How to buy an apartment in 10 days

 

Note: This post introduces three new blog characters, all of whom are also my dear colleagues and friends and were mentioned in some of the previous posts. I thought they deserve their unique nicknames in the blog.

Sister Ladybug is Maria Astefanoaei, because her presence always gives me joy just like the times I encounter ladybugs. There are exceptions to this, though, like windy days on a Danish beach, for ladybugs not for Maria.

Sister Owl is Zoi Kaoudi, because she is one of the people I tend to go to when I need some wisdom.

Sister Cat is Veronika Cheplygina, because she loves cats. I know there are many cat people out there, but Veronika is simply the most deserving of this title.

 

 

Easter Sunday, April 5:

I received an email from my landlord asking me if I would find a painter for when I leave the house on June 16 or if he should find one and deduct it from the deposit.

And that is how I learned I was supposed to leave my apartment.

Taking the side of my landlord; it was true that my latest rental contract extension was till June 16.

Taking my side; since I moved there in February 2018, my landlord always extended my contract without any elaborate discussion, so I thought we will simply extend the contract again.

My side was wrong.

I wrote back asking him if I did something wrong or if he wanted to increase the rent. He said no to those replying within the same hour. I then asked him to give me more time as I wasn’t planning to find a new place since we didn’t say that our last extension was the absolute last one and finding something long-term in two months wasn’t very easy even without my usual unreasonable work schedule. He replied to that email a week later.

While waiting for his answer, I immediately wrote to some of the Teams channels at work asking for legal guidance, since my work network is my main network to reach out for this type of help. As far as I know, it isn’t easy to kick a renter out of a pre-90s apartment after two years, and I lived in my apartment for 8 years. Despite the Easter holidays, several people reached out for help, and I am grateful to them all, but especially to Morten Tychsen Clausen, Peter Sestoft, and Yvonne Dittrich who provided me with pointers for legal help.

 

My parents were with me during the Easter break, and we were having such a great time until the email that broke the mood for all. I took my parents to Davids Samling as we planned before the email, my mind occupied thinking about my options and angry with myself for making the mistake of not being more careful and trusting someone who has power over me.

After we got back from the museum, I booked an appointment with my bank for a mortgage discussion, as I decided that I am done with depending on landlords. A bank approval is a pre-requisite for not just buying a house but also making the estate agents take you seriously. There was one issue, though, the earliest date my bank gave me was on April 21, which was more than two weeks away.

I didn’t sleep at all that night.

 

Easter Monday, April 6:

I asked my parents if they would be up for checking out apartments in the area that are for sale. Some had open houses despite the Easter Monday. We saw three apartments. Even if they would be ok if push came to shove, none felt right.

 

Tuesday, April 7:

One suggestion on Teams was to contact the tenants’ organization in Denmark for legal support. Since the Easter holiday was over, I contacted them both via email (with detailed documents on my rental contracts) and over the phone. The lady on the phone said my case is registered, and an option is to go to court for this. Hearing this option, I got a bigger panic than the moment I realized that my landlord wants me out in two months. The trigger for this panic was I wasn’t sure how a court-case would look in my Danish citizenship application, which I will be eligible for next year. While I know that fighting for your rights shouldn’t be a bad thing in a citizenship application, given the rules of and the political discussion around that application, I also feel like I am supposed to be the Wonder Woman to be granted that citizenship.

To fight the panic, I went outside for a walk and cried for the first time since I received the first email from my landlord. (The next and last time I cried for this would be 8 days later when the owners of the apartment I wanted to buy accepted my offer.)

When I got back to my office, I canceled a work trip (Dagstuhl seminar) for the following week, as I couldn’t afford any work trips before I sorted this out. I then checked the bank appointment times again and saw that there was an opening for next morning, I guess someone cancelled their appointment (thank you very much whoever you are!). First time I felt a bit of hope about the situation.

 

Wednesday, April 8:

This wasn’t the first time I contacted my bank for house mortgage. The first time was in 2019, the dialog was high level, since I didn’t yet have enough savings. The second time was in 2023 and more serious as I could now pay the downpayment for the types of places I may want to buy; the expected amount is ~20% if you are a foreigner but could be more or less depending on how much the bank advisor looks down on you for not being Danish or if you pay one of those Danish companies like Bomae to negotiate with the bank on your behalf. The latter interaction contributed to the opening anecdote of Part 4 of the Navigating the World with a Turkish Passport posts. While I used that anecdote to make a joke in that post, let me be serious now: (1) That was a very uncomfortable interaction due to the blatant foreigner unfriendly behavior of the bank advisor, and (2) I thought the entire mortgage system was an abomination.

Well, as they say, “Third time is the charm.” The advisor I got this time was kind and a fellow Amager resident. And things were put into motion to approve me for the potential apartments I would be interested in buying.

The common advice while trying to get a mortgage is to talk to several banks and negotiate. I had neither the time nor the energy for this. Also, as far as my understanding of the Danish mortgage system goes, if you are paying the 20% downpayment and getting the fixed-rate mortgage anyway, the negotiation space is small. I may be mistaken.

 

I also had another apartment viewing that day. I informed my boss about the situation during our regular meeting, which is a walk & talk, and asked if we could walk in the direction of the apartment so I could head to the viewing after the meeting. (When we had our next meeting two weeks later, I could tell him that I bought something.)

Mom came with me to that apartment viewing. It was a place we both liked, but the estate agent showing the apartment said it was already sold. Why didn’t you let us know before we came all the way?

 

Friday, April 10:

Another apartment viewing with mom. I had high hopes for this one, but seeing it in person, I wasn’t sure anymore, as it required extra work after the move in, which isn’t something I am good at. I started feeling a bit desperate. Though, I felt lucky that I could take my mom with me again, as she basically devoured the place finding all sorts of issues, which I wouldn’t be able to do.

