Open House

Well - things are not ~quite~ to where we want them yet - but they're getting there.

A few more days should do it.... most of the remaining work to be done is up in the attic now; Ross is working on the flooring, I'm painting the stairs (fun job with the dog there! Peacock blue is NOT his best colour) and doing other assorted ~stuff~ and between the two of us, we're getting it done.

And it's a good thing, since we've got people coming to visit.

On September 6 from about 2 - 6 p.m. we're having an open house to show off our new house.

Hope to see you there.

Oh - and there are still rooms available, too, if you're looking for a relaxed all-inclusive place to live. No more hideous orange bedroom though - it is now freshly painted in cottage white. It looks MUCH better!

Save Money

One of the big differences between us and many other student rental situations is that - at this point, anyway - we are not requiring a one year lease.

Which means that you will pay only for those months that you need your room.

If you find a room for $400/month that requires a one year committment, your total cost is $4800 for the year.

If, however, you only need housing for 8 months, at $460/month (which covers all utitilities, phone, TV, laundry, etc.) your total cost is $3680.

You save $1120/year.

The house is coming along great - everything has been cleaned, and most of the main floor has been painted. We are working on the attic now - and then we will see about painting bedrooms - well, the orange one, at least!

SO much work!!!

Cleaning, painting and furnishing is SO much fun....NOT!

But we're getting it done. The phone is in - 741-6245 ...I went with a long distance plan that covers all phone calls (24/7) within Ontario. As long as people don't abuse that by calling outside of Ontario without using a phone card, will be available for everyone to use.

The dishwasher came today - we've got the kitchen cupboards all scrubbed down, so now just running all the dishes through before we stock them up. Meant to go down and make sure the washer and dryer work but didn't quite get there today; will do that tomorrow.

I wrote up a tenancy application/agreement today - if you're interested in having a look at it, let me know and I will send it to you. Or I suppose I could see if I can attach it here somehow. Actually, I know how to do that now that I think about it ...but am too tired to actually do it right now; will try to get to that sometime this week. In the meantime, though, do email me and I will happily send it to you.

The house is ours

Everything went well, and we got the keys to 218 Rubidge St. today at about 5 p.m.

We've spent most of the evening cleaning the kitchen - well, Ross did - me, I cleaned out one fridge but then pretty much ran out of steam. It is just too darned hot for non-stop work after an already long day!

Started annoying the pigeons already - Ross has been spraying a product that they are supposed to hate the smell of out of all the windows and from the fire escape. We can, if need be, pull out the heavy artillary - but even though he's licensed to use poisons, he always opts for the least lethal - and environmentally damaging option.

Tomorrow - and for the rest of the week - our goal is to get everything cleaned and disinfected inside and outside. And then we can start laying tiles in the attic, and painting everywhere. Would be nice if it cooled down some!

Anyway, if you're interested in a room, send me an email ..... will also post the phone number, tomorrow after the phone guy gets here.

Closing tomorrow

So - assuming all goes according to plan - the house will be ours tomorrow!

We're planning to go down there after we leave the lawyer's office (and run errands) here - will have to sort something out about a bed, but we're thinking possibly just a futon couch that can be used as a bed for now.

The phone and Internet both go in on Tuesday; the TV guy will be there on Thursday to hook that up.

SO much to get done over the first couple of weeks - it needs a major clean, painting, furnishing, etc.

Utitlities & Stuff

Have spent most of my afternoon setting up ~stuff~ for the house now that we know when it will be ours.

My initial thought was to have a local only phone (figuring that most people could use their cell phones/long distance cards) - but Bell now has a provincial plan - unlimited long distance anywhere in Ontario. So - we'll try that for now - as long as no one has any friends they need to phone in China or someplace, should work out fine. If it becomes a problem, I'll go back to the original plan of a separate local-only phone. The phone will be installed on Tuesday of next week.

I also went with Bell for Internet (hi-speed wireless; also Tuesday) - their basic service bites - 2GB/month upload/download - yeah right! - but was able to add 80GB for an extra monthly fee, so that should, hopefully, be more than enough - and if its not, will increase it again.

