...as I've just put on a pair of jeans to discover that I can tighten my belt by another notch.
A good motivation nonetheless, as I have committed to doing the Karoo To Coast cycle race in September 2021 and also to losing 10kg in body weight before then. I want to get down to around 90kg.
Onward...
...is never an easy, or likeable, thing to do.
One of these days we will probably be though. We need to become bond-free. I hate banks because of their really poor reasons for needing a house to be bonded.
Why in hell can I buy a car for R1m and pay it off over five or six years, but I cannot buy a house for the same value but it has to be done over a minimum of 20 years?? Doesn't make sense. Unless you are a bank and because the banks are ripping us off in the long term. People NEED houses, but they don't necessarily need a R1m vehicle.
Anyway...rant off.
As mentioned, the objective is to get us bond-free. This will save us nearly R10k a month in retirement benefits. No pensioner should have to pay R10k a month for a house. Ok, maybe we should have bought the house over a shorter period (10yrs, instead of 20yrs, which would have increased the payments accordingly), or we should have bought something cheaper. At the time, not an option.
I take a daily look at the housing prices in Sedgefield, our chosen area to relocate to. The town is peaceful, relatively free of harsh crime, has lots to keep us occupied (nature, beaches, fishing, cycling and walking trails, etc), and is also close to our very good friends who moved there two years ago. There have been a couple of homes we have liked, from the photos, and we have even taken a trip through there to view a couple of homes with one of the local agents. We even put in an offer on a home which was over-priced and had some off-plan changes made that I used thinking that they would reduce the price because of, but that offer was rejected and some schmuck bought the house knowing that there are changes on the buildings which may cost him a lot of money to rectify.
The one thing I don't want to do is relocate over December. The holiday period is traditionally quiet around the country with people taking a well-deserved break form a hard work year. Well, this year hasn't been too hard on the work front, thanks to Covid, but we need a break from everything else that has happened during lockdown. We need a break from lockdown itself. Many of the moving companies will either be closed down, or will be running skeleton staff who feel they should be on holiday so aren't going to take good care of your stuff. Or they will charge an arm and a leg for moving you, compared to during a normal work period.
The holidays are a time when you just want to unwind, have a few (more) braais, a few (more) beers than usual, and just generally get out of the normal day-to-day way of life. Go to the beach, if you can find one that isn't packed with Vaalies, have a swim, lick an ice cream cone, get a little sunburned (great for your VitaminD intake and Covid resistance).
I will complete the renovations on the house in the next couple of weeks and get an agent in to do an evaluation, from which we will decide when to put it on the market and plan on our own move date.
Until then, braai, beer, and beach...maybe get some fishing in...
Take care, y'all...
...since I heard from my BFAM in the USofA, to the extent that I'd thought he was pissed off at me for missing his birthday by a day.
Inexcusable and a poor excuse, I know, but with so much happening these days it slipped my mind.
As it turns out, he had been without a phone for a month and just got a new one yesterday, only to see my message pop up when he got Whatsapp running again.
Still, I am extremely happy to hear from him again, even if it is only his usual cryptic message that he is okay. What with the whole USA Covid spread, and him without a decent job for a while now, it is understandable that I would be concerned not to hear from him. We do go through patches where we don't communicate for months at a time, but our relationship is such that when we do it's as if it was just yesterday that we spoke.
Be safe, Big Man...and stay well. Love you.
