We move a step closer to home ownership in Montecarlo

Terrazzo with a Western view.

We scored again in the home-buying game today. The sellers accepted our offer as is! As for the Swedish couple that was going to bid us up . . . well, we don’t know what happened to them. We didn’t ask. Maybe they didn’t come again. Maybe they found something they didn’t like. Maybe they were afraid to bid against the “rich Americans.” Maybe they never even existed. We don’t really care, because we would have made the same offer anyway. We just would have waited a few more days, hoping to first hear some positive news about the potential sale of our Gig Harbor rental house. No news yet on that front, though. We have about a month to sell our rental house, and if we don’t, we can void the offer and get our deposit back—or get a bank loan and keep the rental house.

This beautiful wood furniture in the two bedrooms is included.

We were shopping for groceries at EsseLunga when Rachele called to say that the buyers had agreed to our offer. We had to drive to her office to sign a new list of furniture that goes with the house, though, because there were two items that held sentimental value for family members. They will take those pieces and replace them with something else of our choosing. This will not be difficult, Rachele said, because the sellers are wood-working artisans and they can make or find replacements.

Me, Rachele, Fulvio and Angelika.

She also confirmed what I had suspected: The woman who lives on the first two stories of the house, with a husband and two daughters, is the sister of Rachele’s husband, so the children are her nieces. We are also quite sure that the woman who lived upstairs was her husband’s grandmother. She said that the meeting with the deceased grandmother’s four grown children to discuss our offer lasted two hours, and it was quite an ordeal for her. I can picture all of them talking at the same time, like my dad and his brothers and sisters would do, sometimes all saying the same thing and sometimes each one something different. Rachele would have been in the middle, trying to smooth things over and keep her in-laws happy while hoping to convince them to accept the offer.

Rachele said it helped that Lucy had shown her a photo of all of our family, taken last summer, so that Rachele could explain to the sellers that we were like them—we respected the importance of family—and that we had commented on the loving way the house was furnished and we wanted to keep it mostly the same. It probably didn’t hurt that I was an Italo-American trying to return to the birthplace of my own grandparents.

We are very contented that our offer has been accepted, but if you are wondering why I don’t sound more enthusiastic, read my last entry. I still have my game face on.

Southwesterly view from terrazza.