Home sweet home

Been a while since I wrote but much has happened. As of last Friday Brad and I officially own our own home. This is both exciting and scary. Exciting because it is essential that we purchased our own property and started paying our own bond off instead of someone elses. Scary because of the current state of the South African Economy. Yesterday it was announced that the prime lending interest rate would rise by another 50 basis points (half a %) and it is now at 15.5%. There have been 10 increases in the interest rate over the last two years and economists predict that things are not going to improve for the next 2 years. As they say in Afrikaans we must just "byt vas" - which means to stick it out. We bought at the right time as the prices of houses are cheaper than they've been in years, so it is a buyers market at the moment. With the latest interest rate increase it is putting so many South Africans in a risky position where many people are going to lose their homes as they just can't afford the monthly repayments on their mortgage bonds it anymore. Costs are continuously rising with the price of petrol (gas) increasing every month which drives up the price of food and commodities. A decision is going to be taken next month as to whether the price of electricity is going to rise by about 50% or not. It's a scary time for us here but we need to keep going, trusting that if we're prudent in our spending and good stewards of what the Lord has blessed us with that we'll be able to pull through this economic recession.

Let me tell you a little bit about our new place. After about 4 months of viewing various places and seeing approximately 20 flats (apartments) we came across a lovely place on the Internet. Turns out it was just 5 doors up from where we have been staying for the past 2 years. It's in the same complex. In the beginning of the year we'd received a calendar which was marketing material for a real estate agent. It had her photo and contact details with a magnet at the back so we'd stuck it up on our refrigerator. This very same lady turned out to be the agent for the place we ended up purchasing - she'd been on our fridge looking at us every day since the beginning of the year. We were staying in number 13 and our new home is number 26 - the reason I'm mentioning this is because as you know 26 is double 13 and this is very symbolic in that we feel that we have been blessed with 'double' what we had before. The townhouse is 14 square metres bigger (it is 65sq metres and the previous place was 51 sq metres) AND it has a garage. This has meant that all the clutter that drove us insane is no longer a problem. Each room is bigger and the drawers and cupboards are bigger. It's delightful not tripping over things anymore. Of course Brad is delighted about the garage because now he can park his car there and do all his guy stuff there with his tools and stuff. Also, it's the place where all the camping stuff, tools and golf clubs can be stored.

The townhouse has two bedrooms with a full bathroom and an en-suite bathroom on the main room. The kitchen is lovely with plenty cupboard space and a double wash-basin (makes washing dishes much easier). The 2nd room is about double the size of where we were staying previously and this is good since in a few years time this will be where a little new Kirsten will be staying. The living room is bigger and we've now been able to bring in the 6 seater dining room table which has been stored in my dad's garage for a few years now. Only thing is that we don't have any chairs yet so that's on the list of priorities because we can't have people over for dinner until we've got some chairs. The outside area is similar to the previous place in that it has a braai area.

I've taken the 'before' pictures and I'll be taking the 'after' pics soon and then I'll load them up for you all to see.

The great thing about moving within the same complex is that we merely had to carry the stuff over to the new place. Thanks to all our friends who helped us move - we really appreciated the help.

Yay that it's Friday. Brad has got to work tomorrow for a while and my cousins are coming over to have coffee with me. Then my folks are coming over as my dad and Brad are going to put in some down-lights in living room. Monday is a public holiday so I'm looking forward to catching up on sleep, spending time with my folks (esp since it's Fathers Day on Saturday), making our housey look lovely and of course spending time with my gorgeous husband :)

Till next time...take care and keep smiling