For the past 6 weeks or so I have been officially house hunting. The difference between what I'm doing now and what I was doing before then is that I'm now registered with every estate agent and property website I can find, and I've been and had the scary 'Please give me a mortgage' talk with two building societies. After ten viewings, and two second viewings I've exhausted everything within my price range and/or geographical area. This means that when I get an email from an agent or website I get momentarily excited that I may be about to set eyes on "The One", but then I open it and my heart sinks again as I realise that my seemingly simple criteria are actually impossible to meet!
I have four main boxes that my future flat (or possibly house) needs to tick:
- It must not be above my budget which is set at the maximum I can borrow. Funnily enough sending me details of a property £30,000 or more above my budget is only going to make me feel sad.
- It must have two bedrooms. This means I'm not interested in all of the 3+ bedroom properties they insist on sending me - they're big, need heating and cleaning that I don't want to have to do.
- It needs to be in an area where I actually feel happy to live. Some of the estates round here are not suitable for a female on her own, and I'm not actually being unreasonable by refusing them, despite what certain estate agents may have said.
- It must be fit for human habitation. You'd be surprised at some of the particulars I've been sent!
At this rate I'm definitely not moving before the spring (but yay for not paying winter fuel bills this year), I'll just keep my fingers crossed for spring/summer.
