House hunting diary
The diary was written in late 2000 and early 2001. I'm leaving it because people still seem to be reading it.
September 10, 2000
For years I've dreamed of a house in France. In the south of France, maybe in the mountains. Or near a river. A very old house with thick stone walls and enormous hand-hewn wooden beams.
With roses framing the front door. French doors opening to a small garden, or a courtyard, planted with lavender and rosemary and basil.
With pots and pans and bunches of herbs hanging from beams in the kitchen. Windows with shutters that open out in the daytime and are closed at night.
A bakery around the corner. And maybe a bar, or a cafe where you can sit in the sun and watch the town go by.
About 18 months ago I decided it was time to see if there was a way to make the dream into a reality. Last November my daughter and I went to France. From my research, and also a gut feeling, I had decided that Languedoc was the place that I would find the house I kept dreaming about.
We stayed in Paraza, a tiny village on the Canal du Midi in Aude. We spent days driving around, going to markets, walking through towns and villages. By the time we left I knew that Aude was the place where I would find a house.
I can't explain the way I feel about that part of France. It's visceral. It's the same chemistry you feel when you meet someone and know that they'll be an important part of your life.
So, to the practicalities.
September 24, 2000
I'll be arriving in France on October 7th for two weeks. I've arranged a couple of appointments to look at house. Right now I'm trying to get the web site as complete as I can without a database, develop the database, and finish my "real" work before I leave.
October 24, 2000
I bought a house!! It's in Rieux en Val, about 30 km south east of Carcassonne. About 8 km west of Lagrasse, a lovely village.
For about a year I've been looking at French real estate sites to get an idea of availability. I had also been reading about buying property in France. It sounded a bit intimidating. Actually, it was as easy as falling off a log.
It needs some work but is generally in very good shape. Rieux-en-Val is a tiny village, probably less than 100 people, in the middle of vineyards and fields of sunflowers. There is a river that is just across the vineyards. When all the work is done there will be three bedrooms, a wonderful bathroom, a sitting room and a large eat-in kitchen.
There's a court in front of the house and a yard in front of that. It's quite unusual to have a yard in the Corbières. Right now the yard is graveled and used for parking but I can smell the lavender and rosemary that will be there next spring. I can taste the wine and cheese.
Serendipitously I met an British builder who is supposed to do very good work. He came with me to see the house and give me an idea of what we'd be looking at in terms of repairs and renovations.
I really want to do some of the work myself, it makes it feel more like mine. We'll just have to see. My goal is to have it ready to rent by April. It officially becomes mine on December 21, 2000.
The house needs to be rewired and insulated. It also needs a bathroom. There are three finished bedrooms and one unfinished right now. We're going to make one of the bedrooms into a bathroom with a tub and a shower and sink. We'll finish the other bedroom and still have three large bedrooms as well as a terrific bathroom.
We're going to strip the sitting room walls back to the stone to see whether it's attractive enough to leave exposed. If not, we'll plaster them. The plaster is in rough shape and needs to come down anyway.
I don't want to do much in the kitchen, take out a bulkhead, put in a counter, and raise the sink. I think the sink was installed for someone who was 3 1/2 feet tall.
November 2, 2000
I was looking back through this diary to see if I had written "I don't want to have to renovate a house in France when I'm in Canada". I know I wrote it somewhere.
I got a quote from the builder who's going to do the major work on the house. The quote is terrific, more than reasonable. His schedule is perfect, matches mine exactly. So why am I sweating?
There's a six hour time difference, it's tough to find a time to call when I'm awake. I keep thinking of things I forgot to say. What about colours? I'm going to do the painting but we need tiles for the kitchen and bathroom. As far as I can see, I won't be back in France until April. What if....?
I'm trying to estimate costs for the part that I have to do, furnishings etc. I found catalogues on the internet. Le Redoute, 3Suisses, and Conforama. Le Redoute and Conforama were fairly straightforward. 3Suisses was incredibly difficult to navigate and appears to be off-line at least half of the time. My limited French doesn't speed the process. Also, I don't understand why I can't seem to find down or feather duvets, only polyester and fibrefill.
