The Handover & The Preludes. Part III.

After some serious thoughts, we decided to go for a HDB flat. It's a shame to say that for the 4 years here, we've not enjoyed the facilities much. Some we haven't used it before.. the rest can be counted with 2 hands. We've also never participated in any of the events (flea market/fun fair/family day/AGM/etc) organised by the management/committee. So we thought it would be wiser to get a HDB flat, which is of no difference to our current lifestyle, & pay the rightful price. What we miss will be the close proximity & convenience of the basement car park though.

Started our home hunting immediately after buyer signed the OTP. Viewed a few units & both of us set eyes on the 1st one. But we didn't dare to commit as our buyer hadn't exercised the option then (still within the 2 weeks for buyer to settle their bank loan). We're a lil anxious that the unit we liked would be taken up by the time we're ready but we kept reminding ourselves that God was in control. 2 weeks later, the OTP was exercised by the buyer & we also got the place that we want!

Thank God for the perfect timing:) We sold high, when the property market was picking up, & bought low, before reaching its high when almost all home owners started to ask for cash above valuation especially for those units near MRT station. And ours was near Sembawang MRT & zero cash. 1 or 2 weeks after we bought our place, our agents told us prices went up & cash required by all sellers.....

The next was to settle the temporary housing issue. As the sale can be completed in 10 weeks & we might only get the keys to our new place, earliest, in mid Nov (1st appointment with HDB is ridiculously scheduled as far as in Oct!) & then renovate.... there's a lapse of 4 months+. We explored a few possible options & chose 1 that would (hopefully) cause the least inconvenience to everyone including ourselves. Mum will stay with sis & we'll be putting up @ Aunty GS' for these months.

Property fever

Last Sat we went for a good friend's (my ex-colleague) housewarming lunch. She & the husband bought this apartment in Eunos at the right time, just before the surge. It's a 3+1 but they commented that the overall area size was smaller than ours. We told them that it's either location or size. Unless you are really rich to be able to afford both. For theirs, there's actually nothing much to criticize about... They like small development & for one with total 44 units, a "fish tank" swimming pool (transparent walls), gym & kids' playground are all accomodated. Also comes with a see-through balcony & all needed like backyard, bomb shelter, maid's toilet... They paid less than $700k for their pool view unit & the biggest attraction is the approx 5-min walk to/from Eunos MRT station. Was such a good deal. She said a few months back similar unit was sold for $1 million!

As for TM's, he bought his 4-bedroom unit in Tiong Bahru for less than $800k & now collects a monthly rent of $5k. Whoopz!

Even our place, there had been calls asking whether we would be interested to sell/rent out. The price was definitely better than in the past but we opted out. Sell high, buy high too.

But the market is kinda cooling down now.

Interesting Weekend

Saturday, brought mum to a GP as she's not well. After sending her home, we're supposed to go get lunch when we saw the nearby condo's showflat was opened for viewing. It's by the same developer as ours, same property age too. We drive pass it everyday & been interested in the interior as they've maisonette apartments besides the normal 3 & 4 bedrooms. It's also conveniently located next to some coffee shops & within walking distance to Chong Pang. At first (after we bought ours) we did wonder could this be a better choice instead?

So there we were, out of curiosity, at the showflat of this 3+1 duplex unit. I love the 2-storey concept... The ceiling (@ the dining area) is 2-storey high! Wow! And it's not so pricy for its size (1800 sqft+).. though it's still much more ex than ours of course. But as we visited a few more units, we're totally turned off. The corridor is just like a storage or dumping ground! Most of the households put their shoe racks outside.. not 1, but at least 2 or even 3 of such per unit. And the shoes, which appeared to be over-populated, are not properly placed but all over the place. There're kid's bicycles everywhere.. also cabinets & cartons! That set us wondering.. why, in the 1st place, would they wanna spend so much to stay there? The facilities & common area are poorly maintained too.
So we're happy to be back to our own place & quite convinced that the management of our development is good.

After the "eye-opening" visit, we went to J8 to have our car washed while we loitered for about 3 hrs.

Went home 5ish & out again past 7. Had a simple dinner @ Marina Square & wanted to go for a drink @ Paulaner Brauhaus. But it's so packed! We then went on to Balaclava & had a pint of Hoegaarden there. Indulged in the good old feeling (like during our courtship). We both agreed we should do that once in a while :) It's slightly past 12 when we left.

Enjoying our Hoegaarden

Sunday, chauffeured mum to & from church. Soon after, left home again to attend a Malay wedding in Bedok Reservoir.. my colleague's daughter's. On the way fetched Claris & bf in Yishun. The 3 of them hadn't attended any Malay wedding before so they're quite excited about it especially Vince. It turned out to be quite interesting & stayed for a lil longer than expected. By the way hubby loved the food!

We then rushed to VivoCity as we're meeting LL & Mandy @ 5.30. LL's younger sis joined us & we'd dinner @ Marché. We're pretty disappointed by the variety & guess they're very much limited by space. Also, it's supposedly sitting on a great location but all windows are facing inside (ie. the building's exits). Unlike the 1st restaurant we went with mum on 1 of the Sundays last Dec, the Imperial Herbal Restaurant which is very much a business restaurant, the view is superb. OK back to our gathering... We didn't get to chat much & after dinner, we walked around by ourselves. Glad that we'd dinner early as when we left, there's quite a long Q & I hate queuing. After an hour or so, we finally met up again in front of Forever21 & had a short chat there & then before we ended the night. Yep.. we'll get together again, hopefully soon.

On our way home, we went to Constance's place to pick up my necklace.

A busy weekend but it's a great one!