You could build your dream house from Lego or on a computer, or admire pictures on the internet. I have moved around the world, mostly renting, dreamng of buying and building, visiting friends who have done so and listening to their cautionary tales.
Let us start with the simplest move, when you go to another country to look around, holiday, take a job overseas, and consider buying or building overseas or back home, using all your ideas.
American homes are bigger. Huge rooms. Huge houses. Huge bedrooms. Often with a walk in clothes closet.
I always thought a flat was just a dwelling on one level. An apartment was grander, bigger. A condo was a big development, like a village of blocks of large size flats or flats of 2 to 5 bedrooms mixed in each block, with shared facilities. What kind of facilities? Most importantly for me, a swimming pool. For my husband, a gym. Extras are often a shop or two, even a nursery school, a hairdresser, and a meeting room for hire.
England is too cold most of the year for swimming, although neighbours in London and friends have had pools where I have swum. For us Brits, the dream is a hotel or condo with a landscaped pool, in Florida, or Spain, or Singapore.
In the USA
In the USA we first lived in a shared town house owned by the company where my husband had a new job, transferred from London within the same company. Rooms on each of the three floors were rented out to incoming staff. These were permananent staff, staying for more than a week and up to a year before they found their own place to live. This was great for sharing meals, tips, cars, social life. We moved to live in a conso with a swimming pool.
The estate agents used to send a packet of offers of everything from bedding and curtains to food delivery, to every new guest, renter, or owner.
Our apartment in Rockville Maryland had a swimming pool open in summer. It was closed in winter and nigh time and surrounded by tennis court style high netting. Two lifeguard seats were there and two of the resident's teenagers were empolyed as life guards. This was to do with local laws and insurance.
Pol fencing. Photo from Med55 in Wikipedia.
Australia has rules about surrounding home swimming pools with fences and lockable gates.
Other American ideas which I liked:
Old People's Home linked To Leisure Centre
The home for the elderly was at the end of a short covered walkway leading to a leisure centre with a library, swimming pool sna djacent cafe. Our neighbours took us there to visti their granny. They spent every Sunday lunch time there. The grandchildren used th pool. The parents read the free newspapers and watched. The granny had company from her family and other residents.
And a pool for exercise. A card room.Lots of visitors and people to see. The visitors were all relatives and were identity checked with membership cards on arrival.
The pool and gym provided exercise.
Later we moved to Singapore.
I was sent a link in Singapore to a website which might be run by an estate agent or be a scam, so I am reluctant to pass on the link. However, I have observed these points for you to notice:
In Singapore there are three main kinds of property, Housing Development Board (HDB), several levels of estates built at different periods, some only rented but most available to buy. Sometimes in some places you have to be a resident in the property for five years before you can sell.
What to look for:
Status of Buyer
1 Is ownership of an HDB flat open only to Singapore citizens (passport holders) and Permanent Residents (those who won't take up Singapore passports because they are unwilling to give up their other passports, which is a requirment).
2 Is it a subsidized government development and only available to first time buyers who have no property overseas.
3 Is there a requirement that you have lived a certain number of years in the coutnry.
Status Of Buyer or proximity to Schools,/Miltary or Govenment property
4 Is there a restriction on the type of preprty or area where you can buy (due to local restrictions on foreigners or any member of your family having a criminal record, not near a military, base, not near a school, not on ground floor or the lower five floors of a builing (once introduced on foreign ubyers in Sinapore to prevent foreign owned buildings being used to orchestrate riots)..
At one point you ould not have windows overlooking housing occupied by government ministers, so apartments in one block had narrow high windows on one side of the building and you could not alter the windows).
5 Are the buildings in a condo with high security. in Singapore most condos are gated and vehicles have to say who they are visiting and give their ID. So you cannot drive around a condo just to see the outside, except with an agent who gives his ID to the gatekeeper, and with an appintment to meet the unit owner or collect a key.
6 You can learn a lot from 360 degree views from apartments currently on sales. However, apartments can vary enormously. One looks out on a mountain, another on a car park another on a dustbin area, another on the swimming pool.
A video does not tell you about traffic noise. If the land next door is sold for another development, or knocked down for another, you could have a year of building works noise, dust from the buildings site, water cut off, electricity cut off (deliberately or accidentally), distubance of snakes and wildlife such as monkeys.
7 Redevelopment could be prevented by neighbours, objections from governemnt, builders going out of business. In Singapore sometimes you are protected by a law preventing building starting unless their are sufficient funds to finish the project. Sometimes in the past the first building in a complex is sold to get a bank loan to start the second building. If there is a recession and the first building does not sell, your deposit on the second buidling would be lost t the defunct company which could not finished the development.
