It is official - we are moving in January! And as all good planners do, we have changed most of our plans:
-rent, renovate and sell before we buy a new house -> bought a new house this friday and will be moving early January no matter what
-split the family for a few months to make time for renovating -> moving all together to start fresh as a unit
-big renovation to maximise price, optimise sell date -> paint and finish details, ignore the big projects, sell when we are ready
The good part: The new house is half the size, and costs 2-300 000 less than what we expect to get for the old one. I will get a pay rise, and the cost of living are substantially lower than here. So we can afford to sit on both houses for some months.
Nobody does private sales here, so we can't sell without a realtor. But we have had three different ones over, and will compare offers. Have a good feeling for one of them, hope his price is ok.
The renovations are getting along nicely. The garden has been our main focus, and it looks like we might be able to finish it before the snow comes (unless it comes tomorrow, you never know this time of year). The rainy days we have been painting. The kids are really a big help, and I think it will look very bright and nice. When that first room is finished, we will start packing stuff in boxes and put them there. That way we can empty and paint more rooms.
There is a lot left to do, and we will get an appraisal from a renovator tomorrow to see how much it will cost to get someone else to do parts of it.
The new house is half the size of the one we have now, so we have to get rid of half of our stuff. So far two big boxes have been taken to charity, one more is ready to go, and I have invited friends over next week to help me reduce my yarn collection. The kids will keep some of their books, but most are going to our summer house. The same goes for the fine china that I never use. I have already donated 95% of the cook books and half of the other books. Every time I go past the shelves, I pick a few more for the charity box.
Most of our furniture is old, and not in a good way. We have decided to keep only the oldest bed (approaching 200 years), but even that will get a new matress. The comfortable antique chairs will also be brought along, together with the sofa and living room table. But other than that, I think we will either burn the rest of the furniture or give it to charity.