Holy shit.

I think we just bought a house.

We were prepared to walk away at an insultingly low price, and the desperate bastards took it.

We almost bought a house last week.
It was old. It needed extensive renovation. It wasn't in the school zone we wanted.

But the signs weren't right, and you know how I likes my semiotics.

We decided we wanted that particular house last Sunday morning. We went back for a second look and then drove around the block to discuss it. And then we went back to make an offer. We rang the door bell, but no one answered. We thought they'd gone out. Turns out, the doorbell wasn't working.

We tried catching up with those people that night so we could officially make an offer, but they were drunk.

Then, due to one thing or another happening, the lady who owned the house – she was a real estate agent, who was selling her own property – didn't catch up with us until Wednesday night.
But then she tried playing us by saying said she couldn't now consider the price we had originally mentioned, as it was too low.
We said that was all we were prepared to pay. D-Missus even asked whether she was sure she didn't want us to put it officially on paper, just in case. She declined.

She rang back at lunch time the next day, saying she would take our offer after all. But by then we had slept on it and decided we didn't want it.

Sucker.

Then yesterday we had a look at another house. They had brought their price down, so their asking price was even less than what we had been prepared to pay for the other. It is a 10-year-old house, in the school zone we want, four bedrooms, double garage.

We wanted to make an offer, but before we did we remembered that all the houses we had bought in the past we'd gotten by going in very low with our offers and then having them unexpectedly accepted.

And then before we called the real estate agent in, I heard a riroriro bird sing; a bird I've always associated with good luck.

So early tonight we started with an extremely low offer. We made two more “final offers” before we were prepared to walk away. We were a bit nervous, because we wanted this house, we knew what the bare minimum the vendor had said they would accept was, and we were still $20k below it.

And then the agent rang back and said they had accepted the offer.

They are leaving the country, so don't have the luxury of sitting tight until they get what they want.

Our final offer was $30k less than what we were prepared to pay for the house we rejected a week earlier.
It means we only have to have a $52,000 mortgage.
The (identical) house next door to the one we are buying sold last month for $70k more than what we are paying. So we could put it back on the market in the summer and make a profit if we wanted. :)

The address has two “8”s in it, which is a good sign.

All going well, it goes unconditional on Friday (we made a cash offer).

All going well, we move at the start of November (a long settlement means our money stays in the bank longer, earning us more interest).

Holy shit.

It's all working out as prophesized.

Fingers crossed…