Saturday
19th March 2005 Today is the second day of the Adelaide Clipsal
500 V8 Supercar race. It's a 500Km race around the streets of Adelaide,
where the Grand Prix track used to be, which is only two or three streets from
the very centre of Adelaide. The event continues for 4 days, which includes
qualifying races and other events on the racetrack, and they really do a lot
of other stuff in Adelaide at the same time. There is a pop concert every night,
fireworks, fashion shows and everything you can think of, and nearly a quarter
of a million people go to it.
We thought that Thomas was a bit too young to enjoy the noise and crowds, so
maybe another year. Yesterday, work was a bit quiet as many people had taken
an extra day off work to go to see it.
The weather has been perfect for the last few days - and the prediction is that it will continue like this for the rest of the week. It's 25-28°C, and not a cloud in the sky, a gentle breeze and crisp, cool mornings that keep the air moist and fresh. Just perfect.
Comment
on this entry
I decided that, due to the perfect weather, I would go out and clean both the cars. So before I got started, I covered myself from head to foot (including my feet...) in sun-block. Then I spent 2 hours washing, drying and polishing both cars. When I came back inside, had my shower and got dressed, Ann asked me if my back was sore. I didn't deel it, but there was a patch across my back that I had obviously not reached with the sun cream, and it is bright red. You can even see white hand prints where I had put cream around the area... It is bound to hurt soon - I haven't gone to bed yet, but that is probably when it is going to feel really bad!
Thomas has been very clever and cute recently. On Friday when
I was getting ready for work, I asked Thomas to go and get my shoes for me -
and he then went off to get his daddy's shoes, one by one, and then handed them
to me. He has also got the hang of taking out his dummy when we tell him to,
and he really loves his DVDs - he will bring us the box when he wants it played.
Thomas watches a Tellytubbies DVD and a Baby
Einstein DVD about learning shapes, and frequently tells us which one he
wants on at the moment, and then he gets very close to the TV and rests his
elbows on the ottoman and watches it intently.
Ann and I are trying to get Thomas to take his dummy out more often, as it could be impacting his speech development. Although it's not really a problem, as even Einstein did not learn to talk until he was 4 years old, other parents seem to be quite worried, but we will just ensure we give Thomas all the time and encouragement that he needs.
Comment
on this entry
As expected, I had a bad night last night from my sunburn. Ann has been rubbing in the after-sun, but it's been uncomfortable to say the least.
There is a lot of cencern here about petrol prices due to rise soon. It's currently $1.08 a litre in Adelaide. They are predicting that it will be $1.20 soon (50p a litre), which is still much cheaper than the 88p a litre in the UK or the 83p a litre in Belgium or 63p a litre in Greece. Still, that's not as low as 24p a litre in America (US$2.12 a US gallon).
Comment
on this entry
Today we had a little disaster. The water heater packed up
whilst Ann was having a shower. She was most displeased that the shower had
suddenly gone cold when she was in the middle of washing her hair. I went outside
in my pyjamas and sandals to see that there was water gushing out of the heater
into the garden, and that there was a hissing sound and what looked like gas
coming out of the top. I then realised that it was not something that I could
fix myself, and not the pilot light going out.
As there was water gushing out and a smell of gas, I switched off everything
that I could. But still the water was gushing out and there was a hissing sound.
I switched off the gas at the mains, and found a gas tap on the side of the
heater and turned that off, but the hissing continued. The water was still coming
out, and I was tempted to turn off the main supply at the front of the driveway,
but I decided that the three taps that I had turned off would be enough. It
later turned out that the water heater has a hot water tank, and that was where
the water was coming from, and the hissing noise was the air getting into the
tank that is otherwise sealed.
We were very impressed that the agency managed to get a plumber out to us and
completely replaced the water heater today. The plumber took only about an hour
to remove the old one and install the new one, and the cost would be around
$1,500.
Comment
on this entry
We got bad news today. We will probably loose the house.
Before we made an offer on the house, we got three banks to give us quotes and
ask us all the pertinent questions for provisional approval. All three banks
knew of my citizenship status and my employment status and Ann's employment
status, and all three said that it would not be any problem. We checked with
the Foreign Investment Review Board and all relevant authorities and all information
resources that were available - all said that we should have no problem. We
then had three mortgages in principle before we went out shopping for a house.
So can you imagine how annoyed we are today to be told that Members Equity have
decided to reject our application for finance, based on my employment status
and that I have not been working for the same employer for more than 12 months.
We asked all three banks directly about it before we made the offer on the house,
and all of them said that it would be no problem if I have been working in the
same industry - as I have been in IT for 10 years, this would not be a problem.
