Selling Up

With the immigration medicals complete and relevant documentation submitted (again), it was back to waiting (again) but this time it felt very different. The feelings of anxiety and doubt of the previous waits was no longer there, the medicals felt like a formality this time around. Canadian Immigration had already accepted our PR application back in August 2020, the medicals were the final box to tick before the new PR visas were re-issued and after that there was no stopping us.

At this point the Covid strains that had caused so much damage across the world were still to wreak havoc on the kiwi way of life, yes, the country was effectively shut down, we had lockdowns, restrictions, face masks and mandates but Covid cases (before the days of Delta) were under control and New Zealanders were living a normal life albeit with some notable changes.

One of those changes were property prices, which had gone through the roof! The lockdowns had created a tidal wave of demand for rural properties, it was a sellers’ market and we really needed to make the most of this opportunity and decide on when to sell our house and which Realtor to engage.

There are so many Realtors to choose from and deciding who to trust with your most valued asset is a decision worth researching and taking the time over, but of course not us! The universe decided who was going to sell our house.

Serendipity (n) finding something good without looking for it

Serendipity is a wonderful thing because it was exactly at this time that a good friend Jenny Sinclair got back in touch with us. Jenny had left her career in NZ Police to become a Realtor Bayleys and wanted to catch up, what were the odds?

When we did finally meet, we told Jenny that we were looking to put the house on the market and asked if she would sell our house for us, she said yes and with that the wheels were set in motion to get our property listed with Bayleys for sale, the paperwork was signed in a blink of an eye. Bayleys Realty Group: Residential, Commercial and Rural Real Estate Agency in New Zealand

There had been so much waiting and inactivity for so long, so much time spent wishing things would hurry up and now that we were finally starting to move it all felt like it was moving too fast. There was a moment of panic after we signed the documentation to officially engage Bayleys, we were selling our house, it all started to feel very real.

There was one minor issue with our plan to sell the house when we did and that was that our PR visas had yet to arrive! What happens if our house sold quickly and the PR visas were delayed, we would be potentially homeless with 3 cats, a dog and 17 chickens! This was a very real possibility because houses were selling so quickly, but thankfully we had an awesome realtor to both guide and reassure us.

Jenny advised us to sell the house by way of an auction which would allow us to write a delayed settlement date into the conditions of sale, this would allow us to remain in the house until a date that we determined by which time our PR visas had hopefully arrived, if the visas arrived sooner than the stipulated date we had the option of bringing the settlement forward and moving out earlier if the buyer was in agreement, sweet as! (To coin a well-known Kiwi phrase).

With that decided Jenny did not waste any time, photos and drone video footage was taken, the marketing was finalised, the house was listed in all the appropriate places (online and property pages, magazines & local papers Etc.), and the all-important ‘For Sale’ signage took pride of place at the bottom of the driveway.

Within hours of the property being officially ‘on the market’ potential buyers were calling Jenny for open home bookings and making offers without even having looked at it, fingers crossed Jenny’s selling expertise and our hard work with the renovations were not only going to sell our property but get us a good price too!

Will it be easy? Nope. Will it be worth it? Absolutely.

As mentioned in a previous blog right at the beginning of this journey we had spent a lot of blood, sweat, tears and money renovating our property, there were times that it felt like renovating was all we ever did but it was worth it.

Like the story of Cinderella with some love, attention, and a sprinkling of fairy dust our shack on the hill turned into something bright, sparkly, and beautiful, the property was a gem, but it would be the views that would make people fall head over heels in love, there was only one way to find out what buyers thought of our property and its value, it was auction time!

Our Home – Before & After Comparisons

Our Home – Post Renovation & Ready for Sale

Now our expectation of an auction was based on a man shouting in an intelligible country accent, banging his hammer at intermittent periods before shouting sold and pointing at some poor bewildered farmer who just bought a hundred head of sheep when he only went to the auction for 10!

Thankfully our auction was nothing like this, firstly Covid put paid to the requirement to physically be at the auction, everything would be conducted virtually and whilst we could watch the proceedings no one could see us or our reactions which was a relief because the anxiety and nerves had us both feeling a bit nauseous.

Going, Going, Gone!

Having gone through the introductions the auctioneer’s opening gambit was this being his first auction where the chickens were being sold as part of the chattels, yes, we sold our home with the chickens, it had been their home all their lives and the potential buyers all expressed an interest in keeping the chickens, so it seemed like the right thing to do at the time. It was time to crack the gavel.

With the preamble over the auction began, the bids initially went up in large increments and towards the end when those bidding were reaching the limit of what they could afford the increments became smaller and smaller until the auctioneers hammer rang out a final time!

Our eight years of hard graft was auctioned off in less than 20 minutes. Holy moly we had just sold our house and for an amazing price too! Our 31-acre property more than doubled in value at auction. We would need every penny to buy our new home in Canada when we finally got there, everything was falling into place.

The difference between ordinary and extraordinary is that little bit extra

The rate of knots at which our property sold left our heads spinning, the whole process took three weeks start to finish. OMG, we had sold our house and were still currently PR visa less! But panic not we had some time up our sleeves and fingers crossed they would be here by the 31st of March 2022 which was our agreed settlement date if not earlier.

Now this is the part of the blog where we thank Jenny for her work in selling our property, Realtors can get a bad press, some deserved and others not and, during a property, boom they have been accused of being paid handsomely for not a lot of work, but Jenny was the exception.

Jenny worked tirelessly often at all times of the day to facilitate open homes, answer queries and any questions asked by us and potential buyers, to reassure us and take care of our needs through this process. Jenny was amazingly efficient, professional to a fault and always going the extra mile.

Jenny is a friend, and you could say that we are biased but Jenny has an amazing work ethic, is a fantastic Realtor, even greater human being and friend and has earned the praise, we have no problem recommending Jenny and Bayleys services. But Jenny’s work was not over yet, she was still going to be in this journey with us for a bit longer, at least until the end of March 2022.

It was now time to start packing, Canada was visible on the horizon, we could almost taste the Beaver Tails and maple syrup.

(special mention is given to Paul Voorburg who assisted Jenny).