Delays?

Lillian 'skyped' Quality Group yesterday to find out the latest and was the development on schedule as predicted?

Whilst she was not able to speak directly with anyone in the office who could tell her the status of our home she was promised that somebody would call back. As good as their word on all things thus far Lillian missed 'two calls ' from Cyprus.

On checking email later we sadly but not unexpectedly received this ..


Dear Mrs. Wright,

I was told that you called regarding the progress of the project. Unfortunately there have been some delays, and therefore the project will probably not be finished by the end of the month. I will be able to give you a better estimate for the completion date sometime next week.

Regards,
Stefanos Nikolaou
Civil Engineer

Paying the cash!

Whilst in Cyprus we visited the Quality Group offices a number of times; signing contracts, sorting payments, design of kitchen, selecting tiles etc.

When talking with a Director Lillian in her normal style of looking for the best deal was able to negotiate a good discount on the house price in return for a change in the payment schedule.

So yesterday meant another payment to be made ….. but we are almost there.  Roll on January 2010 when it will finally be ours!

Our week in Cyprus

So ............... full of excitement we left Asas Towers with 64Kg of luggage at 0615. A taxi quickly took us along the Corniche for perhaps the last time to the airport. We have no regrets for going to Doha and but whilst we had an OK time it was an 'experience' we will not look back with fond memories. It didn't compare with our time in Dubai, where we were spolit with our lifestyle and fine group of friends.

We made a quick flight to Bahrain with Gulf Air where we had to disembark.  This was OK as we were able to wait in the lounge for the connecting flight to Larnaca.  (see Lillian in the picture above). On arrival at Larnaca the hire car that had been pre-booked was soon assigned and we were on our way, deciding to go straight to Pervolia rather than the hotel.

Having spent so long just looking at the brochure it was great to see our house for real!We were delighted with what we saw.  The house, although covered with scaffolding looked great. Rooms whilst small compared with what we have become used to still are good sizes. The location is very good - we tried the walk to the beach. Yes it is 5 minutes! The garden looks a lot bigger than the measurements. Quick instant decisons were made that the downstairs bedroom will become the TV viewing room allowing the lounge / dinner to be exactly that and that the patio area will become part of the living area. The 'hot tub', which we have promised ourselves, although we hope will also be nice for visitors will be just to the right and a second patio area should be built in the far right of the garden for sun loungers an table.

The week was spent getting sorted and finding answers to our questions which are as follows:

Meeting with Quality Group to finalise fittings etc for the home.

This was achieved. We were able to sort the ceramic tiles for the floors and walls in the bathrooms. Lillian was also able to negotiate some changes to the layout of the kitchen

Investigate having a 'hot tub' for the garden.

Sorted along with a concrete base and extra electrical work. We have also decided to have a second small patio area placed in the corner of the garden and a gate placed in the wall which will lead directly to the swimming pool.

Investigate furniture purchases etc

Lots of visits made to stores including IKEA in Nicosia. Local stores will provide all that we will need and we will be able to make a few quick purchases and then take our time to be sure we get what we want.

Other achievements

Bank accounts established. Kitchen white goods purchased. Visits made to a number of car showrooms. Prices are higher than UK but we should be able to find a 'run around' fairly quickly on arrival.

Changes in Plans and more questions

So ............. some unexpected developments. Due to the finishing of my work contract we will not be returning to Doha at the end of our scheduled next visit to Cyprus but will be going home to London.

Due to high shipping costs we will, for the second time in a couple of months be leaving 'goods behind' that we might have kept for our Cyprus Home. The biggest casuality is the sofa set shown here as it would have cost more to ship it back to England and then to Cyprus than it cost to buy! A shame as Lillian and Emily had sourced it with Cyprus in mind. But there you go.

Our possessions here in Doha amounted to 8 cu.m and we thought it might be a good idea to directly ship our things to Cyprus but the cost was a staggering QR22,000 compared to QR8900 to London. This was mainly due to the fact we did not want the container to arrive before January and it would have spent time sitting on the dock in Dubai of all places!!! We have subsequently further reduced this cost to QR 4200 (700 stg) by leaving the sofa and not buying any insurance. Don't let the ship go down!

The loss of the job (these things happen in the Middle East) means whilst the finances have taken a hit we hope that we will be able to get to Cyprus in January 2010 when the house is scheduled to be complete compared with April 2010 that was 'budgeted'. All so very exciting.

Another good thing is that we will now only leave Cyprus on 26th September due to having to get a later flight, so an extra day! We will fly Cyprus Airways for the first time from Larnaca to London. Need to join their frequent flyer club and start collecting airmiles.

Extra things to find out when there to add to the list below?

Price of cars (We have been looking into shipping from London) and regulations for importing. We suspect from internet research that cars are expensive there.

