The Last Days of Our Home on the Atlantic

Last week I was in Western Head, in Nova Scotia, packing up all the stuff that we had stored in our farmhouse, and selling off what we decided we could live without. At the same time, with many thanks to our wonderful real estate agent Maddie Charlton, we had a buyer for our house, at a price that I think was a good one.

This move was a long time coming. Part of it was a realization that Liverpool wasn't really the place where we could settle. The lack of a cultural life, and the lack of a decent health-care system, were significant obstacles. The reliance on Loblaws and Sobeys for our food also played a role - after France we were used to a certain quality and variety in food, and in Liverpool that simply didn't exist. I don't mind paying a higher price for better quality, but in Nova Scotia you only get the first option.

We spent a year in Vancouver while Susan studied at UBC, and are now several months into life in Cambridge. I think that we're both better understanding that although we can dream about a wonderful rural life, the reality is that we need more than snow hares and birdwatching: we want music, and art, and bookstores, and cafes, and driving an hour or more for them isn't really a welcome option.

Beyond that though, is another worry: I still think that Donald Trump is leading his country into a civil war, and that this will inevitably impact all of Canada. Right now, real estate prices - and rents - in Canada border on unaffordable for many people. If Trump manages to crash the entire American economy - and I really think he may manage that - I can see North American housing prices crashing at the same time.

I remember the crash in the early 1990s, and the friends who lost the homes that they were just barely managing to make the payments on. Like now, people were putting a significant part of their household incomes into mortgage payments, and when things crashed there was nowhere to escape.

(Incidentally, this also hit the mobile home market down in the US, and when we lived in Kentucky you could pick up a repossessed double-wide for cents on the dollar.)

Right now, the questions outnumber the answers. Maybe we'll remain in Cambridge for another few years. Maybe our sale proceeds will suddenly be enough to buy another nice home in British Columbia, or in England.

I do know that our experience as landlords has been negative, very negative, with one set of tenants leaving in bankruptcy, and another when the wife emailed us to say she was leaving an abusive relationship, and the husband (and kids?) simply disappearing.

And we learned that if we were to become landlords again, we would want to live nearby so that we could oversee trades and repairs, and better judge issues as they arise.

Meanwhile, I'm back in Cambridge, getting ready for my 70th (!) birthday, (and how the hell can I be only two months younger than Johnny Rotten??) and in general feeling like selling the house lifts a great weight off of our shoulders, and possibly also opens a few doors.