 

Saturday, April 11:

Parents left in the morning.

Sister Ladybug had extra tickets for the Big Thief concert and asked me if I would like to join her. I didn’t know the band, but I said yes. The concert was the first time in a week that I stopped thinking about my living situation. Their music was mellow and soothing, which helped. Plus, it was one of those awesome concert crowds, everyone was helpful and respectful enjoying the concert in unity.

 

Sunday, April 12:

Went to four open houses during the day. Really liked one of the apartments, which was ~5mins to my current one, on the market for a few days only. and having its first open house. There were a few parents looking for a place to buy for their children who were about to move to Copenhagen for their university education. These parents have been a common demographic at the open houses for the types of apartments I have been interested in.

In the evening, I received an email from my landlord asking if he could visit me next Saturday.

 

Monday, April 13:

Almost first thing in the morning, I gave an offer for the apartment I liked promising the price the owners asked for, since, once again, I neither had the time nor the energy for negotiation. The legal advisor the bank assigned to me said that they typically give a response in a day or so, and unless they do that, I should move onto other apartments as the market moves fast. So, I went to see three more apartments while waiting. I liked one of them, not as much as the one I gave the offer for, but great option as plan b.

 

Tuesday, April 14:

The estate agency took their sweet time preparing the official offer document. So, I lost a day because of them. I at least knew that I was the first person to give an offer, which in Denmark gives you the legal right for a counteroffer, if there are other offers for that apartment.

 

Wednesday, April 15:

My period started.

The legal advisor said that they shouldn’t make me wait longer. So, I told the estate agency that unless the owners got back to me today, I would give an offer to another apartment. Then, I went to see yet another apartment. All these apartment visits during the week meant I was running back & forth from/to work, which was physically draining and caused work to pile up.

When I got back to work from that viewing, I got the call from the estate agent informing me that the owners accepted my offer. I started crying. I wrote to my parents. Then, I went to Sister Owl’s office to share the news. We hugged as I cried a bit more.

 

Saturday, April 18:

Sister Cat kindly accepted to come to my place, so that I wasn’t alone when my landlord came.

The interaction with the landlord went well. He told me that his son will take over the apartment. I told him that I bought a place but my move in date is September, so I asked if he could extend my contract till October, and he agreed.

To be fair, my landlord has been overall a great landlord, except for the email he sent me on the Easter Sunday. If he had told me that the last extension was our last one, I would have acted accordingly. But maybe he didn’t know when his son would move there and wanted to keep his options open as well. Anyway, it doesn’t matter anymore.

 

Sunday, April 19:

After the buyer’s agreement is signed for an apartment, both the seller and buyer have a few days where they are allowed to back-off. It is unlikely, as then you have to pay 1% of the house price. But abusing my overthinking abilities, I signed up for two more open houses, just in case, even though I no longer wanted to go see any apartments. While discussing this with Sister Owl over text, she told me, “being mentally cautious is enough.” So, I didn’t go. 

 

Monday, April 27:

The owners’ association of the apartment I bought sent me an email for my first amenities bill. I could now be really sure that the apartment was mine.

 

 

So, that is how I bought an apartment in 10 days or, depending on how you count, 3 years (since my 2^nd and more serious mortgage talk with the bank). My path to a 30-year mortgage can be an example case for Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow. It was my extremely slow thinking process on the matter that helped me figure out how the system works in Denmark and what kind of place I want to buy. What are the essentials? What are nice to have? What are things I don’t care that much about? Then, when I actually had to buy a place, I could put the fast thinking in action executing the steps. I of course also got lucky with being able to move the bank appointment earlier and seeing a place that I actually liked.

 

I moved to my new place at the beginning of September. I don’t remember experiencing this kind of mental load before. I thought moving across the street would be easier, but when I moved across countries, I was also changing jobs, meaning I had a bit of a break in terms of heavy job duties. This move happened when my work was also happening at more than full speed.

I got two periods in the month of September; one starting the day after I received the keys for the new place and the other starting the day before I gave the keys back for my old place. I didn’t think this was the kind of synchronization I needed in my life, but this is what my body decided, and who am I to judge?

I wish I could tell you that I was melancholic when I left my old place for the last time. Instead, what I remember is experiencing cramps while waiting for my landlord to give him the keys and do the final inspection. I just wanted to be done and never see him again (still need to get my deposit back).

I loved my old place. It was a wonderful home, the second longest I lived in, after my first home. But it also stopped being a home when I received that email from my landlord on Easter Sunday. Just like my first home, which was university campus housing, stopped being a home once the university told my parents that they had to leave.

I will miss the ladybugs from the old place, though, haven’t seen any in my new place yet. The new place has uglier bugs in general.

 

The common phrase you hear from many during these times is “Everything happens for a reason.”

I had been dragging my feet to buy a place, because I loved my rental apartment and hate looking for apartments, and buying is a big commitment for a person who can’t even commit to a country. I checked apartments from time to time over the years, but I didn’t want to move to a place that would be worse (based on my own criteria) while increasing my monthly expenses. In January this year, after going to open houses for two apartments, I even wrote to Sister in Movies that I might die in my rental place in the end. Now, I own a place that I am happy with; it is equidistant to work and the beach. I don’t feel like I settled for something I don’t like due to pressure.

So, I welcome everyone who comes to me with “Everything happens for a reason.” I repeat it to myself during difficult times to put a positive spin on a bad or challenging situation. On the other hand, in early June, I also heard the following alternative phrase while watching Bad Sisters, said by the character Bibi Garvey: “Everything happens for a reason. Some patronizing fucker once said.”

Some things shouldn’t happen, no matter what the outcome turns out to be.