ladymoose

What about picking the right town/city/province straight away when we first came over - did we get that right the first time?

ladymoose

Ok - saw the new house today, and sadly it's not our new house Just a bit too far out of Edmonton for an even 3 day commute for hubby and no local FI school for son - the closest one is 95 kms away and no transportation!

Beautiful land though - completely treed and untouched - full of tamerisk - wild blueberries, rasberries, mushrooms etc. The current owners have carved out miles of trails for snow-shoeing and x-country skiing and built a beautiful solar powered straw bale cottage. It was too small for us but gorgeous.

Still - it was wonderful to see it and the owner was a lovely guy who spent a good 2.5 hours with us showing us everything and teaching us about straw bale construction and the local habitat. It would be a great place for a retreat. It has cemented our view however, that we want a move - we want something smaller, more cost efficient with more land - but I think we want a mix of trees and open space.

Next stop is probably NE of Sherwood Park to see what that side of the city is like. Then we'll have to start getting this place ready for sale.

GavinR

Hiya

Sounded like a great place, pity the drive was too far, how long did it take? I'd like to see that straw bale home! Do you have an MLS number?

We were wondering whether it's worth doing the work on the house first before selling or just selling up as is?

ladymoose

There's no MLS number cos its a private sale - I'll find the link and PM you with it - thing is the guy is a real eco-warrier type - lovely bloke - but he wants to sell to someone who will keep the forest intact. In all honesty we could not promise him that. When you have an 8 year old boy and alpaca aspirations you need a bit of footy/pasture space!

There's another one listed also further south which is currently a tipi retreat - has the right blend of land but the house isn't up to much and again, no school. Also, way too expensive for us.

As an aside, if anyone is thinking of putting their kids in FI - think about the future first cos there aren't schools everywhere. If you move, you run the risk of having to transfer them out to english only. That's fine I think after about end of grade 4 cos by then they should be more or less fluent - but until then it seems to be a waste for him to spend 3 years and then transfer out before the French is fully cemented as it were!

In terms of getting the house ready - depends what improvements you have to make. The thing that gets the most return is paint and flooring. Get that right and the rest fades away a bit. Kitchens/bathrooms will always sell - but that doesn't necessarily mean you have to do both or do a complete update. We've replaced countertops, flooring, rearranged existing cabinets, added one sliding drawer affair and bead boarded over the horrible 70s style tile backsplash. With a couple of stainless steel appliances - it looks like new!

I have a list of improvements - how much they cost to do and what sort of return to expect. When we get together, I'll give you a copy. It might help. PM coming.

snorkmaiden

I think I might have seen the house you are talking about on a website - is it this one - http://www.forsalebyownercanada.com/property/202301.htm

We are just starting to look at areas we like the look of and I saw that one when I was looking for acreages the other day, (if that is it) looks lovely, but too small for us with four children. (not to mention the lottery win I'd need to add bedrooms)

We've rented a house right by the Whitemud which is only ten minutes from hubby's work but we really fancy moving out somewhere more rural when our lease is up next year, as long as it's within a good commute.

We're total novices at this point (only been here a month) so right now we're wondering what the roads are like in the winter etc???

I am really hoping after this year in rented we can find something we really like and then stay there, I am starting to really dislike packing and unpacking

ladymoose

Hi there Snorkmaiden - yep that's the one It is beautiful but tiny. Miles and miles of trails though untouched forest - not great for kids though unless you want to clear some more space. We really need to find a compromise on cleared space and trees.

How much land do you want when you move away from Whitemud area? There are 3 houses for sale in our subdivision at the moment - two at 3-4ish acres, one for 8 acres (horse setup). But there are loads of other subdivisions around here too. This area is totally commutable - takes hubby 20 mins to get to his west end office, Jasper Ave would be around 30 (he used to do that to).

Because we access HW 16 and 16a most of the roads are cleared very promptly cos they are all feeders to the main HWs which are practically never clogged (apart from in an actual blizzard when traffic changes to a crawl). I think hubby was only delayed a couple of times last winter - and not at all the previous 2 years.

The side roads can be tricky and can take up to 2 days to clear. But so many people have got trucks that unless you are going out just as the snow fall ends you tend to be able to pass in their tracks. I've seen worse on some of the city roads to be honest especially last winter when Edmonton was dreadful for getting the roads cleared quickly.

You are in a good position to buy at the moment cos there has been a flood of houses on the market so you can probably deal on prices. At the beginning of the summer there weren't so many (especially acreage properties) so prices were high. If you see anything on the market now which has been on since the spring and has NOT reduced its price - I reckon you could go in with a fairly low offer - you might get lucky.

Let me know if you want me to PM you with MLS numbers or the names of subdivisions in our area just in case it helps with your research

snorkmaiden

Ah thanks Ladymoose. We definitely won't be buying until next year as we're only a month into this one year lease and the landlady is entirely the kind who would make us pay the whole year out.

We literally have just started looking at areas to try and get an idea whether we like them or not, so we've not even really decided on size and we still need to see the broker to determine what we can actually afford

We're hoping to pin down the area we really like and then hopefully, nearer the end of the lease start looking for something to buy.

Hubby works on Calgary Trail, right off the Whitemud so it shouldn't be too bad getting in from Stony Plain - we think

I'm kind of glad we can't buy right now as I don't want to make any snap decisions, we went through one huge incident of buyers remorse in Scotland about eight years ago (bought a house, got a job offer in England 9 months later, too early to sell, rented it out, got a squatter, wrecked the house) and we were so put off by it that we've been really cautious about buying again.

The area we lived in in Texas had a lot of new builds and consequently, we saw a lot of people we knew buying and then not being able to sell, so we stayed in rented there, so this will be our first buy in 8 years.

I'm so keen to get my own house now, I'd be buying the first thing I saw, so it's good that I'm forced to take time

ladymoose

I think its good to take your time, especially with your first purchase around here. Gives you lots of time to decide on the area you like so you don't make a mistake. We jumped the gun twice in the UK and regretted it - the one we're in now is great but just a bit too big for us in terms of square footage.

It's given us a good experience of acreage life though which I'm glad we're getting. There's so many things you don't get on an acreage which you do in a city place ie garbarge collection, city water and sewer, no automatic snow removal, gravel roads etc. We don't mind this cos we think the benefits outweigh these disadvantages namely loads of space, peace and quiet, spring water etc.

Now the Anthony Henday extension is done - Calgary Trail isn't an issue - only takes us around 30 minutes to get to Ikea!

snorkmaiden

This is exactly the kind of thing we were wondering about, we noticed mention of water tanks and septic fields etc.

I lived up near the Yorkshire moors (village in Huddersfield) as a teen and all I remember about septic tanks was that my dad swore a lot more there than anywhere else we lived and it was all to do with the tank, and the neighbours we shared the tank with

ladymoose

Yeah - that can be the case - next door's brand new tank has had to be replaced already cos it was cracked - and smelling a wee bit ripe! But we've had no issues with ours at all (touch wood) - though we did have to install a new field when we first arrived cos the old one was a swamp