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An insidious evil caught

Practically everyone now must know of the happy ending to the Amanda Berry kidnapping. That is one evil episode over, in a way, except for rebuilding the lives of those affected. I am full of admiration for the neighbour whose first thought was to give any reward money due to the victims as he had just received his paycheck and didn’t need is much as they did.

But another insidious evil has been totally caught out. And that is the psychic medium Sylvia Browne who told Amanda Berry’s mother she was dead, even giving her mother a last message from the grave. Sylvia Browne makes a pretty tidy living out of this utter crap. I hope she now has to go and find a proper job. Better still, perhaps this is a lesson (for many folks on this planet it’s been obvious all along) that psychic quackery is an evil trade that profits on others most emotionally vulnerable moments. I see it as nothing less than mental rape. It should not be tolerated by any decent / moral society.

PS. We’re currently in Cornwall and have had a few stops on the way. I promise to blog about it soon. I just felt I had to air my disgust of Sylvia Browne and all the parasites like her.

Big Day

In so many ways.

First it was big because we had seven viewings today, four in Henley-on-Thames and three in Marlow. By number seven we were pretty burned out but no regrets.

Today the weather was perfect. Blue skies and temps in the low 20s allowed us to see these two towns outside of winter. And it was glorious. Walking around Henley, particularly down by the river, brought on a real happy state.

The Henley houses we viewed were an interesting mix which we visited in the following order :

http://zoop.la/18cxa3y
http://zoop.la/11VFReZ
http://zoop.la/103e9Kc
http://zoop.la/12mEX8P

The first was delightful. It was on a busy road but close to the center of Henley. It had a divine back garden, no grass, just stone, patio, tree, bamboo, quite the oasis of tranquility. It hit all our buttons bar it not having two upstairs bathrooms. This maybe a comprise we can make but it’s not enough to push us into an offer right now. This is a definite maybe.

The second property was only on the list as it was listed by the same agent as the first. It turned out to be quite a surprise. It was in a fantastic location and while not having the number of bedrooms we want it scored on many points. Even being on the second floor was sort of mitigated by being right by a major supermarket so just in time provisioning would mitigate having to lug large supplies up the stairs. The main problem is the long term view where we’d like somewhere we could live in when we fall apart (as if we haven’t already).

The third property was also very well located. It comes with a commercial lease generating income from a hairdressers below. There are some complications which we believe are the reason this property has been on the market for a while. But for those willing to face the complications it represents a possible fine deal.

The last property was quaint and the interior attractive. But the combination of size, location and orientation to North was not positive so this ones off.

After the mornings burst of activity we explored the town, had lunch down by the river and even had a stroll along the river. This blew us away as the perfect weather showed the town in it’s glory. We can really see ourselves living here.

In the afternoon we headed over to Marlow. We had over an hour to spare before our first appointment so we had another walk around town. Marlow is also a beautiful town on the river but had the sense of a Henley-lite. We can imagine walking the 7 or 8 miles along the river from Henley to Marlow to experience the town. But when we imagined walking the other direction we could only see ourselves asking why we never started in Henley.

But we had three properties to see.

http://zoop.la/VJUflH
http://zoop.la/ZzgwrR
http://zoop.la/12lgIb4

The first was right on the high street. There was no assigned parking but despite having all the character we love, it wasn’t quite big enough. An eye opener but it’s not on our short list.

Our first thoughts about the second property was that it was just too far out of town and along an uninspiring road. Walking up the garden to the property we were bowled over. Inside the property was equally impressive. Despite all this, it didn’t have the right balance of room types and the location was too far from town to meet our needs and too high a price to compensate for this. We passed.

The last property was the home of an airport architect (we’re talking major airports here). This resulted in a modern home that was pretty unique and incredibly appealing. The distance from center of town was a bit too far for us so this remains a property to keep an eye on.

So that’s the detailed house by house view on the day. But a bigger picture emerged for both of us. With the fine spring weather, the river and the town character we’ve now very much settled on Henley and, to a lesser extent, Marlow as an ideal location. Doesn’t mean to say this is where we’ll end up but it’s now the benchmark against which we now feel we must measure everything else. We saw enough prospects in each area to allow us to believe finding something where, even if we have to compromise, we can be happy. So it’s a good time to have our Cornwall break as this new perspective needs time to settle in. One thing we do realize is that the third Henley properties raised a lot of questions and things to learn so that can start now even though we feel a long way from committing.

All this comes with one big caveat. We know that a lot of this makes a lot less sense if my health takes a turn for the worst during this high risk period. What helps is that I now have my next MRI and consultancy with the Prof booked for the 7th/11th of June. We’re hoping for a new betting forecast from the Prof which could well influence things. For now we’ve decided to plan for heads rather than tails and deal with tails if it happens. But we’ve also decide not to commit to anything until we get the June form book.

Two Pairs from Croxley Green

We saw two pairs of properties this morning. The first pair were each side of a semi detached home.

http://zoop.la/18bY63j
http://zoop.la/VmC88G

The first had all the character we’d like of a character home but was too small for us.
The second was big enough but had had a lot of the character spoiled prior to the building being listed.

Just round the corner were a 1st floor and loft flat conversion of an old manor house.

http://zoop.la/Yludfj
http://zoop.la/18bYfUy

The first was enticing and fit the bill of allowing us to imagine we could live there. While we are on the fence with the area, it is now on our maybe list. The loft conversion was quite different. It had a lot going for it but planning constraints meant windows could not be placed to look out over The Green.

