Sorted!
We went apartment hunting over last weekend, and looked at quite a few over the 2 days, some very nice , a couple pretty awful. By then end of Saturday we had a favourite but it was a little pricey and also they wanted a tenant for a year, whereas we would prefer 6 months as the idea is to get a mortgage as soon as possible rather than keep paying out rent. But we cant get a mortgage right now as we don’t even exist in this country yet!But then Sunday we saw better places, not that they were loads nicer, but they were prepared to do 6 months, and they were fairly nice as well. And each place we saw was better than the last. Anyway, to cut a long story short, we finally settled on an apartment building that is classified as being in Mundelein, but is right on the border of Vernon Hills, so is really not very far from Gordon’s office. The place has recently been taken over by a new management company, and was closed down for a complete refurb, so everything is brand spanking new. It is still only part opened, with only about half of the apartments finished and let, and they are still building the outdoor pool. Why always outdoor pools when the weather only allows them to be open for a few months? Everywhere seems to have outdoor pools though! So they say the pool will be ready by end of May which is when all the outdoor pools open anyway. Let’s hope that runs to schedule. And they have a brand new clubhouse, with a TV room with huge screen TV, free wireless internet, and a gym. And this is all really close to our apartment, so no more 15 minute walks to get there!
The apartment itself is only a 1 bedroom. We originally looked at 2 bed places, but then realised that the 1 beds were still plenty big enough to have people stay, and much cheaper, so giving us a chance to save more. So 1 bedroom, with plenty of closet space, 1 bathroom, huge living/dining room, kitchen and balcony. The kitchen and bathroom are all completely new, plus new flooring, new paint, new fixtures and fittings. So real luxury living for us! We have signed up for 6 months initially, but could stay or change up to a 2 bed place if still no mortgage hopes and we like it enough after that.
So we move on 27th April, which is the day we have to be out of this temp place anyway. But our stuff from UK doesn’t arrive til at least 6th May, so for a couple of weeks we will be roughing it quite a bit. We brought towels, duvet and bed linen with us, but will have no actual bed, and no other furniture at all, and nothing in the kitchen apart from the appliances (that’s no china, utensils, pots & pans, etc). We are going to ask around to borrow what we can, otherwise will have to sleep on the floor and live on cold food and take-aways, eating with our fingers! I survived Glastonbury (an outdoor music festival which involved camping in pouring rain and ankle deep mud, awful food, being wet and cold continuously) last year, so I can definitely survive that!
And we pick up our truck this Saturday, so we are all sorted. Apart from the fact that we are still trying to sort out car insurance for it. It seems that the fact that we do not have US driving licences means they can charge us an arm and a leg for it. Plus we still need to take out renters insurance, and health insurance for me, all of which had been complicated by the fact that we did not yet have a Social Security number between us and have not been in the country long enough to qualify according to some insurers. But those sorts of things should get easier now as Gordon got his Social Security number yesterday. So now he does exist in the database.
We (that is Gordon) managed to get the home laptop hooked up so that we can go online from home now, so I don’t have to walk down to the office every time, although it is a but slower, but is great to be able to go on and off whenever now, no more planning the whole day around it.
My tenant is still due to move into my place in the UK at the end of this month, so all going well there. And we may finally have a buyer for my car. I had originally put my faith in what I was told by one dealer as to the value of the car, and it now turns out he had over-valued it by around £1000, so that would explain why it didn’t sell! So now it has been valued elsewhere, and the most recent highest bidder on ebay is due to pick it up this week from my Mums. But there was someone else due to go there for it last week, who just never showed up on the day, so I am not counting my chickens just yet. Am keeping fingers crossed though.
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