What's Next?

We have booked to fly from Doha to Cyprus for the week 19-25th September as it is the Eid-Al-Fitr holiday in Doha (celebration at the end of the Holy month of Ramadan).

Whilst we will be staying at a small hotel in Larnaca our agenda will be:

a) Meeting with Quality Group to finalise fittings etc for the home.
b) Investigate having a 'hot tub' for the garden - a bit of luxury for us and of course visitors
c) Investigate furniture purchases etc
d) Get to know the island more
e) Visit friends Wendy and Martin from Dubai who have already made Cyprus their home
f) Relax!

But it is only 5 minutes to the Beach!

It really is only a five minute walk to the beach. Although not sandy it will do nicely for brisk morning walks! These pictures were taken by Lillian in February 2009 when she visited Pervolia to 'seal the deal'.

The '5 minute walk' is confirmed by this image from Google Earth.

Going for it!

Having mulled it over, we decided that it would be fantastic to have a house that was big enough to be our permanent home in Cyprus.

We'd seen on the Quality Group website another development at Pervolia, which was a little village we'd really liked on our visit to the island. So Lillian went to Cyprus in February to see if the small develpoment of 15 houses just outside the village of Pervolia and only a short walk to the coast would fit the bill - it seemed so "on paper" - we just had to check out the reality.

House 5 at Tersephanou (which can be seen in the picture above) was just as we'd imagined and now that it was half built Lillian could see that we had chosen a great little house, but House 15 (seen left) at Pervolia could be a home, big enough for the friends and family and truly was only a 5 minute walk to the coast.

Sadly there was no sea view but we could live with that! Instead the house is right next door to the small communal pool and gym and has the second biggest plot in the complex.

There's an aditional room downstairs - either a 4th bedroom or study/rec room; we haven't yet decided. But what we did decide was that House 15 at Pervolia would be ours!

And here it is - the last on the left handside of the row you can see. The small 'shelter' looking construction will be the gym and next to that the swimming pool.

A change of mind

As time went on with life in Dubai, it became apparent to us that rather than have a small holiday home we should consider making the Cyprus sunshine a base for the future. A place for us to be happy but also be attractive to visitors not least Andrew, Steve and Emily for years to come.

Completely unexpected and 'Out of the Blue' Chris was invited to apply for a post with a new company which was operating out of Doha, Qatar. Two meetings later a deal had been agreed that was too good to refuse and so our life that we had so enjoyed in Dubai was scheduled to come to a very sudden and unexpected end. After serving one month's notice Chris was off to Kuwait for four months (new company HQ) and then we packed up our Dubai home (well Lillian did) and relocated to Doha!

However with the new job came increased salary which allowed 'new ideas' and thoughts. Could we afford to upgrade? Could Cyprus really become the base for the future? It was clear that we would never be able to afford the lovely places we had seen right on the coast that Quality Group had shown when we had visited Cyprus. But what were the alternatives?

Setting the scene

Let us start at the very beginning. In January 2007 we chanced to see an advert in the Gulf News in Dubai for a property show for new properties in Cyprus. Having missed out on the 'boom' and profits people were making / had made in Dubai we decided to go and have a look as we were not doing much on a Saturday afternoon.

The show was in the Grand Hyatt Hotel and organised by a company McKenzie McMillan who were acting as agents for a property developer known as Quality Group Developments who had a number of projects on the go in Cyprus. We were impressed with the company and the examples they showed of their other developments....and so to our own surprise we signed up there and then to a 2 bedroomed house on a complex adjacent to a yet to be built golf course about 10 miles from Larnaca. It was to be in a small village called Teresephanou.

We had never even been to Cyprus but trusted the judgment of friends and family who have travelled the world and still say Cyprus is one of the nicest places they've visited; not necessarily the prettiest, but friendly, easy, diverse and warm!! Just what we wanted.

We chose House 5 as the best remaining - a view across to the swimming pool and the hills beyond. We hoped it would meet our dreams of a holiday home in Cyprus to enjoy in retirement whenever the UK weather proved too dull, cold and wet for us to bear, having become "softies" as a result of Dubai sunshine and warmth!!

The deposit was paid and then in March we made the first of our staged payments for the house.

It wasn't until the October that we actually went to Cyprus to see the plot for our future holiday home. Quality Group met us at the aiport and showed us around. This is the site where our 'holiday home' was to be built. It was hard to imagine but we explored a bit of the island, and knew we'd made a great decision!

The only downside was that we saw an absolutely wonderful development that Quality Group were building along the coast - large individual houses with fantastic views out to sea; sadly we didn't have the kind of money needed to have a place like that, but we toyed with the idea of putting down a deposit on their next project further along the coast.