It's such a basic question, but they suddenly decided to reject us today.
I tried to offer more paperwork, more deposit or anything that they wanted -
but they said that they would stand by their decision.
The problem is that my last employer - the LAS in London - never gave me any
official contract that states my job title or role. I have no paperwork whatsoever
from the LAS relating to my employment there, as I was employed by the recruitment
agency, and paid by an accountancy.
The root of the problem is that the deadline for getting finance arranged is
tomorrow. Our purchase contract states that it is conditional on us obtaining
finance by the 25th of March - as this is Good Friday, this really makes the
deadline tomorrow. If we can't prove that we have got finance by tomorrow, the
sellers can cancel our contract and put the house back on the market.
So, tomorrow we are going out shopping for another bank. I have gathered together 2 inches of paperwork, and we will try every bank until we get an approval.
Comment
on this entry
We are homeless now. The house that we are in now has been rented out, and as the new tenants have signed up between us signing that we were going to leave and then finding out that we had no finance - so they have more legal right to move in than we have the right to stay.
So, this means that we have got to move in to the
new house, or find another rental (which would be for a minimum of 12 months).
So we went to find another homeloan that would accept us. We went back to Savings
& Loans, and after 90 minutes of form filling and photocopying and waiting
for phone calls to head office to be returned, they rejected us based on my
citizenship status.
The story is that there are only two mortgage insurance underwriters in Australia
(and so now we have been to both of them), and they both refuse to insure the
lenders when I am not a permanent resident and have not been in continuous employment
for more than 6 months. The insurance is for the mortgage lenders, where if
they need to reposess our home and they can't sell it for as much as the outstanding
mortgage debt, the gap is covered by this insurance. All mortgage lenders need
this insurance, and as there are only two insurers that are used by all lenders,
we are stuffed.
There are three ways around this. The first one is to buy
the house in partnership with someone else, in a four way loan. Then when Ann
and I can get a mortgage by ourselves, we only pay ½ of the stamp duty
when we buy out the other two people. The second option is to have someone else
buy the house for us - but the big problem is that when we later buy it ourselves
we need to pay the full taxes and fees all over again (another $15,000).
The third option appears to be the cheapest - which is to get someone to lend
us another 10% of the house value, so that we can put down a 20% deposit, which
means that the mortgage lenders don't need to take out the insurance. But we
can't get it in a loan as this adds to our liabilities and decreases our borrowing
potential, we have to get the money as a 'gift' and we have to have a letter
from whoever gives us the money to state that it is a gift and that it is non-returnable.
We looked at other options, such as getting someone else to act as guarantor (where they promise to pay the 'gap' that the insurance would otherwise provide), but the lenders did not like that idea. Then we tried shopping around for other lenders that do not require the insurance, but they all had problems with my citizenship and employment history. We also tried to do the application in Ann's name, but as I am the income earner, the provisional visa and the 5 month gap in employment cause me to be rejected.
The only bit of good news is that the seller of our new house is being flexible. Well, really it's that they can't do anything but let us have more time, because it would take another 2 weeks for them to market the house (as it's Easter weekend and nothing can be done this weekend), and they have to move to their new house on April 22nd. So, they are not too worried about this delay.
We asked about rental of houses, but the problem is that to rent is much cheaper than buying (due to the recent increase in property prices and the delay in rises in rent rates), and so every rental property is occupied and there are waiting lists for property. The agency that we are with only has one property - a one bedroom flat. Ann and I are going to have a look around for any properties to rent, but because we don't know our status we can't sign up for anything, but we would have to sign up now in order to get anything.
We are stuck, and potentially homeless. Not the best start to a long weekend. We won't know anything about the three more mortgage applications that we have made today until Tuesday.
Comment
on this entry
Today we decided to take our minds off things and go down
to the beach and see the kite festival. We packed Thomas' bucket and spade,
coated ourselves in sun-block and drove down to Semaphore. The 
kite
festival was well underway when we got there, which we all enjoyed looking
at. Thomas had fun in the playground,
and we ended up buying him a toy windmill which amused him no end. He got most
upset when he flicked it so hard that it landed under the seat and so none of
us could get it on the way home.
Thomas has been very photogenic recently, and he loves his
latest toy, a pair of plastic chairs
from Toys'r'us ($5.99 each...) He will sit and eat his morning tea, and sit
and watch his DVDs. He does like to climb on them though.
Comment
on this entry
[Homepage] [Blog] [Slideshows] [Links] [Migration] [Search] [LogoTest]