Also went with them for TV - got 2 receivers for now - one for the living room and another for the attic - but can, if people want TV in their rooms, add 2 more receivers. Hopefully that will be enough - if not, will figure something out. Just got the basic service for now (about 60 channels) but if that's not enough for people, will sort that out too.

And of course, everything else is done now - hydro, water, gas, all that fun, boring stuff.

Will have to find someone for snow removal for the lane/parking - but got time for that yet (although not as much as we should have if the geese aren't lying to me - they've been preparing to leave for a couple of weeks already).

Looking forward to meeting a few potential roomies tomorrow! And then to doing some major SHOPPING!

Closing!!!

FINALLY heard back from the lawyers and we have a closing date - the house will be ours as of Monday, August 17.

Still on for visiting it on Saturday - we will be there from noon - two - looking forward to meeting those of you who have said you'll be stopping by then.

And if you haven't been in touch yet, but are interested in renting a room, feel free to email me, or drop by between noon and 2 p.m. on Saturday.

Saturday Open House/Viewing

Or whatever you want to call it - received confirmation today that my realtor will make sure we can get in to show you the house this Saturday... I expect to be there for at least a couple of hours - say from noon to two - so if you're interested in having a look, that would be a good time.

Closing date still not settled but SHOULD be early next week. I'm sure they will all be motivated to do it quickly now - I whine well when needed LOL

Still Waiting on Closing Date

...and still irked - and becoming even more so the longer I have to wait for a response from the sellers' lawyer - this is NONSENSE. They agreed to August 13. If they can't do August 13 fine (although not really) - but they need to tell us what they CAN do now - not when they bluddy well feel like it!

Also, the sellers and their realtor had said it would be "no problem" to let us in whenever we wanted to show the place - but I asked to set up a time for Saturday and didn't get an immediate "of course" to that - so that is not making me happy either.

Seriously - they need to smarten the heck up and get us in there!

One good thing today though - since we live so far away, I'd asked our realtor to take a picture of the SOLD sign for me just in case it was gone by the time we got there. He sent them today.

Not such a big deal for hubby - he's bought and sold houses before. But for me, this is my very first house, and I'm excited about it - I wanted the picture of the sold sign.

Closing date and Saturday viewing (around noon/1p.m. if you're interested in renting a room - email me and let me know if you can make it to come have a look) will all be sorted out tomorrow or I will be throwing a major tantrum or two... in other words, it WILL be all sorted out tomorrow!

This is me, irked

So - our closing date on the house was supposed to be this week. We worked SO hard to get all of our little wee ducks in a row - and we pulled it off! We were out most of the day dealing with things... only to get home tonight to a message from the realtor saying that the sellers were now asking to push the closing date back. The NERVE!

Anyway - looks like the closing date will be "early next week" now - but we are able to get into show it before then if you're interested. It is a 2.5 hour drive each way though - so we'd be really cranky if we got stood up!

Once we close on it, we'll likely be around bunches, since we'll have lots of painting and cleaning and furnishing and decorating and ...and... and....

If you happened to see my ad on kijiji (or elsewhere) today, you may have noticed that the price of a single room jumped by $10/room. If you've already contacted me and I told you $450 then we'll stick with that... the small increase was my way of getting hubby to agree to buying a dishwasher for the house. We need a dishwasher, I think.

Anyway - still rooms (and painting jobs) available - send me an email if you're interested.

Rooms for Rent - the house

I'm a full time grad student @ Trent University in Peterborough - and since I'll be there for another 4 years, we decided to buy a house. The one we found is WAY bigger than I need ... so if you're looking for a room without all the hassles and rules that SO many other landlords put on their student housing, welcome.

The stained glass windows are probably my favourite part of the house - although the trimwork and moldings and the very cool cupboard under the stairs and the summer kitchen and... okay - I love the house.
So... okay.... this is, you may have gathered, the front of the house. You can't see it in this picture, but there's actually a lava lamp sitting on the front porch - will have to find a good place for that, if someone doesn't swipe it between now and our closing date.

