We have been informed this is going to be intense. We heard of colleagues who visited more than 30 houses to find the right one. We heard of another one who had the typical bank lease rejected by two different house owners, unsuccessfully, and is still looking. We tried to come prepared a bit, we had a look at it from a distance, and we knew about the style issue - hacienda a go go. We arrived, with our our two jet-lagged kids, some pencils and a coloring book, ipods and snacks, and a camera to help our memory. We thought we were ready.
Yet, we realized quickly that one hard thing was going to find a house that fits our needs. In fact we only need three bedrooms, a dining and living area, a kitchen, simply. By this I mean, do we need a beautiful wine cellar/cave? 5 bathrooms? A gym room (well, maybe for some yoga??)? Yes we want to keep the pool, for sure. About a outdoor kitchen, fully equipped? Maybe. A triple car garage? Not sure. And a sauna? Sure it is nice, but not essential. About 2 rooms for the staff? Oh! we need to house our staff? And about a stock room? And a walk-in closet the size of my kids bedroom? And a library room? And a TV room? and a his and her pool side bathroom?? And a living room larger than a bowling room? You get the idea: the houses here are big. Really BIG.
Yet, we realized quickly that one hard thing was going to find a house that fits our needs. In fact we only need three bedrooms, a dining and living area, a kitchen, simply. By this I mean, do we need a beautiful wine cellar/cave? 5 bathrooms? A gym room (well, maybe for some yoga??)? Yes we want to keep the pool, for sure. About a outdoor kitchen, fully equipped? Maybe. A triple car garage? Not sure. And a sauna? Sure it is nice, but not essential. About 2 rooms for the staff? Oh! we need to house our staff? And about a stock room? And a walk-in closet the size of my kids bedroom? And a library room? And a TV room? and a his and her pool side bathroom?? And a living room larger than a bowling room? You get the idea: the houses here are big. Really BIG.
And the other hard part is to find something we like. You see, even if I do not want to let my "work" interfere with regular life, as an architect, I have trouble closing my eyes when I do house visits. Luckily my husband share a good eye also. How to ignore the bad layouts - dark rooms or areas that are just not usable? Or the badly unplanned transformation of a room into something strange or odd? Or the bad detailing of a building? Or the brilliant haciendation of a modern house, with tiles and shutters all over?? Yes, my eye catches that, it is hard to ignore. I also have trouble with details that shows are easily datable - specially the hacienda meets the 80s era. So that was the harder part.
We logged 10 houses in our first 4 days.
We logged 10 houses in our first 4 days.
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