Does any of this sound familiar? I don't mean the specifics but the feelings. That stage after you've made a major decision where you start second guessing yourself, painting worst-case scenarios?
Into solution mode! Always the best place for me to be. I cut pictures from decorating magazines and have assembled them into a little book to send to the builder. At least we'll both be working from the same pictures.
I don't need bed and bath linens until April. I'll order them then. It'll be fun equipping a kitchen from scratch, not feeling that I have to hang on to all those weird things I never use.
I do want an old bathtub and I do want to have the tub put in when the bathroom is done. I had thought about waiting but decided that I don't want to. I haven't ever used discussion groups but found one, in French, that's devoted to brocante. So, I'll join the group, get someone to help me write a French posting, and see if I can find a tub that way. I'll also e-mail the people that I know in France and see if any of them know of one lurking in Languedoc.
Megan and John (my daughter and son-in-law) and some of their friends (the handy ones) have offered to come to France and help me paint and do the "finishing". They'll pay their airfare, I provide accommodation and food and they will work for three days and vacation for the rest of the week. They're all still young enough to think that sleeping bags are kind of fun. This is a great offer. Seven people for three days is 21 days of work, more than enough to do what will need to be done.
There, I feel better already.
December 12, 2000
This shouldn't be called a house hunting diary, the house hunting was so quick and easy, I'll have to think of another name.
The house in Rieux-en-Val closes on December 21st. Right now I'm busy confirming that money arrives at the banks it's supposed to arrive at when it's supposed to arrive. I would think that in this electronic age an international bank transfer would be instantaneous. Apparently not. There is also the language challenge when I'm dealing with my French bank.
And there are details. What is the address of the house? It's described as Section AB #107 and #111 on the cadastral plan. I doubt that's the mailing address. I need insurance and I have to get the electricity transferred. The phone can wait 'til April.
And speaking of April, I realized that I'm going to arrive in a house with no mattresses, no bedding and no towels, no dishes, no cutlery. Hmmm. I think I need to start planning.
Every time I speak to the builder he asks me about the weather here. I told him it was quite nice, zero and sunny. He almost had a stroke. I guess zero isn't ever considered quite nice. He'd hate today. It's -8 with a wind-chill of -17 and we shoveled 30 cm of snow this morning. I looked at the 5 day forecast for Carcassonne, 12 to 14 degrees. Next year, it's Christmas in France.
I decided to name the house. Mainly to make it easier for people to find. So, because there are fields of sunflowers alternating with the fields of vines, I am calling it Le Tournesol, French for sunflower. So now I have to get a sign.
Merry Christmas.
January 9, 2001
The house hasn't closed yet because the notaire overlooked a clause that needed to be inserted into the agreement. I had to hand-write the clause on a plain piece of paper, get my signature notarized and courier it to the notaire. She should receive it tomorrow and hopefully the transfer will be complete.
Communication is not a straight line. The notaire wrote to the present owner who then contacted the agent who then called me on a Saturday.
I was in the office reloading my computer - hard drive problems - so was here for her call. Sheer luck.
Even so, things are moving. I have advertised the house on another site. I'm also working like a madwoman to optimize this site and move it higher on search engines. No small task. Everything I read says that search engine optimization is a full-time job. It is, or would be if I didn't already have a full-time job.
Friends have been pricing appliances and looking looking for a bathtub. My dream is an old cast iron tub, maybe, maybe not. They went to Spain on the weekend to look at tiles. I'm determined, no shiny tiles. The pictures I sent them finally arrived so at least we both know what I'm talking about. They should have their e-mail up soon, I hope. That'll facilitate communications.
My next step is to check the cost of shipping stuff to France so I can decide what to take from here and what to buy there.
Happy New Year.