To change is to chance!

Situations and events often present themselves to us proving the old adage that change is inevitable, and unlike death and taxes whose presence never changes, that notion becomes more true with each passing year. While most can handle some change, riding out the waves on some figurative surfboard, there will always be times on our lives where the tsunamis of change threaten to overwhelm our comfort levels. 

When the tsunami is of our own choosing?
Well, we really can't complain all that much.
Joyce and I created a whopper!

A few weeks ago, I was in doing a supply job and struck up a conversation with a colleague who was looking at realtor.ca for available properties in Barrie, and having enjoyed the splendor of his castle on a number of pre-pandemic social occasions, I queried him about his quest. His reply typified parental concerns these days surrounding the likelihood of children ever owning a home of their own with the market the way it has become, and his desire to help his own kids afford entry into the market. Our conversation got me thinking about my own children, and although Maddi and Chris already owned a beautiful place in Angus, Keaton was not yet in a position to be the same.

Fast forward a couple of weeks and I was having a porch to porch conversation with my young neighbour about a variety of home ownership things when he asked if I had seen that the house up the street had listed for $569 K. I was flabbergasted because I could picture in my mind's eye the exact house he was referring to, and I struggled to understand how that list price was even possible, excluding gilded gold fixtures or something similarly crazy. My neighbour remarked that the market in Barrie was "going nuts", prompting a story about the variety of ridiculous scenarios happening across the city.

Joyce reacted the same way as I did ... dumbstruck and bewildered.

The result of both conversations was a call to a former Central student, Tomas Sample, who was now a successful realtor in Barrie with Century 21. I explained to Tomas what I had heard and asked if he could find a time to come visit us, in the hopes that he could confirm or debunk what I had heard. That conversation led to a whirlwind of activity in preparation for us listing our home to explore the possibilities. 

Truth be told, we've never sold a house before.

We have created a life that is not necessarily the norm. We purchased our home, got married, had kids, experienced that trials and tribulations of raising them, then retired, all while still under the same roof during those 30 years. With both kids being so involved in a variety of activities, and being a single income family ... albeit a choice on our part ... the thought of adding a move into the mix of hard decisions never entered our minds. We had discussed the possibility of moving at some point once we settled into retirement because, despite the fact that our little home was our first and only, it had become much more house than we really needed. Discussions during our regular walks in and around Simcoe County did not mean that we were ready to push the button, but at least we were in agreement that it would eventually happen. It was Tomas' advice on the list price that spurred us to consider it right now. 

Let the purging begin! 30 years of accumulated stuff  has to be touched, sorted and decided on!

I'm penning this post, sitting in my trusty recliner, laptop in its place, stealing the occasional bewildered glance at the Spartan appearance of our once-lovely home, the curios and knick-knacks long since packed away in an effort to increase marketability. While we were pleased to hear the experts tell us that we had very little to fix or upgrade in preparation, the sheer volume of decluttering and downsizing effort left us both feeling anxious. If the process follows the trends of late, the end is not that far off in the future, but we have steeled ourselves to think long and deep before signing on the dotted line. We were in agreement that it had to feel like the right thing to do since we could just as easily walk away from the sale.

Of course, the next tense part was deciding both where to go and what to search for. 

When the discussions of where we might choose to relocate following retirement began, oh so many months ago, and we had bantered about possibilities like Canada's east coast, Kingston, Guelph, and for a fleeting moment, the southwest of Ontario. Now that the actual end is nigh, anything over a two hour commute has been taken off the table, thanks largely to the pending nuptials of Maddi + Chris this coming fall and their high probability of parenthood. SuperMom will trade in her cape for a SuperNana version, meaning that the distance had to be manageable. Some of the possibilities further away were not NEVERs, but they were definitely NOT NOWs. I'll share with you that the top of the list right now is the greater Guelph area, for a host of reasons that will likely be the source for a future post.

To RENT or PURCHASE, that is the question! Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous rents or to take arms against the murky waters of mortgages!
(*My apologies to Shakespeare)

Much of that decision will be buffered by the success of the selling process, with it's potential for a sale over asking, however incredulous that may seem at this moment, but it is very likely that we will choose to rent so that we (a) can spend some considerable time looking for what fits us best and (b) can subsidize any rental costs by investing the sum in the short term. What will ACTUALLY happen is still up in the air, leaving a pang of discomfort in both our chests ... we're both type A personalities, through and through, and unaccustomed to open ended decisions.

The game is afoot!
Stay tuned for the continuing saga!