I bought a house

[Smid]

Over the past 18 months or so, Mrs Smid and I have been in the process of buying a block of land, getting council approvals and permits and building a house. Today we picked up the keys for our new place! It's taken long enough but very exciting now it's complete!

[Proud Lieberal from Northeast]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-0utDrWa5w

[dead0man]

Cool and congrats.

[Grumps]

Congrats, Mate!  Enjoy!

[Thomas D]

When I first saw this I thought it said "I bought a horse"

Anyway, congrats on the house.

[Platypus]

Even if it confirms you and Mrs as Evil Easterners...

Congratulations mate, can't wait to bring over some beers and check the serenity.

[Torie]

Congratulations. Boy homes are expensive in Sidney. They had an episode there on HGTV international of a couple looking to rent a home. They ended up renting some rather drab thing in the boonies for about $3,000 a month.

[I'm JewCon in name only.]

Congrats

[Χahar]

Is it common to buy a plot of land and then build a house on it? When I saw the thread title (and your Facebook status), I thought that you had bought a house from someone else.

Congratulations. Boy homes are expensive in Sidney. They had an episode there on HGTV international of a couple looking to rent a home. They ended up renting some rather drab thing in the boonies for about $3,000 a month.

Smid lives in Melbourne, of course.

[Swing low, sweet chariot. Comin' for to carry me home.]

congrats

[J. J.]

Congratulations.  The bank now owns your soul. 

[Smid]

Thanks for the well-wishes, everyone!

I do indeed live in Melbourne, Torie, although my new house is technically in a town outside of Melbourne (commuter town, to borrow the British phrase), since there is farmland between it and the edge of the Melbourne suburbs. It's about 65km along the Motorway from the CBD, and there's a railway line, too. I'll try to post some photos next week but we have a gorgeous view across a cow paddock to some distant hills.

Xahar, most people would buy an established home, but with population growth, mostly migration (both inter-state and international) many new houses and apartments need to be built to accommodate people. We bought a house and land package on the edge of town. It's been a while because our block needed to be subdivided, which required council approval. The construction took just under six months.

Hugh, we're looking forward to having you over for drinks and dinner. Spare bedroom, etc.

[Senator Clarence]

Congratulations-

[Gustaf]

Cool to hear! Congratulations!

[Vasall des Midas]

If you built it yourself, why do you need to "pick up the keys"? Oh wait, you had someone build it for you.

[Gustaf]

If you built it yourself, why do you need to "pick up the keys"? Oh wait, you had someone build it for you.

I wonder how common that is today in the Western world. My grandfather built his own house for  his family but I don't know anyone now who's done that.

[Vasall des Midas]

No one literally builds their own house today - at least, not alone. Some people like to have as much control over plans, construction etc as possible and also muck in and "help" / annoy on the building site, however. I guess if you neither picked it from a catalogue nor simply bought a new house that you have no or next to no influence on how it looked (say on a brand new privately built estate) - in which case of course you're still making the decision to buy before it's actually finished - I'd call it "building a house".

[Platypus]

Smid and Mrs Smid have been pretty involved in the process from what I understand, without being too annoying.

[Boris]

No one literally builds their own house today - at least, not alone. Some people like to have as much control over plans, construction etc as possible and also muck in and "help" / annoy on the building site, however. I guess if you neither picked it from a catalogue nor simply bought a new house that you have no or next to no influence on how it looked (say on a brand new privately built estate) - in which case of course you're still making the decision to buy before it's actually finished - I'd call it "building a house".

My parents built the house they currently live in back in 1998 (in fact, I think most, if not all, of the houses in my neighborhood were customly built for the owners).  I don't remember the process too well since I was around 8 at the time, but they fired the original architect due to visionary disagreements or whatever so they definitely had some sort of creative control over the process. They actually had a Hindu priest bless the then-empty lot prior to construction, as I recall.

[Smid]

We picked our block from among the ones available, but it was narrow, so they had to redo the plans. The plans they showed us had a fourth bedroom, but we told them we wanted to sacrifice that for a walk-in robe and ensuite. We also got them to reduce the laundry size for more space in the bathroom, so we could fit a bath without it being under the shower. Then we switched the normal, shallow bath for a deep bath, with a tiled rim around (room for wine bottle and glasses). We also picked all our colours, from bricks and roof tiles and garage door colour, etc, to carpet and floor tiles, wall tiles, shade of paint, the cupboard and benchtops colours for kitchen, bathroom and ensuite. We also made a change with the island in the kitchen, to leave a space in the middle to install a wine cooler/fridge.

[Ebowed]

Congratulations. Boy homes are expensive in Sidney. They had an episode there on HGTV international of a couple looking to rent a home. They ended up renting some rather drab thing in the boonies for about $3,000 a month.

Tell me about it!  We managed to find a rather nice house for $2700 a month (lowered price after being on the market for a couple of months), and needless to say I have dialed down some of the more luxurious aspects of my lifestyle.

[Vasall des Midas]

No one literally builds their own house today - at least, not alone. Some people like to have as much control over plans, construction etc as possible and also muck in and "help" / annoy on the building site, however. I guess if you neither picked it from a catalogue nor simply bought a new house that you have no or next to no influence on how it looked (say on a brand new privately built estate) - in which case of course you're still making the decision to buy before it's actually finished - I'd call it "building a house".

My parents built the house they currently live in back in 1998 (in fact, I think most, if not all, of the houses in my neighborhood were customly built for the owners).  I don't remember the process too well since I was around 8 at the time, but they fired the original architect due to visionary disagreements or whatever so they definitely had some sort of creative control over the process. They actually had a Hindu priest bless the then-empty lot prior to construction, as I recall.

See, that's the kind of situation I was thinking of, that I would count as "building a house".

[Sibboleth]

Nice to hear that that sort of thing is going well, you know

If you built it yourself, why do you need to "pick up the keys"? Oh wait, you had someone build it for you.

I wonder how common that is today in the Western world. My grandfather built his own house for  his family but I don't know anyone now who's done that.

When our family got a bit big for what was effectively a two-up two-down, my dad did the wiring for the little extension and was involved (though I can't quite remember how much; this was ages ago) in some other stuff. Of course given his job...

[Gustaf]

Nice to hear that that sort of thing is going well, you know

If you built it yourself, why do you need to "pick up the keys"? Oh wait, you had someone build it for you.

I wonder how common that is today in the Western world. My grandfather built his own house for  his family but I don't know anyone now who's done that.

When our family got a bit big for what was effectively a two-up two-down, my dad did the wiring for the little extension and was involved (though I can't quite remember how much; this was ages ago) in some other stuff. Of course given his job...

Yeah, I guess that is a prerequisite. My grandfather was a construction worker so I guess building a house came rather naturally to him as well.