It’s been a while and life has been real good ^^
After ‘saving up’ for years, we can finally more or less afford a flat, yeap that will be our very own house! It’s been a quick and fantastic decision I must say.
Last month (on 14th Sept to be exact), we decided to start viewing houses.
Since Merv is keen on north east side, Hougang seems like the best choice. Sengkang and Punggol are a bit more expensive, guess because they’re newer.
Kevin drove us around and the first house was so good that everything else couldn’t compare. Nevertheless, we spent both Sat & Sun to view 8 houses in total.
Some are pretty terrifying, with one marked with obvious loan shark paints (complete with the mess and smell) and another one with a family playing mahjong and the reason for sale is they can’t afford to continue paying and decided to downgrade. Well, these kinds are totally a no-no for us.
I realized that besides looking at the condition of the house (so that we can save on renovation), it’s also important to know the reason of sale, gotta make sure that the family and the neighbours are fine.
Anyway, after 8 houses, we kinda decided on the first one at Hougang. For a 4room flat, 104 sqm is considered the biggest. The living room is big and since the house is square, it gives a really spacious feeling. For a corner block on level 9, it’s practically fantastic. Though not that near to MRT, but there are shops and coffee shops around. Many buses to Hougang, Kovan and Ang Mo Kio too.
There’s another one at Punggol that is nice, but the place is kinda small. The price difference is not a lot with the Hougang house, but the size is so much smaller. I guess you’re paying for the ‘newness’.
Now, we made our interest known to the owners on Monday and found out that we had a rival. So Kevin decided that we must be fast and went down to the place the next day to negotiate. Owners seem to like us but they wanted 30k COV. Considering that we still need to pay the additional stamp duty in cash, it’s kinda stretching. We asked for 15k, that’s a no.
I really wanted the house so it’s kinda sad if they insisted on 30k (which we cannot afford). At the end, they decided on 20k!! YAY. WE GOT THE PLACE.
Next are all the boring tedious parts of ensuring the bank loan before we went down again to secure the Option to Purchase. Signed, paid deposit and now we’re just waiting for HDB 1st appointment.
All of these were done within the span of 2 weeks. What an expensive purchase in such a short time!
Now we are into the complicated parts of renovation and furniture search, which is very difficult for me since I do not know what I want. Gonna hand it to Merv haha.
We are expecting to get the keys in January and hope to move in by March. We’ll see.
One thing for sure, we’re going to be SO broke paying for all the things (so much cash needed especially since we don’t have enough CPF to cover) but I guess it’s worth it, just like what everyone else said. After all, it will be our own house.
Ah. Sweet.
keep walking 