we have signed our souls away to that devil known as - a new house (okay the house is old - in very bad condition, but its ours all ours...muahahahaha). Looking for a house and buying a house has been a whole learning experience. the house is quite old, about 100 years old. it was an old italian style farm house, called a cascina. farm houses used to be practically communities, several small apts for families, a place to store the tractors, hay and/or animals. i dont know how ours was at one time, i hope it was just people living there, but by now, you cant really tell what was there. when we start doing some upgrades and im sure there will be LOTS to write about! but for now i will leave you with this sign. it's mos def not going to be ANYTHING like Under the Tuscan Sun!
* i forgot to mention (thanks tammy)- you know how you usually have to give a 30 day notice before you move out in the States? well here 6 months notice is very typical here, in fact thats what we have written into our contract, so we won't get the house until March. This actually works out better because i dont want to be packing up boxes and go into labor halfway thru the move
** i already forgot to mention...applying for a loan is sooo different here. first of all you have to apply to see how much you qualify for (and yes thats the same), then you look for a house. one thing is, if it's your first house, you get very low taxes. max's parents helped their kids invest in a house when they were younger, but as it's a bad market now, it's not a good time to sell. it is a good time to buy, hence why we got the house now. anyhoo if it's a second house the bank doesn't give you 100% of the selling price, you get 80% of what you ask for and the taxes are higher. wouldn't it just make sense to give 100% but a lower amount? guess not, that's how it works here and they are stickin to it! don't ask where we are going to get the other 20%, we are hoping more loan fairies come and help us out, but for now we are just going to cross our fingers and hope it all works out for the best.
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