House Hunting

House hunting off base is a very challenging thing. There's huge list of housing agencies in the area. We're just getting started and already spent the past day and a half meeting with them back to back...8 different agencies, (and we have 3 more meetings scheduled on Mon)...we've viewed 18 different units (yes 18!), and we've only found 1 that we really like far as cleanliness, style, and distance from base. One new house was amazing, however well over budget.
We've seen an array of Japanese style homes, which to no surprise is quite different from American style. Sqare footage is not so much an issue, but the major difference is in layouts and appliances. Japanese appliances means a 3 burner stove with a tiny (fish) broiler compartment and no large oven...refrigerators are smaller...there are no dishwashers...no garbage disposals...minimal counter space...the washer and dryer are small as well. Bathrooms often have the toilet by itself in a little room and a separate shower room. Sometimes theres a bathtub and/or there's a shower head out of the wall and just a drain on the tile floor (no shower doors to enclose the area like we're used to). Japanese style typically had a room with the traditional tatami mats as flooring instead of carpet. No units had carpet actually, it was either linoleum, tile, or wood. Storage space is huge, with very deep closets. Strangely most kitchen cabinets were positioned so high (in fact Dan barely reached the first shelves). Overall very interesting. It's a challenge to find the right combo of Japanese and American styles.

The tough part is that we still want to consider what we are offered on-base (since living on-base will be most cost effective and convenient), but we might not get offered a unit on base until Tues or Wed. Then we can really compare and choose to accept or deny the on-base housing to move off-base instead. BUT, it's also risk to wait since the one unit we like off base may be secured by someone else by the time we have the chance to compare it to the on-base housing! Tough decision. Pray we either get offered something good on base, or the one we like off base is still available for us!

The hunt continues...