Wednesday, January 09, 2008

The search for Home: Part I - The first time

I reached a new milestone in life yesterday - my first time to view a house to consider buying it for myself.

It was a very strange experience. I tried to keep in mind all the principles which my shrewd mom had tried to drill into my mind from my youth. Things like, not seeming too enthusiastic to buy the place. Otherwise they'll charge you more. Criticize any shortcomings you find. So that they'll think you're not so keen.

Well - lol. No, my mom is not the hard-bitten cynic I'm painting her to be. But she had mentioned these things, and I was keeping them in my mind. So blame it on me, not my upbringing.

I'm naturally quite a positive person (except when I'm playing devil's advocate). And when I'm in this house, I'm thinking, wow, it's clean, it's spacious, no damn it's huge! If I'd gone to my friend's place and this was it, I'd be like, whoa, nice place you got here man. And I'd look past things like how the flat was old, how there was no aircon installed, how little wind there was.

But now, these were all the things that I was looking out for. Hmm.. no oven. Yeah, the floorboard is nice, but... Well, it's so windy outside, but so stuffy here, even though all the windows are open, you know?

And at the end of the day, guess what? Well, I didn't really like the place wonderfully - not enough, at any rate, to pay big buckets of cash I was still hoping to earn for it. Good thing, right? Not to overpay for a not-too-fantastic place. And yes, that is a good outcome.

I'm just wondering, whether I'll ever look at other people's homes the same way ever again.

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