So nothing yet that makes us want to break out the wallet and buy something because it is so right. But this is all totally within expectations. Now to rest before tomorrows viewing marathon.

Two more down, eleven more on the way

Yesterday we saw two more properties :

http://zoop.la/ZQWCrT
http://zoop.la/ViLP4H

Helen’s sister, Betty, joined us for the first visit. This was the first home we could truly visualize ourselves living in. The price was good but it didn’t hit all the bells. It was in Chesham which, although quaint, is a little small and lacks the charm, depth and character of other towns nearby. It definitely stays on the list as a maybe as sooner or later we’ll reach the point where we’ll probably have to compromise somewhere.

The second property had a lot of charm but didn’t quite make it for us. Helen and I had a slightly different perspective on how good the location was. (Right by Tescos versus being next to a busy commuter road which has to be crossed to get to the Old Town).

By now, we’ve ironed out many of the wrinkles of our process and have geared up for the rest of the week. Today we have four more properties lined up and tomorrow we have another seven. Unlike the US where buying agents line up all the house visits, here there are only selling agents. The leg work of organising all the visits with vendors is down to us. It’s more effort but being organised and developing a good process around it makes it simpler and allows us to team up.

Using the technology we have makes things simpler too. By ensuring we have addresses set up against our calendar appointments, one swipe of a finger accross my phone followed by one tap and I have the road directions to our next appointment. Another couple of clicks takes us to the data we have gathered on each property and a wealth of data from the web. It’s pretty empowering to us as buyers and allows us to really scale up our activity.

Next week we’re taking a break from house hunting. We’re visiting a number of friends and family in a line between here and Cornwall. We haven’t decided on a return date yet.

Three More Houses and A Complete Aside

This morning we went to see three more houses, two in Old Amersham and one in (New) Amersham.

zoop.la/16ggxEG
zoop.la/18d3yQA
zoop.la/18d3tN0

It was good to get out and see a few more homes but none of them grabbed us to the extent we were tempted to go for a second viewing.

On Thursday we’re targeting Marlow or Henley-on-Thames. These are probably out of our price range but it’s worth a look. And it’s a bit of a change from the last two. Both Great Missenden and Amersham are in Buckinghamshire which is still in the old grammar school system. This is good if you have a school age family but if not, it simply adds to the prices of homes here. So looking outside Buckinghamshire has it’s appeal.

Now, for a complete aside. If you haven’t figure it out yet, I am a tech geek. One things I like to do is to future gaze. ie, to develop ideas about where I think technology, and those who are leading the industry, is taking us. When I came out of my mental fugue last year (and perhaps influenced by the steroids I was on) it became more and more clear to me we are heading towards a driverless future, ie. where all cars will be automated. This is not a new idea as a number of companies are publicly working on autonomous vehicles. But where I see this going will be transformational to many areas of society. What I see is more or less the end of private car ownership. The more we let our cars drive for us, the less we’ll be ourselves skilled enough to takeover. Driverless cars will essentially become taxis arriving to pick us up just in time, travelling at very high speeds (computers will be safer) we’ll arrive at our destinations, also just in time, with no need to park. It will work for everyone as traffic and routes will be optimized centrally. There will be enough vehicles in any region to handle peak demand plus a haircut for failures, maintenance, etc. leading to far fewer vehicles being built (very ecological). Intelligent pricing for road journeys may flatten out peak travel too. Vehicles become bubbles of our home/work giving individuals greater work/life balance. Traffic will be centrally managed avoiding jams. Vehicle types will evolve to new needs: travelling offices, small scale sharing, sleeping, who knows. Urban use will transform. Parking, as we currently understand it, will more or less be eliminated providing new opportunities to use saved space (and a need for new jobs for wardens). I suspect road networks will transform and simplify over time freeing up public spending for other purposes. House values will shift as demand for proximity to mass transit reduces and costs of individual short distance travel falls. LIVES WILL BE SAVED. It goes on.

There will a be a lot of resistance to this sort of change. You’d think so at least. But the easiest sort of change to accept are those that creep up on us bit by bit. We now have radar assisted parking / cruise control. Some cars can now even park themselves. All major car companies are aiming for the end of this decade for their autonomous cars. Some navigation solutions are already centrally managed. Journey anticipation is already built into some smartphones. The changes that will take us to that future are already happening and I believe some of the big vision companies are already positioning themselves for this future.

How does this all help us? I’m not all sure. I suspect autonomous cars will only get on the road in a big way in the 20s. It will take a decade before ageing manual only vehicles will come off the roads. So it won’t happen until the 30s. But it will happen. And economics will respond ahead of time, as it always does. The long view on this would suggest that the average house bought near a station today won’t be as sound an investment as an average house away from a station. But we’ve got to live there before the change happens and at the end of the day it will be our kids (and the tax man) who will benefit or lose from this. So it’s not much of a consideration for us but it does trickle along in the back of my mind.

Just to make sure I’m not having pipe dreams I did a bit of googling and I’m not the only one seeing this future :

Here is a small collection of articles I found

http://complaintsincorporated.com/2013/04/06/autonomous-cars-and-the-end-of-ownership-not-if-but-when/
http://www.templetons.com/brad/robocars/
http://www.popsci.com/taxonomy/term/55646/all
http://www.gm.com/vision/design_technology/emerging_technology.html

Looking at these again, I’m now wondering if the forward reaching impact of this transformation is going to take as long as I thought.