Fun & Famous
HOUSE HUNTING HORROR
As the clock ticks at home, home is where the heart is, the east-west-home-best phrase, you know it well. A place where you walk around a bit musty in an ugly tracksuit that someone accidentally left lying around, (but it feels so comfortable). That's what I'm looking for. The house hunting has begun. Now I thank whoever I can thank that I don't need anything in Amsterdam, that seems to be a kind of Titanic. Everyone wants to be in that one little boat, even if you drown in the mortgage. But easy is a different story.
In student land, you were just happy if you had a slightly excessive square meter more than the downstairs neighbor and your roommate turned out to be somewhat okay. And when I started living with my love, there was a real house ready. We even put together a jewel of a kitchen in there, with built-in oven and dishwasher (hallelujah), and every morning my buddy was ready with the rain shower. Call me a luxury lover, but you get used to that. I also get a bit short of breath if my dish friend doesn't appear in the description of a potential home, because it's no big secret that I don't like to let the dish towel flutter, just read here.
After all that student discomfort and the overwhelming splendor that followed, you do make a wish list. Goodness, for the first time I actually have something to choose from in the housing market (I thought). A square meter of green with three blades of grass behind the house, please. A kitchen where all the cabinets are the same (I viewed one made up of THREE separate kitchens): plus point. Something with a roof where we don't have to renovate for a year: sold. Or actually rented, because I want to check the neighborhood a bit before I invest in stone (I got this construction term from my grandpa alias the retired contractor). But what turns out? Online house hunting is pure horror. It's just like with a job, almost a hundred percent chance that it's already gone.
“Online house hunting is pure horror.”
I check Pararius more often than Instagram, slog through houseboats on Marktplaats (you never know) and with JAAP.nl I go on dates in the evening. With Houdini-like skills, I dodge extortion sites where you pay thirty euros just to view the photos, but I also email realtors where everything is for sale asking if they rent the place out. All this in a cheerful sauce, making people practically ask if you might want to move in with them. Almost… Another fun one: call everyone who is in the area you have in mind. They go crazy from you, so that increases the chance of success.
My heart did a little jump at the location of a houseboat on the Vecht, but sank from the jump straight into my shoes due to the state of the vessel. And that little house with a deck by the Vinkeveense Plassen was amazing, but for those three months it's such a hassle with your belongings. How wonderful was the time when I clicked around wishlessly on Kamernet and went through the roof because I only had to share the shower with one person? One person, the wow. I think we should just go back to living in a room, for old times’ sake. Or you must be looking for the best tenants on earth with huge household skills for your place, then I am of course yours.
