May 20, 2006

Delicate Balancing Act


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Originally uploaded by billyjoebob.
Today, as you well know my punkin, was spent trawling the northern suburbs looking for a house that we want to live in.

On the way, your mother and I, with your very special help, made some discoveries and came to some conclusions.

The first of which was that we cannot afford the house we want in the location we want. This was not strictly a "today" type discovery, more of your general awareness reached over the course of many years being bombarded with information about the property boom that appears to have made every single person in the world except us incredibly rich beyond their wildest dreams.

What we HAVE figured out, punkin, is that we can afford a house WHERE we want to live, or we can afford a house we want to live in, but not both at the same time.

Naturally, given that there are thousands and thousands of houses around, in thousands and thousands of locations, this means that it's probable that SOMEWHERE is the house that's exactly halfway between where we want to live and the kind of house we want to live in, and that's the one that we should buy.

But here's where it gets complicated.

It is possible, you see, to have a house actually custom made to exactly match one's requirements. This entails things, actually within our price range, like Home Theatre rooms, ensuite bathrooms and alfresco dining areas. Naturally, all of this abject luxury comes at a price, and that price is Craigieburn.

Then, there's things like easy access to convenient public transport and decent cafes and cultural events, but they come at a price too, punkin, and that price is an awful horrid poky little house.

So we're trying to find the happy medium. We're trying to draw the line on the map that says at exactly THIS point, we can afford a house that is nice enough to spend five years living in, but isn't at the end of the earth.

We haven't found it yet, punkin, but after today I think I've got a better idea of what suburb it's in....



Love you.

4 comments:

jenu said...

Go ascot vale!! Or Moonee Ponds...thats where we're looking. Although...we don't have kids...

Phil said...

And......What suburb would that be? Do they also have houses for poor parents who have not been IN the Melbourne market for the past 12 years?

E in Oz said...

Ok, having lived in Craigieburn for a year and now living back within the rest of society, with houses next door, not cows, I have two things to say....'travelling distance' and 'petrol prices'....and nobody visits, coz it's "too far".

Good luck with the hunting. I hope you find the right space in the right place, soon.

Kate said...

The thing that amazed me the most when we were buying a house was the difference between what I thought I wanted and what I actually wanted. I never knew until we were looking seriously that I could not live in a home containing a small kitchen or one in which the bathroom was on a different story than the master bedroom.

Conversely, I was amazed to find that some of the things I was adamant about having (central air conditioning, large-sized bedrooms, fenced-in yard) didn't really seem to matter once we saw the house we bought. It just felt right. Your house is out there somewhere; be patient and you'll run into it eventually.