We have started the great hunt for our new "zu hause". On the one hand, exciting, on the other terrifying. What to look for, what to avoid. This will probably be a recurring topic (hope this won't bore you all out of your trees, particularly those of you who already have roofes over your heads.) Some observations to date:
- Germans do not appear to sell their houses privately with any frequency. (Is the realtor fielding a few phone calls really worth 10k to you? (And then another 10k to me btw.)) And if they have more than one realtor, you could get stuck paying it twice. Haven't quite figured out how that works yet.
- I think I could get a lawyer in the states to review the sales contract for a hell of a lot less than 1,5 % of the sales price. My normally mild-mannered German said, "Anwalte - die kriegen so-wie-wo für jeden Scheiss ein Arschvoll Geld." Shocked the britches off me.
- People advertising apartments are sneaky with the living area. Always make sure you get a good look at the size of the place according to the DIN. It's much smaller.
- We hear that prefab houses from the 50's are/can be crap (hell-hörig, schlecht gedämmt).
- We want to avoid buying near a Hauptschule - although it's not a dealbreaker because the days of the Hauptschule may be numbered anyway.
5 comments:
Maybe you should have studied law then if you'd make so viel Geld :-P
ps how is the driving learning going?
AND did our lovely eltern tell you i have to miss the nichte's 3rd geburtstag bc i will be in friggin oklahoma? you don't have sympathy, i'm sure, but she's my godbaby, and a june baby at that, so i'm sad i have to miss it.
ok i could have emailed you that, but i'm on here so whatever.
Well, here's some stuff to do while in Oklahoma.
Ok, so I'm the only one reading this blog who'd be interested in those sites, but it'll help pass the time, at least if you're in Oklahoma City or Tulsa.
It's a good idea to tell *everyone* you know you're looking for a house. We totally lucked out and found ours through word of mouth before it went on the market and got to bypass a realtor that way. The seller also knew a Notar, a family friend, who took care of all the details so things were fairly painless. Of course he received a hefty fee for doing it, but this was 12 years ago and I can't remember what percentage he got. But at least we saved on the Maklergebühren. Our house was built in 1969 and is very solid. Don't know about houses built in the 50's but you can have people come in and do a Gutachter to check what kind of shape a prospective house is in. Also, if you find a house you like, make sure you visit it morning, noon and night and on the weekends to check out the noise factor, how much sun you get, what the traffic is like, who's coming and going etc.
haha thanks, Paul.
I don't know how much free time we'll have while in OKC (it's again a work meeting...I get sent random places, really)..I think we're doing the OKC Memorial. We shall see.
But how appropriate for you to suggest baseball sites haha
Hope all is well!
Your German was right about the lawyers!
The modern prefabs (fertighauser) are very good and very energy efficient :)
Post a Comment