That's my husband, Ross - among other things, he's a licensed exterminator (good thing, since this house comes complete with some pigeons on the roof that need to find themselves a new home - that will be happening as soon as it is officially ours). Ross will be around some of the time - usually November - mid-March - when I am....which is typically only when I need to be for classes. We live near Midland, 2.5 hours away.... and go home pretty much every weekend.
This is Scrooge, my 10+ year old walker hound, and he will also be joining us when Ross does.... Scrooge likes (most) other dogs - which is why we're willing to consider furry tenants. Scrooge is a big part of the reason we decided to buy, rather than rent - lots of places for people that don't want/like dogs .... this isn't one of them! I want my dog!

Ross, Scrooge & I will be living in the attic apartment, which includes a separate washroom and small kitchen area. I will probably also use the main kitchen, since the upstairs one is SO tiny - I have room for a fridge OR a stove; probably not both.
We will also be wandering through regularly on the way up to the attic - while I DO like the apartment, I'm not so fond of the fire escape and don't expect to be using it regularly any time soon. But other than that, the other two floors will pretty much be for the use of whoever is renting the rooms.

That includes a living room, dining room, 2 washrooms (1 has a tub, the other a shower), the storage room, and the cellar, which includes lots of rooms for bikes or whatever, and also a washer and dryer for everyone's use.

The house is, right now, very colourful - and then some. Our plan is to focus on painting the main floor - and probably the attic - before Sept. 1. We'll see how that goes, and if there is time, we'll probably also get the bedrooms done (unless you happen to really WANT a green, red, blue or I-don't-know-what-to-call-it bedroom, in which case, we'll leave it for you). Oh, and if you happen to like painting, and have some time before school starts, we'd love to talk to you about that too!

Inside the front door - aren't the colours ~charming~ ? That carpet too - that has got to go!

Yes, the living room is bright purple with green trim, and the dining room is - well... you can see for yourself. Like I said, that's all going to be painted though. I'm thinking something a bit more neutral.
I didn't get a good picture of the kitchen or storage room (used to be summer kitchen) but there is lots of room - 2 fridges, extra cupboards, and so on. We'll provide some of the basics here - dishes and so on.









Those are the bedrooms (DUH!) ...told you they were colourful - although the blue and whatever-that-colour-is aren't SO bad, I guess.

There is also a large storage cupboard on the second floor (still boggles my mind that with all the colours in the house they managed to find curtains that don't match any of them!)




The upstairs washroom - the main floor washroom is tucked behind the kitchen.

As you can no doubt tell, I am not a professional (or even, good) photographer - but the house is huge and - given a good paint job and some furniture - is going to be very livable.

I was, when I was looking for places to rent, completely frustrated by the "No pets, no smoking, no couples, one year lease" thing - so am determined that my house will be a whole lot more tenant friendly.

Rules about smoking will be set by the tenants - I smoke, but can live with smoking outside (on the fire escape, once Ross fixes it LOL) if need be. Scrooge is non-negotiable, as you may have gathered - other pets will be considered (but of course, must be Scrooge-approved).

Couples are welcome, either sharing a room or not - at this point, we're thinking $450 for a single room, $650 if couples are sharing one - but depending on how many rooms wind up rented, especially to couples, there is a possibility of everyone's rent changing - as in down, not up, of course.

We are not, at this point, requiring a lease, although we will have a tenants' agreement, and will require 2 months notice. Our plan is to offer a reduced rate to keep your spot over the summer if you wish, and are willing to allow the room to be used in your absence.

I'm a geek, so high speed wireless is a given; all utilities and the use of the laundry facilities are also included in the rent.

What did I miss? Oh - location - the house is a 15 minute walk to CPT or <5 minutes to the buses to go to whatever campus you happen to want to go to (or wherever).

If you're interested in seeing the house, you can email me at flit_c_s_a@hotmail.com. Or, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to leave them right here if you prefer.