Gutters, downpipes and drainage channels (and maybe a tree down!)

So a how that I owned in England several years ago had a drainage channel across the front of the house. Our drive was on a fair slope, so this caught the surface water run-off. When looking at the original house photos, you may note (in typical Bulgarian style) that the drain pipes don’t actually meet a drain! They sometimes stop halfway down the wall and then shoot out a metre or so; in addition, we had a concrete path that joins the wall of the house, meaning that rainwater just “sat” by the walls – by no means ideal.

How the drainage pipes looked on purchase – not meeting a drain at all!

I’d requested a drainage channel with a grate surrounding the house – but in fairness, my guidance was a pair of random photos I’d found online that reminded me of the one I had in the UK that I mentioned before. My only other guidance was that the downpipes/ guttering needed to be either black, white or grey.

These were the actual photos I sent to Mowlem as their guidance

So, in typical Mowlem style, they did exactly as we asked! In honesty, I genuinely can’t fault their recreation of our vision & hopes for this…and considering we’re over 1,500 miles away, couldn’t have asked for more…

So, we now have the drainage channel sorted, as well as the guttering and downpipes sorted, but what you MAY have noticed (and Norm especially is SUPER excited by this) is that in between the drainage channel being installed and the guttering/ downpipes being replaced, the huge tree out the front eft of the house is actually down! I don’t envy Mowlem getting that sorted, as it was at least 40 feet high…

Pandemic Progress

So you may have noticed that we haven’t had any updates? That’s probably because a) not a great deal had happened as we were paying for the house itself and b) you may have noticed that we were (and still are at this point) in the midst of a global pandemic!

We travelled to Bulgaria in September 2019 to sign our contracts and in honesty, cannot fault how helpful Mowlem were. They were simply amazing at guiding us through the notary part, as well as literally taking us to the bank in order to set up a Bulgarian bank account too.

Since then, the world kind of stopped from the respect of travelling – with our 16 night trip in May 2020 being cancelled whilst the world dealt with a virus that shows no sign of stopping.

Saying that, this meant that our usual holiday money we would have spent was now being saved, so we were in a good position to be able to start work on the house.

So what’s come first? The logical list included a new cess pit, reinforcing the roof, taking down the huge tree at the front of the house, a drainage channel all around the house and new guttering. At this point only the garden clearance and cess pit has been completed, but boy we’re happy with what we’ve seen!

Before work started

After the garden clearance

We don’t even question that this needed doing as full access was going to be needed in order to start work on the cess pit….

As you can see, a great deal of groundwork was needed, and the Mowlem team were fantastic at sharing progress photos with us – at least helping us feel closer to our home whilst travel is still banned for us and we can’t get over to the house in person.

The “Cess Pit” taking shape…..
Concrete poured and it was finally taking shape
Really useful to see the exact location of our pipework to see how this fits in with future plans for the back garden

So, it’s finally happening! The next stage photos should be due any day now. As I said before, this is roof strengthening, guttering, drainage channels and the big tree down….we’ll keep you posted!

The Journey Starts….

The original exterior

We started looking at the idea of living in Bulgaria since late 2015. Norm is ex-RAF and has been posted/ lived abroad whilst serving in the military, and I have lived in France several (3) times and Malta for 3 years – so neither of us are in the slightest bit phased by the idea of living abroad.

My research has been consistent….looking at the cost of living, crime rates, history, regions, transport, utlities etc, etc… this is a VERY different country to what we are used to, but neither of us are in the slightest bit phased. We have both owned property in the past, but are currently renting a small flat in a rural part of Gloucestershire. It may not be the prettiest, but we did it purely to save money….to make Bulgaria happen! Having moved in 16 months before and “created” a garden from wilderness (with the very generous support of my little sister), the time came to sort out our retirement home.

We had been keeping an eye on a few Bulgarian Estate Agents, returning to several on a VERY regular basis! One stood out from the crowd though, and that was a company based in Ruse on the Northern-Central River Danube border, named Mowlem. They have a very good relationship with a Brit named Paul Hawtin, who I had also done a fair amount of research on, but liked the British/ Bulgarian link. Paul runs a business called Emerge, based in the UK.

About 18 months before, we had visited Bulgaria on a “fly-drive” kind of basis. We flew into Sofia and hired a car, touring from town to town across the Northern-Central region, staying somewhere different every night, as well as a couple of nights with ex-pat friends who had already taken the plunge 5 years earlier. During this trip, we went out with Mowlem for the day, visiting 5 properties that we had an eye on at the time, but also to look at the condition of the houses that they offered.

Whilst it may seem a little “odd” to fellow Brits, the way that Mowlem/ Emerge allow you to pay for your home is actually quite normal in Bulgaria. The way it works is that you pay an initial deposit (in this case £500) and then make agreed minimum monthly payments (for us this was £300). You can have the keys from the beginning, but the house isn’t officially yours until you make the final payment, then arrange to sign and pay the Notary & Legal Fees (in this case, £350, plus the government charge of 5% of the cost of the purchase). So how much will this house cost us….. £12,900 for 120m2 of house, with 1667m2 of land. Amazing!