One still, sunny morning in the week before Christmas, I opened the front door to find a white gift bag on the verandah. NOEL was written in red and green letters on its side. The bag contained a bottle of pinot noir, a large jar of Six Barrel Soda lemon and honey syrup, and a bag of fresh coffee beans.
I read the gift card. Merry Xmas from .... Martha and Louise? Mary and Lois? The handwriting was hard to read, and the names didn’t look familiar. Perhaps it wasn’t meant for us. I considered trying to find the intended recipient, perhaps putting a post on Facebook. But then I figured it out. Mona and Louis. Our landlords.
I showed the bag to Barnard when he got home from work. “How nice of them. Have they given you a Christmas present before?” I asked. No, they had not. An unexpected Christmas gift is always a nice surprise, but this one also generated a sense of relief. For there had been a little flurry of tension between Mona and ourselves in recent weeks.
In early October, Mona visited the house to check on the pool fence, which apparently did not meet Council standards. A few days later, we received an email from our property manager, Megan. She said Mona had been concerned by Arki’s barking and scratching at the front door, and she also noticed there was a lot of dog poo on the back lawn. Barnard politely replied that dogs often bark when strangers arrive and they are also inclined to poo (we had thought that a landlord who allowed pets might already know such things). Megan replied that when she was advised of owners’ concerns, she was obliged to follow them up.
By the way, Megan added, Mona didn’t realise I was living permanently in the house. She thought I had only been staying for a few months. Barnard patiently reminded Megan he had told her I was moving in when he signed the new lease in March, and Megan had replied that my name didn’t need to be on it. He asked Megan to make sure Mona was aware of this. There was no reply.
Prior to these events, we had enjoyed a good relationship with Mona and Louis. Barnard had spent many hours of his own time repairing the badly damaged swimming pool (they paid for the materials) and we had offered to paint the front verandah this summer. The cans of paint had been delivered, but we hadn’t got around to starting yet.
A few weeks later, it was time for our quarterly property inspection. Megan’s previous inspections had been efficient yet relaxed, and always resulted in a postive report. But this time was different. Her approach was finicky and militant. She commented on some cat hairs she found on a curtain and on the stove. “This is not a show home,” Barnard told her. “We do actually live here.”
But now, at Christmas, it seemed all was well. Perhaps the gift was intended as a peace offering. Barnard sent a thank-you text to Mona. We drank the wine, put away the syrup and coffee beans to enjoy later, and got on with our summer holiday.
However, it was soon interruped by another email from Megan, on December 29. We had 90 days to vacate the property. Mona and Louis’ circumstances had changed, and they were moving in to the Card House. It turned out the peace offering was actually a goodbye.
We walked around the house like zombies for a few days. I frequently escaped outside to sit at the outdoor table under the trees where we had eaten our Christmas lunch with Barnard’s adult children. As I gazed out at the wide expanse of cheerful green lawn framed by tall oak trees, I wondered how many more times I would throw a ball for Arki on the lawn, or read under a tree, before we moved out.
We began searching for a new rental property on Trade Me, but quickly became dismayed at the small number allowing pets. With five cats and a dog, it seemed the odds were stacked against us. One morning, as I sat outside, a plan began to form. When Barnard strolled out with a coffee, I was ready. “Let’s buy our own house,” I said.
As I write this, we have a daunting schedule of eight Open Homes ahead of us today (we’ve already viewed 12 in the past few weeks). But we’re excited. There’s a lot for sale in the Wairarapa, and we have a solid pre-approved budget from the bank in our back pocket.
It hasn’t all been plain sailing though. We contacted a mortgage broker in January, keen to get the best possible deal from the banks. It resulted in an excruciating three weeks of to-ing and fro-ing as broker Donald asked more and yet more questions about our financial circumstances. Although we had heard New Zealand’s lending rules had been tightened up, we were still surprised by the depth of his questioning. How often do you get your haircut, he asked me on the phone, and how much does it cost? He chided Barnard about our regular meals out. I read about someone who had spent three months buying nothing but the bare essentials in order to get his mortgage application approved.
Finally, Donald advised us he would be taking our loan application to a bank. But a silly typo on the letter of advice (a $795 loan application fee was incorrectly transcribed as $7 million) was the last straw. Fuming, I rang my own bank and filled in a mortgage application form. Three days later, it was approved. After briefly kicking ourselves for wasting so much time with Donald, we got back to the job in hand.
I think Barnard and I make a good house hunting team. He schmoozes with the real estate agents and checks for workshop/man cave potential, while I play the stern librarian with a clipboard and checklist. Back in the car, we compare notes and rank each house against a detailed list of 25 critical and “nice to have” criteria. With marks out of five for each category, a house needs to score well over 90 points to make it into the Top 5.
Along with criteria like a spacious kitchen, good entertaining potential and a quiet location, we rank each house on its emotional appeal; that indefinable quality that makes us think, “We want to live here.” I know from past experience it’s a feeling you usually get within minutes of entering a house. And as the months and years in the same home pass, the house starts to take on a personality of its own, leading to an emotional attachment as strong as one you might have to a loved family member or a close friend.
When Barnard first asked me to move in with him, I cried. The idea of leaving the house I had called home for nearly 18 years brought on the kind of grief usually reserved for a death in the family. 2/48 Fraser Avenue, Johnsonville had seen me through five different jobs; eight years of part-time study; the beginning and end of a long-term relationship; becoming a stepmother; and the failure of our business. It had become a faithful friend; the place I retreated to when navigating life’s biggest challenges.
The thought of leaving it was, at first, frightening and overwhelming. But, over time, those feelings of fear and grief were replaced by excitement and anticipation. The day I finally left Fraser Avenue, it was, as they say, with nary a backward glance.
Likewise, I’ve formed a strong emotional connection with the Card House in the short time I’ve lived here. Initially, I resisted the house’s overtures. We were only renting, I reasoned, and we could be asked to leave at any time. Best not to get too close.
But over time, that resistance softened and my attachment grew. I revelled in the many small and large pleasures of living in a beautiful historic home. I began to research the house’s history, wrote about it on this blog, and occasionally allowed myself to dream about owning it one day. But, as we’ve discovered, renting a house is always an illusion. It never belongs to you, no matter how attached to it you become.
And so, we have new dreams now. We’ll find new pleasures in a new home that will be ours to enjoy for as long as we like. On the day we close the front door of the Card House for the last time, it will be with a sense of gratitude and peace. For everything has a beginning and end, and that’s how it’s supposed to be. And Mona and Louis can paint their own bloody verandah.
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