8 Don't accept verbal assurances. Check a legal document. Check the history of developers. Go to see thier previous developments to see if you like the finish.
9 What to lok for:
Is the parking covered or will you get leaves and bird droppings?
10 is the building on stilts to withstand flood water?
11 Will the building have fire alarms and a lightning conductor?
12 Are you dealing with the owner of the land or apartment. Have you checked their identity and have you met them?
13 Are tenants of your property allowed to have children and pets and to sub-let? Can you veto the tenants?
14 Do you need to let the place to pay off the mortgage? If so, can you have any guarantee the place will be let? Can you reserve one period a year, such as Xmas or Easter for your own family holiday?
15 What is the cost of a porter and mainteance/ Is there a contingency fund to deal with a 20 year old boiler, boiler switches for communal hote water, subsidence and tree roots under the ground floor, leaking through the flat roof (Singapore and UK I have been in buildings which had this) and leaking down the outside walls.
In Singapore A balcony can be turned into a fruit and vine growing area. I have seen vines growing on the balcony of a neighbour in Singapore. They also have allotments. You may need to get on the waiting list early for an allotment.
In Singapore the plan is to tturn flat rooves of housing into gardens for fruit and vegetables. The plan is called 3030, meaning 30 percent of the coutnry's needs will be grown within the country by 2030.
In Singapore many flats have a mmaid's room and toilet. One family has converted the mai's room area into a kitchen and made the kitchen itno a dining area off the lviing room.
16 Can you buy up an adjacent flat or nearby flat for your parents, children, grandchildren, cusins, future husband or wife, guests, or to let out and easily visit the proeprty even with travel restrictions.
Remember, when it is a bad time to sell it could be a good time to buy. And vice versa.
What can go wrong? Worst case scenario, the developers disappear,, run over time, use substandard concrete, build onto foundations not strong ennough to support an extra storey, added without planning permission later. Worst case scenario, loss of life of builders or tenants or guests.
Thinking of Grenfell Tower in London, a goverment building, Beiru explosion and firet, the tsunami in Asia, and the Versailles wedding disaster in Israel.) For every one of these cases you can read comments on what could, or should have been done to prevent thse events, and what is being done now to protect people in future.
Some laws seen to be there just to make life difficult nm and cause paperwork delays. Other laws seem there so the governemtn can collect taxes for inspection and permits, or for intermediaries to collect bribes to speed things up. to look on the bright side, many of the laws are there to protect the builders, the owners, the buyers, the sllers, the inhabitants, and those renting.
The 'Finish'
What can go wrong? In Singapore, we had a batrhoom floor which sloped the wrong way, so the shower water did not run down the drain but collected in the opposite corner, creating mould. I have rented property which had basins cracked by the installers, light fittings broken by tenants.
In the UK, a neighbour's insecure low wooden side gates were opened by burglars. The remedy, required by the insurance company, was to install a metal gate with a high top.
Downstairs bedroom
I met a family who needed a ground floor bedroom for the huband in a wheelchair. they bought a house in a secluded cul de sace. The double garage of the house had been converted by the sellers into a a large ground floor bedroom, with parking for two cars in the open on the forecourt.
More Cupboards
Another person I met had converted open shelving in the kitchen into high cupboards to create extra storage space.
Space under stairs can be cnverted to a libary, with a desk, clothes closet, shoe cupboard, downstairs toilet.
Space under stairs can store boks or horizontal wines.
The attic can be made into storage, a guest bedroom, or a bedroom and bathroom, or an art room with a skylight for the painter, or writer and illustrator.
A conservatory can be a playrom or an artist's room or for watching bird and animal life.
Too Many Roms?
In London the UK I met a widow who had her old-fashioned house knocked down and built herself a double size basement flat, plus three floors of two flats above to provide income. She went to visit the developers' other proerties he had built to see if the finish was god enough.
UK Lego Room
Another young London couple converted one bedrom into a children's play room. Every birthday and Christmas they asked every family member of guest for Lego. By the time the children reached the age of five, they had an entire room filled with Lego. They had more Lego than their local toy shop.No problem keepign children busy and ut f your way, or off the computer. Easy to entertian visitng children and guests.
What can you build? Everything from buildings to rockets.
USA Scene
NASA's image of the day.
About the Author
Angela Lansbury and her family have lived in the UK, USA, Spain and Singapore.
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