Housing Success

One of the houses Ian had found by himself is in the Sai Kung Country Park.
This was an area that I had been recommended. It is further out, but house prices are lower and it is very rural.
I could tell Ian was keen on the house, so started to make enquiries about the price and arrangements before going to see it myself.
In fact there was another offer on it, but being an ESF teacher really helps when booking housing it seems. Landlords are happier to dealPwith ESF teachers as there is guaranteed rent payment!! So all was ready for me to visit the house.
We landed on Saturday and on Tuesday Heather and I were doing the 2nd viewing.
Here is Heather in her first HK taxi ride... (pic to follow)

The agent was eager to show us and make the deal. The other offer was from a different agency. In fact I had seen the house online, with the other agent, but they hadn't replied to my emails.

Well I saw the house and was smitten, as was Heather. It will take extra time to school and work, but a great house at a great price is worth the compromise.

Returning to the office, the paperwork was completed, the deposit (how much?) handed over. The landlady also came to sign up so we have met her and her daughter.
Moving date is provisionally the 15th August.

Here are two pictures of the house from the website. Will post my own soon...


<--- Front garden

View from the roof --->

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House hunting

House hunting was our priority on arrival. We knew that we had just 2 weeks in the hotel, in which time we had to find something.

Before arriving we had been warned that it may be difficult to find something in the time, but we had spent a lot of time fact-finding before arriving. So, we knew which village we would be moving into and had made appointments to visit houses as soon as we arrived.

Actually it was Ian who did all the legwork over the first 2 days, seeing 12 houses. He also found estate agents in the same street and went to other places too.

Estate agents here are the same as the world over. We specified a max of $22k and min of 1400s.f. We are a family and needed suitable housing. Ian was shown flats over the price limit, under the size limit and one property with 3 bedrooms, which was actually 2 adjoining flats where you had to hope over the balcony if you wanted to check on the kids.
(Actually that has its advantages thinking about it).

I had been warned about the sizes of places, we were coming out of 2400s.f. and were looking at 1400s.f flats / duplexes. Ian had a bit of a shock though as many of the flats wouldn't have fitted our king size bed.

He short-listed 2 properties that he liked in the end.

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First day in HK

Having arrived safely in HK, Ian found a Jackie Chan movie on TV! Typical.