I guess this is the first post of this blog and it seems a reasonable place to start. I moved to Scotland with my partner right at the end of 2019. We were selling a flat in London and moved into a rented flat, thinking we'd be here a few months while we settled in to Glasgow and found a place to buy. Then a few things happened.
I mean they happened.
First, legislation came in after the Grenfell Tower fire about cladding on high rise buildings. Eminently sensible legislation, let's be clear, but the problem was without a certificate saying your high rise flat was safe it wasn't mortgageable. My buyer pulled out. So now I was stuck renting a place in Glasgow and paying for a place in London which I couldn't sell.
Well, it's not the worst thing that could happen. We'll get the survey done, get the certificate and sell it again.
Of course it turns out there's only a limited number of people in the country qualified to do that survey and issue that certificate and there's a lot of high rise buildings to cover. It also turns out that when a global pandemic hits and everyone is put on furlough those certificates are not getting issued in a hurry.
I think you can probably see where this is going. We've been in that same rented flat in Glasgow for a lot more than a few months. We did, eventually, sell the flat in London. We then found a nice place we wanted to buy in Glasgow and after some legal tooing and froing were just about ready to buy when... it turns out it's at risk of flooding. We consider the risk and the fact that we both believe climate related events are just going to get more common and... pass. We go back to house hunting.
Then we found another place, looks great for us. Even has a great basement. We could finish that and have even more room down the line... except the basement isn't on the title deed. Huh. Commence more delays and more legal tooing and froing. Well, here we are end of March 2023 and it looks like we're really, really close to moving. Finally. Three years late.
Now what that means is my life is about to get interesting as for various reasons I have a fairly decent bit of money stashed ready for this move so we're going to be doing some renovations, installing some new tech and generally making the place our own. Which will give me a lot to document that I'll probably want to look back on in the future.
Hence, a blog.
It's going to be about, well, stuff that happens to me. It's a personal diary more than anything but if you get something out of reading it then welcome!