Moontan

New view?

Uploaded by Silwertand.

A few weeks ago, when Kobra’s mother visited, we had a look at a lovely house in the neighbouring village. It’s owned by the same woman who owns the flat next door, and she asked us if we’d be interested.

It’s a lovely place, and all of us fell in love with it. But we had always been worried about the price. Earlier this week we spoke to her, and it turned out as we had feared: she wants almost double our current rent.

Then another opportunity presented itself. One of Liela’s friends and her single mother lives on the edge of the village overlooking the fields and forests. It’s also a 3 bedroom semi-detached house, but very, very small.

Despite it’s huge garden with it’s climbing frames and slide - which the girls loved of course - the house itself is tiny. The single bathroom is slightly bigger than a cupboard. This alone put Kobra and me off.

After having a look at her current place, we joined her at her new place. It’s on completely the other side of the village, near the pub and the old mansion house for which the village is named. It’s located just a block off the main road to Guildford, and the main road through the village.

In fact, it overlooks the village bowling green, with ample lawns for little legs. The road itself is quiet as it’s a cul-de-sac, and there’s a large lawn directly in front of the house.

The reason we went along is to see what the row of houses look like, because the one next door is available in a month’s time. It’s called “terraced houses”, which is the same as “townhouses” in South Africa. In other words they’re not free standing or even semi-detached, but each have their own garden.

Both Kobra and I just had a good feeling when we set foot in the place. Although much smaller than our current, sunny flat, it’s still someway bigger than the house we had just viewed.

There’s a small little garden in the back, it includes a garage, and the rooms aren’t much smaller than we have at the moment. There’s more than enough space inside the house for all 5 of us, and even more space outside.

The rear garden is typical of a small townhouse - about the size of a sitting room! But that’s enough for a braai, a swing seat, some grass and a few potted plants. Both Kobra and I were thinking “low maintenance”. At least I’m not going to spend the whole of every weekend mowing the lawn.

And for the same reason Kobra likes the smaller house - it’s less effort to keep clean than a big place. Sure, a small place can look more untidy much faster, but this place has enough storage space as well. Although the bedrooms don’t have built-in cupboards, there’s a loft, hall cupboards, a little shed as well as the garage.

Both of us are very excited, and the girls were as well. Obviously Elfie loved the idea of “having an outdoors”, but Liela was sceptical at first. Until she realised she’ll have the space and opportunity to finally ride her bike!

Needless to say, we’re all very excited. Now we need to negotiate rent, and figure out what we might need to buy. We have very little furniture of our own, and apart from the tumble dryer now white goods at all.

All in all, for a little more money, we’re gaining a lot. Sure, our current place has many great features which will miss, and the new place is still not ideal in the very long run. However, for now things seem to be going very well.