Saving for your first home can be a daunting and overwhelming task. It can be hard to know where to start and how to get to where you want to be. I still remember when we were newly married and set the goal to purchase our first home. It took my complete focus - from when we created our plan, until we signed the contract for that home. It was something we really wanted, so we prioritised our finances and focused on this goal.
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Alexandra. Known as the hottest, driest and coldest town in New Zealand. Have we been here before? We drove through it on our honeymoon 9 years ago. But we didn’t stop. Now we have moved our lives down here. Good move? We sure hope so - and about to find out.
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Buying a house can be a daunting experience. As with anything, the first step is always the biggest, and when you learn the most. It’s often only through hindsight you realise how much there is to know and what you might have done differently. Our property story to date has been concentrated in one city - Auckland. This focus has helped us become experienced in this market, but we are newbies to doing it out of our hometown.
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For a while now, we have been working toward an idea we can’t stop thinking about - The Renovation Road Trip. In short - we are leaving our world in Auckland (including jobs), packing a car and trailer full of the essentials and relocating around New Zealand. The aim is to renovate 2-3 homes in different towns within 12-18 months, as well as taking constant road trips to explore our big backyard. This has been a plan that was conceived and developed over the past 2 years for us. But before we get started, we wanted to begin by sharing why we are doing this crazy, scary thing that is, The Renovation Road Trip.
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I couldn’t stand in the house a moment longer - the smell was overwhelming. We had been to long lists of open homes and Caleb had been focusing on some select suburbs trying to find the next project for us. I got to see some things I would rather have unseen - inappropriate drawings on walls, bedrooms that feel very “fifty shades of grey” (I don’t mean the wall colour), hoarding. But this was the most memorable of them all. At the open home we entered a room with a male tenant laying across a bed in the lounge, shirtless, smoking, who said we had to keep the door closed as there were four cats who weren’t allowed outside. I counted 8 litter boxes - though from the smell I could tell it wasn't the only place these cats relieved themselves. I stood outside trying not to vomit, Caleb looked at me not sure what to expect and was getting ready to start his sales pitch.
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When we first started renovating we were complete rookies. While Caleb knew about property from his studies and beginning his career in project management, he had very limited understanding when it came to DIY or anything practical. And while I had a natural intuition with design and colour scheming, I had no idea about interior design techniques or where to source the products I liked. To sum it up - we had a youthful confidence which is probably best described as pure ignorance. Normally within a blog we would share details of our renovation to provide inspiration and advice - but this is more of an example of what not to do! Our first renovation project was our “boot camp” in renovating - and boy did we realise we weren’t “renovation fit”.
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