As you know, we were looking at houses, desperate to move to somewhere with less dog excrement and more than one toilet. We scoured the online rental sites for months. We researched suburb profiles, did Sunday drives to new areas, and as our lease ran out, started doing drive-by’s of potential houses. One Saturday, we even looked inside 2 houses. One house was great, so we applied. Well guess what….We got the house! 
I realised we’d have to rent 2 houses for a while in order to move out of one, and clean it to a bond-worthy state. I wanted to do it in 3 days, but after consultation with a friend I realised a week might be a bit more realistic. The new real estate said we’d have to bring forward our start date anyway, as the owner was impatient to get tenants in. So I agreed to take the house on a Friday, exactly a week before our old lease ran out. On Saturday we would move.
In order to get the keys of my new house, I was required to sign a few forms and hand over the GDP of a small nation. Do you have 6 weeks rent in cash, asked the real estate agent? Who has outrageous sums of money like that in cash, I ask you? So I borrowed her computer and did an internet bank transfer, which wasn’t nearly so terrifying. She gave me the keys. With shaking hands I took them, and headed to my new house.
The house looked very different now it was mine. I noticed that the floors were encrusted with mud. The back door didn’t open once I closed it, the griller hadn’t been cleaned, the second toilet leaked badly, and (drumroll please) the second toilet DIDN’T WORK! How did I miss this stuff at the initial “open house”? We had a least 15 seconds (with another family traipsing through and an aloof estate agent intently ignoring us) to look around and decide if we wanted to spend the next several years of our life here. I had noticed some other stuff, like the letterbox sitting in the bushes, gates not shutting properly etc, but we weren’t in a position to call the shots. No, we were in a position to say in grovely tones “please choose us”. Anyway, it was ours now, so to get on with it. After waiting for hours, wishing I’d brought the mop, the electrician finally came to connect the power. Wouldn’t you know it –the lights and stove circuit were unsafe, so he couldn’t connect them. Ahhhhh! I called the real estate and they arranged an electrician to fix the problems. Tomorrow. I was starting to worry we’d made a hasty decision to move here, and the old house wasn’t looking too bad after all.
Next began the arduous task of actually moving. As usual, I’m heavily pregnant…what’s with that? I’m hardly at my most physically dexterous, emotionally balanced and clear-thinking. Its been 3 years since we last moved (I was also heavily pregnant), but this time we have twice as many children and at least twice as much stuff. Nevertheless, the move had to be done (or we were committed to doing it). We packed all our stuff into boxes, borrowed a ute and spent a whole Saturday hauling load after load of stuff to the new house. We were fortunate enough to have the help of a couple of friends who can lift heavy things (not a euphemism for dumb, although they did volunteer for a day of hard labour). Thanks Dumpy and Brett, we couldn’t have done it without you! By evening the old house was empty and the new house was full. Everyone was exhausted, hungry and filthy, so we ordered pizza. I looked around at the pile of boxes and furniture and realised we were a long way from finished. As long as I could locate the kids’ beds and rustle up some makeshift bedding, this day was done. The electrician had fixed the lights and stove, and we were officially MOVED!
So now we live in the new house. We’ve been here 2 weeks today, although I spent most of the first week scrubbing the old place. I cleaned until my hands were sandpaper. The old house came up spotless, causing the new house to look grotty in contrast. Everything is relative. Now we’re in negotiations with the new real estate to fix the stuff that needs fixing, and to organise/compensate us for the cleaning that hasn’t been done. Everything’s unpacked, life is starting to flow smoothly. The house is light and breezy, there’s breakfasts on the balcony, spontaneous trips to the park across the road, and harmonious evenings in our new house. I’m sure the second toilet will be functioning soon, and there’s no sign of doggy-do. It feels like a good decision to have moved here. It feels like home, sweet home.
Hi, I’m Lara: mum, wife, and maker of Extremely Nappies.
I picked the place I’m in at the moment because 1) it looked lovely, and 2) it was the only place I looked at that had a bath tub, which I deemed necessary as I have a small child.
Move in and promptly discover the taps into the bath tub only provide cold water. I ask you: who the hell bathes in a bath tub full of COLD water? WHO? Who renovates their bathroom to include a bath tub knowing there will be no hot water for it? Surely the builders would have said “you do realise there’ll be no hot water to the tub, yeah?”.
I spent the first couple of weeks reboiling the kettle over and over, and eventually just bought a bucket. Fill bucket with hot in shower, pour into the bath. It makes me a little sad every. single. time.
oh jasmine, that is SO sad. apparently there’s this thing called “home owner’s insurance” that cover the cost of repairs (and lets say it needs repairing, coz no one would deliberately install cold-only taps to a bathtub). So if you hassle your realestate, they can hassle the landlord, who can hassle the insurance company to get it fixed. Then every time you fill the bath you will feel a little bit happy. that will make me happy too.