My retirement was driven by a disruptive medical issue, Cancer of my mouth in 2017. My partner also had her work disrupted due to urging to take leave to support her partner with Cancer.
In this time, we purchased our South Yarra apartment and sold our family home in Mount Waverley, including renovations and moving.
My partner’s work was impacted and wasn’t the same after she returned to work, so six months later she resigned (retired). I continued working from home for another six months and then pulled the pin on all work.
During the following months we looked at purchasing a country property and undertaking some travel with our caravan. This was after we completed 4 weeks working for Blazeaid as volunteers, very enjoyable. However my partner, who had completed many years volunteering, declared, "I am not volunteering any more".
So we looked around for a country property to suit our budget and give us something meaningful to do, such as clean up a property, place a house on it and use as a country retreat. The property we found was 3 hours north of Melbourne which was a bit of a challenge. Covid was upon us, however as owner builders we were allowed to visit our site to meet contractors and do work (2021). The property was a 2-acre block where the house had burnt down (deliberately lit apparently to collect insurance!)
We began our search for a suitable portable home which was cheap and could be moved to the site complete. The council advised that as it was a portable, relocatable dwelling, we didn’t need a building permit! This has since been revised and we had to go through the whole process of stumps, power, septic and getting sign off.
The whole process took about 9 months to complete, and we moved the cabin on at the end of 2021. We then decided to sell the apartment and moved permanently to Yundool, 35 km north of Benalla. Our retirement activities included many long walks and bike rides, exploring the local area (pubs, towns and finding all the best pie shops).
The project included adding large decks and verandahs, front and back. We finally received our certificate of occupancy. One of the gotchas was our BAL 29 fire rating which required steel mesh screens. The final item to be ticked off was a compliance certificate for the glass shower screen (ridiculous!). We now had our permanent place of residence and could live there.
Job done. It was an interesting journey dealing with council, building surveyors and our cabin supplier, who stopped taking our calls as soon as the 12-month warranty expired.
The neighbours were very helpful at all steps of the journey, including pulling trucks out of the mud and mowing the grass so we weren’t at risk of grass fires. We learnt so much and enjoyed being back in a country location where people are helpful, welcoming and we only have 40 years to go to becoming a local!
During the project we encountered another issue that is now my retirement activity….. (for another time…..)
James Davey
August 2023
In this time, we purchased our South Yarra apartment and sold our family home in Mount Waverley, including renovations and moving.
My partner’s work was impacted and wasn’t the same after she returned to work, so six months later she resigned (retired). I continued working from home for another six months and then pulled the pin on all work.
During the following months we looked at purchasing a country property and undertaking some travel with our caravan. This was after we completed 4 weeks working for Blazeaid as volunteers, very enjoyable. However my partner, who had completed many years volunteering, declared, "I am not volunteering any more".
So we looked around for a country property to suit our budget and give us something meaningful to do, such as clean up a property, place a house on it and use as a country retreat. The property we found was 3 hours north of Melbourne which was a bit of a challenge. Covid was upon us, however as owner builders we were allowed to visit our site to meet contractors and do work (2021). The property was a 2-acre block where the house had burnt down (deliberately lit apparently to collect insurance!)
We began our search for a suitable portable home which was cheap and could be moved to the site complete. The council advised that as it was a portable, relocatable dwelling, we didn’t need a building permit! This has since been revised and we had to go through the whole process of stumps, power, septic and getting sign off.
The whole process took about 9 months to complete, and we moved the cabin on at the end of 2021. We then decided to sell the apartment and moved permanently to Yundool, 35 km north of Benalla. Our retirement activities included many long walks and bike rides, exploring the local area (pubs, towns and finding all the best pie shops).
The project included adding large decks and verandahs, front and back. We finally received our certificate of occupancy. One of the gotchas was our BAL 29 fire rating which required steel mesh screens. The final item to be ticked off was a compliance certificate for the glass shower screen (ridiculous!). We now had our permanent place of residence and could live there.
Job done. It was an interesting journey dealing with council, building surveyors and our cabin supplier, who stopped taking our calls as soon as the 12-month warranty expired.
The neighbours were very helpful at all steps of the journey, including pulling trucks out of the mud and mowing the grass so we weren’t at risk of grass fires. We learnt so much and enjoyed being back in a country location where people are helpful, welcoming and we only have 40 years to go to becoming a local!
During the project we encountered another issue that is now my retirement activity….. (for another time…..)
James Davey
August 2023
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