Why Corfu?

The number one question asked so far...

Yassas! And welcome to my first blog! Six weeks ago Joe and I left the North east of England, waved goodbye to the in laws and set off for Corfu, Greece. Heidi our dog and Treacle our cat were in the back and the car was absolutely packed to the gunnels. With a rather vile aroma emanating from Joes footy boots mixed with the cheese and pickle sandwiches kindly provided by my mum we were off and so the adventure began!

So how we decided to move permanently to Corfu

“When one door closes, another opens.”

Yassas! And welcome to my first blog! Six weeks ago Joe and I left the North east of England, waved goodbye to the in laws and set off for Corfu, Greece. Heidi our dog and Treacle our cat were in the back and the car was absolutely packed to the gunnels. With a rather vile aroma emanating from Joes footy boots mixed with the cheese and pickle sandwiches kindly provided by my mum we were off and so the adventure began!

We were living in Newcastle upon-Tyne, I was working as a nurse, Joe in health and fitness. With all of our siblings living in Australia, Australia was the dream. Then, covid hit and I aged over night, literally and metaphorically, turning 32 and subsequently loosing 5 Australian immigration point as I moved into a 'less desirable' age category and with travel to Australia on hold for the foreseeable due to covid. Just like that, Australia was off the table. In truth, I'm not 100% sure Joe was really onboard for moving so far away and I am a strong believer in the age old classic ‘Everything happens for a reason!’.

We sat one night and said - Okay, bye Oz! Where else would we love to live? Joe: “Corfu?” We had been to Corfu twice!!! We both chuckled dismissively, then after a few days, I started looking at houses.

The house hunt

Like everyone who has ever fantasised about living abroad, I spent hours, scrap that! I spent days, scrolling though the house listings on Rightmove, getting giddy at ones wayyyy over budget with infinity pools and views to die for. Then in the evenings my dreams were consumed by the #doeruppers and the #renovationprojects, redesigning and decorating the villas without roofs as I slept. Then, after seeing what we called 'The Green House' come up on #RoulaRouva estate agency Corfu with its Farrow and ball (F&B) cooking apple green exterior I screeched at Joe "I've found our house!"

Finances and fact finding

“Why not?”

It had everything we wanted and more! Just a bit over our budget but it looked picture perfect! We had an emergency zoom consultation with our numbers man and good friend Steven Bates at Giraffe Financial. We said "Ok this is a bit out of the blue but we want to move to Corfu and have found a house". Steven said not why would we move to Corfu but rather why wouldn't we? He set to going through all of our options, to sell our main house in Newcastle or to rent it out, mortgage options for Brits in Greece - that was a non start - but with his help, a hope and a prayer, the numbers were in our favour and we booked our flights to start the house viewings.

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House viewing in Corfu

August 2020, we headed to Corfu in the few month covid reprieve when holidays with testing were permitted. Due to work commitments, it was a whistle stop tour, 4 days, just enough time to view a few houses, get engaged on Agni beach and eat some gyros. #bestholidayever! We saw a few lovely villas but all of which didn't have what we really wanted which was:

1) Sea views (Joe),

2) Pool (Me),

3) Garden (Me),

4) Driveway (Me),

5) Rental opportunity (Me),

I didnt want much did I! Well, there was one house that ticked all our boxes, 'The Green House'. We met with the lovely estate agent Andy from #RoulaRouva Real Estate. Link to their website below: http://rrcorfurealestate.com He drove us to the house and as if the stars had aligned our financial advisor, Steven, was on a family holiday in Roda at the same and kindly agreed to come with. We all bundled into the agents car, masks on, windows down and headed to the house. I was beyond excited!

Reality check!

As we pulled up for our viewing at 'The Green House' my heart sank, I whispered to Joe "Is this even the same house?" The sun kissed cooking apple green painted render was tarnished with green moss and dirt. The paint work all chipped, flaking, the render cracked. The drive was overgrown with weeds up to my knees and the whole house was in desperate need of TLC. We walked round the property unable to even get into the garden it was so over grown, the smell of rat urine in the so called 'granny annexe' was unbearable.

The house had apparently been on the market for around 8 years and I could see why! We left the house a little deflated. Was this the end of our dream? Was it too much of a project?

We arranged a second viewing the following day, flying back to the UK that evening. We knew from reading "How to guides", that one does not put an offer on a house abroad whilst still in holiday mode sipping retsina in the local taverna! We had some serious thinking to do!