The house

Here it is!



Pretty, eh?

I have no inside pictures because I was trotting around with the inspector and he only took pictures of things like the hydrostat and plug sockets and plumbing.

So we waived our conditions today and have officially bought this house, to close on March 16. Gah. Remind me again that this was a good idea?!

Now the fun (not) truly begins

Booked the house/fire inspection this morning. $550 for that. He's coming on Saturday which is good, since I don't want to take time off work for that.

Rob is arranging the deposit to the seller's agent. $5000.

Arranged financing with mortgage broker. $5270 CMHC fees because we are only putting down 3%. At least they'll roll that into the mortgage. 5.2% 5-year fixed rate mortgage.

Called lawyer to let him know documents were on their way, gave him the heads up. $1500 for fees and disbursements.

Gave the insurance company the heads-up that we'd be swarming them soon. I don't know what that will be $$-wise.

And good God, I have to buy my license stickers ($75) and my professional license needs renewal (Happy Birthday, give us $250!).

Buying a house ain't cheap!

We bought a house!

Oh yes. I didn't expect this to get done in a week. Crazy. I don't have a picture of the house, unfortunately.

We saw the place Friday night. We walked in and said, "This is the one!" It's a triplex. First floor appartment is 1-bedroom, all original wood, brand new carpets, paint, kitchen stuff (sink, fixtures). Good colour taste too. Second appartment is 2 floors, on second floor a bedroom, living room, kitchen, bathroom, on third floor another bedroom. The amazing thing about this one is the bathroom. Slate floors, cathedral ceilings, a SKYLIGHT! All new paint, carpet, fixtures up here, too. Third apartment is the basement, pretty typical 1-bedroom, but pretty bright and spacious for a basement. It needs a bit of finish work (paint).

So we get home, and it's listed for the ridiculous price of $179,900. What the heck is wrong? This is nicer than most of what we've seen at 210. We make an offer and figure out why. Two young guys bought this house last year to flip it for a profit, and they now HATE each other and are out of money. They need to sell, and they need to sell fast.

So we bought it for $170,000. I should say we stole it. Amazing. Who knew we could be so lucky? Well - it still has to pass inspection, but we shall see. He had an inspection done when he bought it a year ago, and he's insured. So I don't think it'll be a problem.

Are we crazy? Yes, we are!

Holy man. We're standing on the precipice, about to take the plunge. Teetering there, every day asking "Are you sure? Should we?"

The make or break moment is fast approaching. We have crazy people willing to lend us vast mortgages for basically nothing, we have a hard-working real estate agent, and we have a plan. Hopefully the plan is solid and the numbers crunch together properly. We shall see. This is not short-term riches, but long-term savings and retirement plan. However, you still want to at least break even while you're paying for these types of investments. Anyway...here are some of the houses we're looking at:

33 Nightingale, 3-plex, nets about $200 a month:


203 Grenfell, another 3-plex, does alright:


143 Avondale, 4-plex, good income, bad-ish neighborhood:


And then, the top of the line, 21 Proctor. If you know Hamilton at all, this is a beautiful street and even in bad landlord times tenants line up to rent here. This is expensive and barely within our top price range. But it actually makes money, since the rent is high:


This is only a few of what we're looking at. We're going to see these places tonight. We've already seen 6 and completely eliminated 4 of them. Of the other 2, one is still a maybe, the other is a definite yes but unfortunately they JUST accepted someone else's offer. Bah. Snipers.