We have been in Chile for 2 weeks and 3 days. I reference weeks and days because that is the state of my mind right now. We are currently living in temporary housing and have to be out of this apartment on Nov. 23rd. We have been trying diligently to find a permanent house, but that search is proving more difficult than we thought.
A lot of people watch House Hunters International. Seems like it is an easy thing to do - find a house in another country. Find a real estate agent, they find you three houses, you choose the best one. If only it really worked that way in real life. (Who calls those shows reality TV anyway????)
The way finding a rental house works here: Search online to realize most of the posts are old and that house is no longer availalbe - after calling the numbers listed for the post. Try to find real estate agents online and call them. (If only we knew how to call a land line from our cell phone.) Write down a bunch of addresses for real estate agents and ride a metro or a bus or walk to find those agents. Go in and ask if they have any available houses for rent. They tell you no. Walk around town and find other agents that weren't listed online. If they are open, go in and find out the same information: no houses available.
As we have done this process we have learned several things:
1. There is no such thing as MLS for rental houses here. Each agency has their own rentals and no other company knows about them. So even if we found an agent to help us, it wouldn't be very helpful.
2. Everyone wants to live in the city where we will be working. So there is a big demand, especially for houses. Thus the reason there are no houses availble to rent. And if there is a house it is going to cost us a lot more than what the house is really worth.
3. I'm learning to trust the Lord more and more each day as we wait.
4. Our kids are troopers as they have to go with us as we do all the searching. No grandparents or babysitters here to watch them. They have done well with all the walking we have done.
Even though it is discouraging, we did find a house that is in the perfect location for us. Pretty close to the work site, very close to a nice grocery store, semi-easy to catch buses, and it is a house in a nice neighborhood. The house itself isn't great - a bit run down - especially for the price they are asking. It also has a small pool in the backyard. Great for those hot days, not so great with small children. We have been told by another agent that they have a house in that same neighborhood, but they have yet to get the keys for it. So now the question is - do we wait to see the other house or because of the housing crunch, we need to go ahead and get this one.
So here is one of those times we trust the Lord and pray for wisdom and guidance.
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| This is the house we are praying about |
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