As you may know Fiona loves pink houses. She has started a little tradition of posing for pictures in font of pink houses if we happen upon one. There are a few of those photos here.Well a few weeks ago we purchased a pink house. Or should I say another pink house. Yes - this will be the second pink house we have owned. Years ago in Southern California we were the proud owners of, as one visitor put it, a big pink box. All it needed was a bow on top...
(pic: our old house in Encinitas)
The new house is less of a coral/princess pink and more of a salmon/orange pink but it still falls within the range of pink according to our daughter. This qualifies it for Hello Kitty curtains and princess awnings.
A pink house may seem strange to some - but we have purchased a house not far from Basel in the Alsace region of France. As in many American communities there are strict rules on house color - except in the Alsace your house must be pink, purple, mint green, or electric blue. Seriously - the mayor has already told us we need permission if we want to change the house color - which we don't.
Just over a year ago we decided to buy a house somewhere near Basel. We don't own any property in the US and we want to stay in the Basel region for a few more years. Buying a house makes financial sense and will give us a bit more flexibility. So we started to investigate buying a house here in Switzerland.
The real estate process is a bit different than in the US - there isn't a buyer's agent so we were on our own to look for places and make appointments. In fact most people here rent and there is very little on the market - driving prices up. We were shocked by the prices - well not shocked by the prices since they were on par with Southern California - but more what you got for the price. After a few depressing months of looking we decided that we might just be better off in a new larger rental. Until someone suggested we look over the border in France. There were apparently some deals to be had - larger houses for less money. Of course France isn't quite as clean or efficient as Switzerland but - in my opinion - they speak a language I can understand a bit more of and they eat better food. Enogh said - I was OK with the idea.
We had been told that as Americans it was nearly impossible to live in France and work in Switzerland. In fact all of the people we know living over there are European or Swiss. No visas required - easy living. We decided to go ahead anyway.
Our first step was to meet with the bank across the border in France - just to make sure they would loan us the money. We found a banker through the recommendation of friends - Vinny as I call him. Thank goodness for Vinny. Vinny is a young and energetic (OK as energetic as French bankers can be) - plus he speaks English almost fluently. Although it was a strange start. Vinny tends to speak English with what I would call a 'Friends' or 'Seinfeld' accent. At first I couldn't place it but after getting to know him a bit he has certainly learned much of his English from TV and likes to throw in a Chandler, Ross or Joey phrase. Well Vinny didn't see a problem with us living in France - could that BE any easier? Like, I don't think so. Cool.
Phase two - finding the house. Not quite as easy as it seems. I do enjoy going over to France - I have a nice pastry, buy some low cost meat/cheese/wine and then head home. Now we were looking for something a bit bigger. We started off with the real estate advertisements. Not so much luck there... Even with the help of some friends we didn't find much on the private sites or through new advertisements. Then one day Aimee found someone at work who was selling a house.
We had looked at a few houses and none of them really came close to what we wanted. They were all a bit close to the city. It is possible to find a house in France that is just a few minutes from downtown Basel and not far from the International school - but these villages come with a premium. So Aimee convinced me to look at a place about 35 minutes from school and 30 minutes from downtown Basel. As the main driver I was quite skeptical. Quite far but some nice scenery sort of like this...
or maybe this...
We arrived for the first viewing and met the owner - Mrs. Robinson as I like to call her and her boyfriend Ben as I will call him. She is German but purchased and renovated the house Ben who is French - she works in big pharma he is a landscaper. Things haven't been so great between them lately (he wasn't living there when we looked at the house) and hence she needs to sell.
We pretty much knew after a few minutes that the house was what we wanted. The showing was quite odd in that Mrs. R, although a native German speaker, speaks English well but not perfectly. When showing us the jacuzzi she held up a chemical tablet and said 'I take one of these before I bathe.' Clearly she meant she put it in the jacuzzi - i just hope the kids don't start popping chemical tablets. We also had a detailed explanation of the oil/wood burning heater. I'm pretty sure we'll be layering on the sweaters for the first few weeks until we actually figure it out.
Ben on the other hand spoke only French and German (sort of Swiss German/Alsatian sounding German). So he explained everything to me in French. Aimee has basic German and I have basic German and basic French. So we were able to get through it and could understand enough to know that they weren't saying - ha ha look at the silly Americans paying too much for the house. They saved that for later. But we were sold and decided to move forward with the buying process... to be continued..
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