Surreal - that's how this day is to me. Why? Because today, December 1,
2012, Adrin and I took the big leap and made a reservation for the purchase of
our future house!
It was after lunch when we met Tita Marisol, our broker contact, for a
house-tripping to the village that we've been eyeing for quite some time
now (I can no longer count the times I've checked out that place online). It's an on-going housing project nearby my parents' place with units we like at
the budget we can afford. As soon as we reached the location, we checked the
model houses and inquired about the specifications and details that come with
each unit. The dressed-up units were all beautifully decorated and arranged
that it makes you want to live in that exact same house already. Haha!
With our heart set out on the Sabine unit, we proceeded to the sales
office to check the latest house inventory. We were hoping that there is one
that would meet all our requirements:
1. Total contract price within our budget!
2. Turnover date before our wedding
3. Manageable equity/down payments
4. Linear park (nice to have borderline necessity). Hihi.
 |
| Sabine House Model |
Anyway, as we were checking the list of available units, we noticed
there were only very few Sabine units left compared to the other two models.
Most of the remaining Sabine units do not meet a requirement or two. Luckily,
there is one (yes, just one) meeting all of them. The only catch is, it is single
attached unit instead of a single detached one. This is one we haven’t pondered on since
we didn't know that there are always units like that in a block. We
discussed this setup in detail with Tita Marisol and she mentioned that units
like this are sturdier than the others since the firewall of the two houses are
stuck together like a common wall. This settled our doubts somehow.
Given that specific unit as sample, payment options were laid out on the table. We
explained to Tita Marisol all scenarios that we’d like to explore and she has
been very patient explaining to us the pros and cons of each. She helped us
compute and recompute everything just so we fully understand the financial
hurt that we’ll experience once we pursue the house. She also mentioned of the
terms and conditions of the developer as well as the policies implemented and
duties imposed on the eventual homeowners.
After a lengthy discussion, she invited us to the actual site which is
several hundred meters away from the office. There we saw that majority of the
houses were already built, occupied even, while some are still undergoing
construction. Being in the actual location gave us a glimpse into the
community that we might possibly belong to (since we haven’t decided yet at
this point).
Before returning to the sales office, we asked for some personal
discussion time from Tita Marisol. Adrin and I went to the park near the model
houses and that’s where we discussed things. Since we already know the amount
to be paid should we get the house, we looked into our current pool of savings
as well as fixed monthly income to compute whether we can actually afford it or
not. Our immediate concern is the equity (down payments), and based on our
computation, we’ll still be able to cover for it while simultaneously saving up for the wedding. The amortization is easier to solve since it's of lower value that the down payments, and by time we start with it, we’d be
free from the monthly wedding save-up so we can just shift that budget to house
payments.
With all our bases covered, we walked back to the office and finally
gave our decision to reserve the house! Whew! What a big decision to make. Filling up the forms and formalizing the actual reservation was a breeze compared to the
stringent discussion and thought process we've undergone before that.
I told you, it felt so surreal. It’s just so hard for me to believe that I'm already making decisions like this with my future better half. We really felt (at least I did) like grown-ups stirring our
future closer to our childhood dreams. J
Cheers!
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