Good luck with the move, Mother Bear

[nickydwuk]

Just wanted to send positive vibes for your impending move and hope things aren't too bad Remember my garden shed is still available at a reasonable rent (12 months in advance ).

[MotherBear]

Thanks, Nicky. It's been another day of it with Purdey, our cat who suffers from epilepsy, still vomiting. She's been poorly for a few days now with no sign of recovery. Took her to the vet's tonight and she thinks it could be 'the stress of moving'. I think we could all identify with that. Hubster's had another row this evening, this time with the removers who decided they'd come an hour later tomorrow than agreed. We're trying to go like the clappers to get the move finished in one day because rain is forecast for Weds. and when it rains properly here it's torrential, everything floods and people die, so not a good day for moving house, especially with small open-backed lorries. They'll be toing and froing between the 2 houses for ever.

It's all in the lap of the gods but I would like to keep open the option to make use of your garden shed in case, at some point, we feel we've had enough of the young landlady's interfering father and decide to hand her house and all it's troubles back to her.

For anyone who doesn't already know and may be awaiting pearls of wisdom from me in the coming weeks/months, I probably won't be on the Internet for a while until we manage to fix up something. Haven't even got mains water yet let alone a phone line so things will have to proceed at their normal pace as usual.

Take care everyone and I hope your plans and preparations move forward fruitfully and without hassle. I'll try to have a sneak peek at how you're all getting on when I visit an Internet cafe so it had better not be a case of 'when the cat's away......' or in my case 'when the bear's away......'.

[ebianca]

I've got my fingers crossed for you MB for a smooth transition.

I hope it isn';t too long before you get back on the net- we will miss you and I want to see you back on here before I make the big move in March.

Thinking of you- keep safe.

[MotherBear]

Thanks Beth.

Well, isn't this fun. Just returned from taking the first load of stuff up to the house. Landlady, Salwa, was up there with us last night and assured us all sorts of jobs including filling the water tank and cleaning through the house plus a plethora of other jobettes like fixing the defunct lock on the balcony door, fixing mirrors and particularly putting in plumbing for the washing machine (which was overlooked when they built the house). Nothing has been done despite several rows about it. We have no water for the toilet or washing hands, no facility for a washing machine and the place is still dirty especially the toilets where the workmen have been using them all week without water to flush. It's appalling. They've had 6 weeks to sort this lot out and haven't done a thing apart from painting.

Feel sick to my stomach about the whole thing.

[Glenda]

I am SO angry for you. How could any landlord expect anyone to move into a property in that state and with no water? Surely it is breach of contract?

Do hope things work out OK and the rain keeps away. If we all send good vibes, maybe some of it will stick. l look forward to hearing from you when you 'escape' to the internet cafe.

[MotherBear]

Originally Posted by Glenda

Surely it is breach of contract?

That's what I keep hearing from hubster. I'm just so weary of all the fighting to get them moving, all the false promises and the worry that, if they can't do simple things like filling the water tank and cleaning the place, how will we ever get the bigger jobs done once we've handed over the 6 months rent in advance? Salwa is too immature to be a landlady and doesn't take the role seriously. All we get from the agent is 'She's young and is learning the ropes'.

It's half past midnight and we've just returned from our second trip up. It's worrying that our smaller stuff is there now but workmen will be wandering in at some point to do odds and sods. We have a key to one of the front doors (we have 2, front doors that is ) and that is all. The removal men will have to cart all the heavy furniture and appliances around the house to get into the relevant rooms because Salwa's brother, who lives next door, has all the keys. He was supposed to hand them over to us tonight but was conveniently 'out' and will be off to work tomorrow morning by the time we get there.

If ever there were signs that we shouldn't be taking on this house, I think we've had them all. I feel totally

[selchie]

I didn't know that poor Purdey was also suffering so badly. What a nightmare for all of you. I can't imagine what compels people to neglect their responsibilities so much and to treat others in a way they would not ever wish for themselves

Here's hoping Salwa grows up, gets a backbone and finds her conscience. Soon.

We've a guest room you can use when Nicky's shed is too chilly.

[MotherBear]

After all the drama of 'I'll probably be off the Internet for months' we managed to get an Internet facility via a mobile phone company the day after we moved in. Just haven't had time to hook it up until today and certainly wouldn't have had the time to use it.

The move itself went pretty smoothly with the last of the 4 loads being brought over in the rain. It could have been worse, the next day it threw it down and there was severe flooding in a lot of places. Boy, were we lucky!

A tanker finally brought water half way through the first morning so I rushed around flushing all the toilets that the workmen had been using since the last load of water had been used up. Unfortunately the relief of having water was offset by the plethora of leaks that suddenly became apparent. I could write a page full of details about what's wrong with this place and it's only confirmed my suspicions that the house has been built on shoestring by a cowboy builder and, worryingly, the results are showing immediately and it doesn't bode well for the future. What is really upsetting is that, after the first month, we become responsible for all repairs and maintenance - something we should have asked about at the outset, but it's so unusual for landlords not to sort out the repairs themselves that we overlooked it. I put it to Salwa that, at this rate, we'll be doing the contractor's job and putting the house to rights for her at our expense but it just went over her head. Every day something else goes and, if these problems can't be fixed permanently, hubster might as well hand his salary over to Salwa as it'll all be going on repairs. Some things can be fixed but when materials and fittings are cheap and nasty there's not much one can do e.g. one of the kitchen cupboard doors fell off the first day, the 'stainless' steel sink unit is already badly marked in the places where the plastic protective covering has come off, so I'm leaving the rest on there as I don't want to be blamed for damaging her sink, then the plastic drainage pipes under the sink unit are just pushed together and not sealed, hence, when water is run it leaks into the cupboard beneath.

Because it's her first house and first stab at playing landlady, Salwa's head is in the cloud's. Being so young, she hasn't yet found out the consequences of buying cheap rubbish and, unfortunately, we're going to be the ones who will bear the brunt of it. We're running behind with the settling in and unpacking because every day there's been meetings about the problems which have taken a long time. Day 2 we had to go to our bank to get the money for the 6 months-up-front rental payment. What should have taken us about 1 1/2 hours with a stop-off to sign up for the Net, took 5 hours because of traffic jams due to the floods so we lost a whole morning and part of the afternoon.

Apart from that we're settling in OK, although anyone who calls here and is silly enough to stand outside for more than a few minutes gets stoned by the little darlings next door. Today it was an Indian guy who has been sent to try to sort out some of the problems. We seem to have landed in the midst of yob city with hordes of boys roaming around looking for mischief. Just hope they don't spot our Chunky out on his rounds and try to grab him. One good thing is that Purdey, who was very sick for a week before we moved and also when she was in the cattery during our move, has now settled down again without any sign of sickness so that's a big relief. Thoughts are she might have been reacting to the stress of what was going on around her.

So, that's a 'quick' update. I'm still pretty busy unpacking and trying to establish some sort of order, so I won't be back on here full time yet. Just thought I would pop in and terrorise you after you thought you'd gotten rid of me for a few months.

[ebianca]

Good to hear from you MB- even if it isn't all good news at least you have us lot you can let off steam to.

Hope you manage to get some of those problems sorted out.

[selchie]

The fun never stops, does it, MB? After this place, you'll be sneering at the rest of us with our comments about unmodern Kiwi houses.