did their condition report. I remember asking the agents to not leave anything to the last minute so as expected everything was left to the last minute. Hopeless.

The surplus funds from our sale will go into our savings account gaining a few extra $ for about a month or so, then we take up our land mortgage in mid December and do it all again.

Its too early to find out about our soil tests.  Hoping we can get them back by Saturday week.

Soil tests ordered

Not much of an update at this time.  Our builders have finally fixed up our preliminary site sitting which only took them 2.5 weeks,  hopefully this isnt a sign of the process to come as were aiming for a fairly strict timeframe.

We have authorised soil/site/contour and feature surverys now. Once that comes back we will know exactly what our budget is.

On other news the settlement on our unit is just a week away now. We will be returning as renters just like old times.

You designed us a cave? Thanks

So we have been working with a volume builder on the design, layout and options of our new place and you would think they would have the foresight of thought.... evidently not.

In early setout plans they decided to have no north facing windows in our kitchen, dining and family room and only a western wall made of glass.... it also gave us 2 disjointed side yards.... great thinking....not. 

I dont know about you but living in an area that has effectively become a cave that would be dark until midday then facing the searing western afternoon sun isnt that appealing...AT ALL!

I really wish they thought things out better and applied some logic. It really was a face palm moment.

Our alternative is to put in a large horizontal window on the northern wall and shrink the house by 300mm and remove a non structural pilar of 600mm which will give us a 1m walkway behind the house and access to both side yards would be joined.

Land deposit paid

Today we paid the balance of our deposit for the land and have asked the vendor if they are able to clear it sooner rather than later so we are able to perform soil tests and site surveys as that is the next step holding us back.

We already know that our land is "P" class due to neibouring trees however the building area is "M" class. We found this out from our own soil test we had done prior to purchase.

We are now accelerating the steps to get moving and will are in continual contact with our builders.  Early indications are for a May finish.