whoa!

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Okay, so there's a limited amount of space upon which to regurgitate all thought...duly noted.

As I said, you are witnessing first hand my very first blog attempt...and our journey to purchase property in the Caribbean.

So where was I?  And how do I get my blogs to appear in chronological order...or would that confuse readers?  I guess, I'll find out.

Back to Cabrera...

Not only did we fall in love with this little farming town that hit all our checklist points, but we saw three properties that we were very interested in.

One was a plot of land with a breezy beautiful view...ocean dominant...not to be obscured too much by haze...but way less corrosive salt air to deal with and a price point that's within our means.
Our version of a 'goldilocks' view
The problem with this lot is it's pretty far away from town, not too far, but I'd like the option of being able to walk places. (Which is a calculated risk in the Dominican Republic due to crazy non-existent road rules!) And there's nothing there.  We would have to start building, getting a road to the lot, electricity, water, etc.  We are not ready for that yet.  My husband renovated houses as a hobby and is really good at it.  Old School German Know How! But, we want something to use now as a vacation home with minimal work. Second was a 80% built larger home with a gorgeous view, and lush forested cliffs and valleys around it...and a killer balcony that took full advantage of the setting.  Really a perfect fit for my husband to finish the way we would like.  It could rent when we aren't using it and it's more room than we originally wanted.

Villa Suenos
Oh boy, this got our heads spinning!  The pictures don't do it justice. But it actually filled in an important piece of the vision that we had been missing.  What style of home would we prefer? And how much indoor versus outdoor living space is ideal?...and the flow between those spaces...and on and on.  We just didn't know what the price on this property would be, and unfortunately, the preliminary quote was about

50K more than we hoped...This house had the advantage because  A) It's THE house that we would definitely retire to, and B) It has great rental potential once finished. But, alas...there's the rub...we would have no budget in the next three years to do anything to the house.  So we would use all our resources to sit on a property that we can't use yet due to lack of funds.  And we would still have to look for vacation rentals if we wanted to take any vacations in the near future.  So sad.  It's not off the table...but, it will have to sit unsold for a bit before the price could come down to a level where we could even attempt it. It remains my 'dream house'...and will probably enter into any future home as the inspiration! I can't wait!



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