Room with a view

Keep your eye on Prize

                        

    Now comes the waiting, which neither my husband  or myself are good at. Buying property in Greece is difficult even on a good day.

First step: Notary office  of Yannis 

 Periklis : seller must go to several offices, some here on Ikaria, some on Samos,  island next to us. Without this paperwork  we cannot close on the property,  we are told it could take up to two months maybe more with covid issue. 

Once notary has these documents he will draw up contract, land certification (deed)

Second step: Lawyers office  of Christina 

who tells us  we must get a  contract & deed from notary  first before we can proceed with her.

Third step :Forestry Department 

We must get special permission that says the property is not on  protected  forest 

land. We ask how do we do that. You must go to  an Architect he then goes to forestry department for permission .They do this by google earth, they make sure property is not in a protected forest, before issuing  a  special  permit. 

Fourth step: Architect 

Kula and Kosta Architects

We all meet at property Kosta reiterates that we must have special permission  from forestry,  could take 2-7 months as there is only one guy who works in that office. We now must wait for  forestry  &Kula Kosta , who will survey the land, as well as doing the design, then only after we receive  permission  from  forestry department will  we get our work  permit to proceed,  begin building. 

Fifth step: Stone builders  

We meet with several Greek & Albanian stone tradesmen. 

If you think this is a lost art, you are only to come here to see for yourself, we are amazed  by their talent, work ethics, beauty of their work.

We have chosen, Micos, an Albanian who has worked next door to where we currently  live. He & his crew  of 5 guys work tirelessly 7 days a week, 8  hours a day  creating beautiful  stone walls,  steps, stone houses.

*Forgot to mention the initial  step which was getting a Tax ID number* 

We were told by our  bank we must have a Tax ID #

This involved waiting 4 hours  in a room with  no air conditioning,  chairs of any kind,  no semblance  of  organization,. To make matters worse, person  running the show was  a very rude lady . When we left her office we both had  a headache traumatized by our  experience , BUT with tax ID  in hand. 

Bank experience  was  made only slightly better,  took four hours  to set up a savings account, was only made palatable by pleasant people, air conditioning,  chairs.  I am sure by now you get the picture. "

 It ain't  going to be easy!

A big  difference over here  we are allowed  to work on the property before a closing takes place. It seems strange to us to, but is considered  quite normal here.

We begin by  cleaning  inside,  we are quite sure goats have  been sleeping here, which would explain  an unpleasant  odor. We are told don't  throw away dried goat poop, its great for your garden you will be planting. 

Can this really look like
Photo below 

                                               

Next was  the yard, in front were 2 beautiful  moira trees.  In spring,  it bears delicious   black  berries only problem is that it drops its berry onto terraces making  a slippery  ununsightly  & gooey  surfaces . Our friend shows us how to  prune but still to keep  these lovely shade trees. My husband  and Paschale chop away branch after branch , reassuring  me this is  how its done here. After they're finished, our tree was totally bald. Sad part of pruning,is  in the spring they will  not  bear any  fruit,  still be beautiful  shade trees, hard to believe as I look at the tree now.  

                                            

                                            

 

  

                                                          

                             

                                             

                                                             

One of many things  that  we  love about Ikaria, everything  is naturally  recycled. As I  already explained  about goat poop. Another example all the branches & clippings are given to the goats, when they are finished  eating all the greens , all that is left is hardwood to be chopped burned in woodstove . This same process takes place year after year. 

Circle  of life