Encouraged about the new house

We're sure there will be snags of some sort with the new house, but so far things have been encouraging. We set the financial transfer going on Friday when the exchange rate was about the best it has been in the past few months. The money should arrive in our Cyprus account tomorrow or Friday. Our solicitor here said that we now have the official approval to buy (basically a rubber-stamp for Europeans, but the application still has to be made) and he was collecting the paperwork today.

This afternoon we went to see the house again, to take measurements for curtains, and so that Tim could decide which bedroom he wanted. We were also interested to know if the owners had made a start on packing! We were pleasantly surprised to see that they've already moved out - all the main furniture has gone, there are just odd bits and pieces lying around, recognisable anywhere in the world as the detritus of moving. They could probably finish in a couple of days if necessary, so the end of next week should be fine. They've had problems with their new house - difficulties with planning, and - as ever in this country - everything taking much longer than promised. The guy was feeling very frustrated about it. His English is basic, but we were impressed at how well he managed to communicate in the absence of a translator. He showed Richard all the technical parts of the house - power points, the gas that powers the central heating, the arial sockets for the TVs and satellites, the pump that enables good pressure in the upstairs bathroom, and so on. He's clearly done everything to a very high standard.

With no furniture, the house did look much in need of painting, but we had planned to do that anyway. We're not entirely sure where all our furniture is going, since when studying the plans we had quite forgotten about the central heating radiators in every room! However we won't need to use those for a few months.

It feels very odd to think we'll soon be making our home in a new neighbourhood. The upstairs two storeys are less than 20 years old, so it's probably the most modern house we've ever lived in, and potentially one of the nicest. Tim thinks it's quite amusing that at this stage in our lives we've moving to a seven-bedroomed house... although one of the rooms he's counting as a bedroom is going to be my study, and another will be the music studio. Of course he has a point, but we'll only really be using the upstairs house, which has three bedrooms (plus the study). Also we hope to have more guests when there's the entire downstairs two-bedroomed flat available.

It all seems more real, somehow, and a little scary.