The Housing Process. Its a long one and so is this blog!!

Renting a place to live in The Netherlands differs greatly from the US. In the States there is pleanty of affordable housing. Here there is way more people than houses. Younger people ready to leave home and move out on their own, people with roomates that want to break away from the situation or people, like myself, who winds up getting divorced. Those are just a few examples of people looking for housing that I can think of off the top of my head. Of the latter, someone has to move. That is exactly what I did about a year and a half ago.

I was lucky enough to hear of someone who was renting an (privately owned) appartment that he actually wasnt living in but needed to keep the place in his name. A friend of mine is this guys employer and she negotiated on my behalf and I was offered the place at a really good rate, after all, it was helping us both out. I had a roof over my head until I came up on the "list" of the social housing process and he could re-coup some of his money each month. I jumped at the chance. In this appartment I have a neighbor who shares the entryway and hall. He also shares the toilet (I do have my own shower).This can lead to some interesting situations as I have gone to the toilet and just after unlocking the door it came open and there stood my very nekkid neighbor. He screamed like a girl and I had a laughing fit for about 10 minutes. He is a little hard of hearing and didnt hear me in there. The other thing that happens occasionally is if he has had one too many and has to "go" in the middle of the night he tends to NOT hit the bowl. Thank goodness I grew up with boys and learned to look before squatting or this could have lead to a rash of profanities as that is a HUGE pet peeve of mine. The last 15 months have been interesting, to say the least but it was what I needed to do while I waited to climb the "list".

You can get housing here one of three ways, buy, which is expensive, rent from a private individule, which is also very expensive or "sign up" for social housing, which is controlled by the government (basically) and is much more affordable. The latter can take a good long time. I have been signed in since Sept. 2009. What happens is you sign in and start earning points. You recieve 1 point everyday that you are signed in, 5 points for every house you apply for and 365 points for applying for a house in your preferred area. You preferred area has to be the city or village that you are registered in. In my case that is Waarland, where I lived with my ex. You can apply for up to three houses every 2 weeks. The key is at first to apply for every house you possibly can to build up those points. After awhile you will be higher on the list of applicants for certain houses because of your point level. You want to eventually be number 1 on that list so when your points start getting high you have to be more careful about applying for a house in an area where you dont want to live because if you apply and deny you lose some points, do that 3 times in one year and you loose ALL points that you have built up. However, you dont always have to be number 1 on the list. My ex and I were number 3 when we got our house. People apply to build up points, hence my point earlier...you have to be careful about applying for houses where you dont want to live. At this point, however, when I apply for a house it is in an area where I dont mind living. I applied for a house on Dec. 10 2010 and saw after 2 weeks that I was number 14 on the list of applicants. No way was that one mine. In the last week of Jan. 2011, I got a phone call from the housing company about just that house and was I interested. Of course I was, I didnt really need to go look at it but I did anyway. There is a LOT of work to be done, but I accepted it. The work brings me to my second big difference.

In the States, you rent an appartment and it has some kind of flooring....wood, pergo, carpet, ect. The walls are painted a neutral color and it has the basic appliances, i.e stove and fridge, sometimes even a diswasher. It always has heat and depending on where you live, airconditioning, usually central.

In The Netherlands central heating is always there, no airconditioning (not really needed here) BUT you have to either live with the color choices of the former resident and the flooring of their choice IF they didnt yank it out of there. While kitchen cabinets and a sink are included, appliances are not. In the case of my new appartment, the colors are horrible and someone ripped out the flooring. So it is re-decoration time for me!!

Below are some before pictures. After pictures will be a future blog.

 The kitchen, while very small, has brand new cabinets, sink and counter top.

 The livingroom (and Arnos head) with some really ugly green paint. I love green and one of my walls will be green, just not this puke color. I have since stripped the wallpaper in this room.

 Looking up into the bedroom from the livingroom. Notice the two different colors of red. The wallpaper on the ends would be acceptable, even pretty but the shiny paint in the middle iis really bad. Both just simply have to go.

 Balcony. I am sooooooooooo happy to have a place to sit outside with my morning coffee or my evening glass of spirits. It's small, but that is fine by me!

 The hall, coming in the front door. That red wallpaper again. Actually pretty, but old and faded in places so it iis going. Since the appartment is pretty much open it will be one color scheme throughout.

 Shower area of the bath..actually a wet room with a sink and toilet. Kind of reminds me of a girls locker room shower at school! To the left (you cant see it) is my very own toilet that I dont have to share with anyone (except the occasional invited guest) !!!!!

 Bathroom sink and that thing to the right is the "central heating". That is also where the hot water comes from. You can pretty much stand under the shower all day and never lose hot water. But since the hot water is going to the shower none is going to the radiators so if you do that your house is going to be pretty chilly after your all day shower!!

 Hall from the stairs going to the bedroom. Left door is bathroom, right door is storage that runs behind the bathroom. Pretty big storage. I was suprised!

 Bedroom. See what I mean about the two different red colors. TACKY!! Comes complete with orbs as well! I am glad they took out the flooring as I found proof of carpet upstairs and I hate carpet. It houses dust mites that shed cells and pooh both of which I am allergic to!!

Looking downstairs from the bedroom. Arno was already attacking the wallpaper for me. What a guy!!

I now have my keys, am registered with the "county" at this address. Internet, cable and telephone is ordered. Gas, electric and water has been switched over to my name. On Feb 28. Arno and some other burly guys are going to help me move the rest of my belongings in and I can finally get on with the rest of my life and get the hell out of limbo, where I have felt like I have been living for the last 15 months.

I hope you all enjoyed  and didnt get the headache that I could sometimes get while going through this process. It is over and no more headache for me....or maybe so.....I have lots and lots of stuff to do!!!