22 January 2011

It's been nearly 7 months since we moved here to Casa Riana apartment. All that while, we've been delaying payments for our maintenance fees. We thought it was the least of our priorities so it always come last in our monthly budget and sometimes we just skipped the payment altogether. The thing is when it's time to renew our parking lot car stickers, we had to settle all our outstanding arrears beforehand. Else we might not be permitted entry with our car into our very own home. I know that sucks but that's one way the maintenance company get to make all the owners pay up their maintenance fees. That said, I can see about a quarter of the tenants here has yet to change their old car stickers and the due date is set until the end of this month. It is interesting to see what happens when that day comes. I'm sure tempers will flare and all hell will break lose.

Lucky for me my lovely wife sacrificed to settle all the outstanding arrears so we can come home in peace and not get bugged by the security guards every other day asking to change our sticker. We drove down to the management office in Pandan Jaya to pay 5 months worth of bills. What would I do without her. One thing for sure I will vote to change the management company once their contract is up. RM143 is bloody expensive to pay for an apartment of our size.

26 September 2010

Today we had our first mini open house/house-warming/get-together-with-family at Casa Riana apartments. We have thought about doing something like this since we moved here. It's only now that we got the chance.

It's nothing major really and we purposely didn't invite everybody because we meant it to be a family/neighbours affair. Besides, we couldn't possibly accommodate everyone had we done so. Still, nearly a hundred people came by today, mostly family and relatives. I really had no idea we had so many relatives living hear in Selangor until they all came by today. Thank you guys for coming.

3 July 2010

We have a good community! This evening the folks at Casa Riana held a potluck/birthday party/get-together+World Cup viewing party down at the pool & the community hall. Residents brought along foods to the event and my wife made her trademark onde-onde which was a hit among the guests. The empty tupperware was proof.

This is the 2nd time already we had such gathering. The first time, we just moved here the day before so we were too busy to attend. Earlier in the afternoon there was another meeting with the resident's association, developer and some other folks. I missed it because I had some other matters to attend to. We here at Casa Riana is like one big kampung. Hopefully it'll stay that way.

20 June 2010

Today I attended our first resident's association meeting. They've had a couple of meetings before. We haven't moved in yet so obviously I didn't attend.

The security firm and representative from the management were present. We discussed a lot of things, security, parking, cleanliness, security, mainly security. In fact the first hour and a half was all about security. Not surprising since there were already 4 break-ins here at this apartment. All of them in block A. I know stuff happens but what are all those security guards doing about this?

After that they also selected several new committee members for the resident's association. I was elected as head of the fifth floor at random. Wow, now I'm head of something.

4 June 2010

Once upon a time, I got bonus from my company and treated myself with a huge desktop table. That was before when I placed all my computers and stuff in our living room. But now here in Casa Riana my wife explicitly prohibited me from putting anything in the living room so I had to move them here instead in our bedroom.

I traded the huge table for this smaller one so that it can fit into our small bedroom. Small as it is, at least I got an outside view of the hills. No this hills don't have eyes and it is actually quite beautiful. I can't wait to start studying already!

31 May 2010

I broght my kids to the swimming pool today. Adam has been there before with his uncles on the very first day but it was Mia's first experience inside one.

Obviously they had loads of fun. Most of the time the pool is filled with kids and teenages of all ages. Grown-ups like me, we wait until it's late in the evening or very early in the morning to dip in. That said you need to keep a close watch on the little ones.

29 May 2010

Friday was Wesak day and a public holiday here in Selangor and some other parts of Malaysia. I took this opportunity to wash my car for the last time at Taman Universiti. Living in an apartment, I don't know when I'll get to wash the car for free next.

Two days is definitely not enough to pack all our stuff. Although we've been steadily sending a lot of our stuff there all through the month, we still find there's a lot of things yet to be packed. The movers came around 10:30 AM while we're still busy packing stuff. There were altogether 3 of them with one 5 tonne lorry. Lucky for us since it's a huge lorry, we loaded most of our stuff in on the lorry for a one trip journey. Apart from them, my 2 brother in laws also dropped by to help. We finished the entire exercise about 3 hours later. As of tonight we are still unpacking and organizing our stuff at the new place. I think it might as well take a week before we are trully settled here.

Needless to say we're all so tired. Our 2 year old Mia was really stressed with everything, getting in everybody's way and knocking into stuff.

22 May 2010

As with every new home, one has to install lamps and fans and fix up wiring and stuff. Some of my neighbours here renovated their entire house especially the kitchen. Us, we'd start with some basic lights and fans first. I asked a colleague of mine who happens to be a chargeman for help with the wiring. His price was RM1300 for the whole house. Wow, that was like my entire gross pay for last month. Honestly, we just wanna install some lights, fans and a few power points, not turn it into a mansion. Thanks but I think I'll pass.

Then my father-in-law who was in town offered to help with the wiring. People sleepy given pillow, I accepted his offer with open arms. So all last week we worked together day and night. I did most of the hard work like drilling and screwing with his instructions. He did all the wiring and stuff. Never knew drilling holes in the wall is one heck of a job. After drilling like 3 dozens holes my hands and feet were all numb and there's a loud ringing in my ears for hours. No wonder people pay others to do this kind of stuff.

Anyway everything is almost finished now. We'll be moving in next Saturday.

30 April 2010

A few days ago I got a call from my bank saying that we'll have to start paying the housing loan next month. The thing is our purchase of the house is not complete yet and our lawyer maintained that we can not moved in until everything is settled. Fortunately though after I called my agent who talked to the owner, he said we can move in anytime we like and he's cool with it. So suddenly we have like a month to get the house ready and prepare for everything.

It's all about money really. The grills will cost us at least 1.5K and installing the fans and lights with all the wiring will cost another 500 ringgit. Not to mention we have to pay some 500 more for the renovation deposit to the maintenance office. I've got like a million things to think about and I started to have trouble sleeping at night.

That said, where there's a will, there is a way. Casa Riana, here we come!

9 November 2009

Thanks to my Dad, we can finally pay the 2.75% booking money for Casa Riana apartment. I was worried that we might not get that 115K price. The last agent I called said the apartment is now for sale from 120K onwards. Somehow my agent managed to convince the owner to sell it to us with the old price. Now we only have to apply for a housing loan and maybe take out a personal loan as well to pay for the legal fees. We never knew owning a house would cost so much money.

Last week I found a little rat in our kitchen. I managed to trap it in the toilet and smack it to death with a broom. Two days later I saw another rat hiding under the kitchen cabinet. I gave it a chase with my trusty broom but to my astonishment it ran and slip right under the kitchen door and straight into the backyard. I know that it's small but the way it slid under the door, it's like the thing has no bones at all! I had to nail a piece of stick below the door to stop the rat from coming in the future.

Yesterday while I was about to park my car, I saw a big ugly dog about to poop in front of my gate. I quickly blared my horn like crazy but the dog just kept on going with his business. It's only when I was about to run the dog down with my tires did it ran away an poop at the vacant house next door instead.

If those are not enough reasons why we should move away from this place then I don't know what are. I can tell you a dozen more reasons why I hate this place but I'll save them for another day. I know I probably had to take another part time job to afford the apartment but right now, anyplace is better then this.

5 November 2009

Oh Casa Riana, how i long for thee. Our plans to own a house has hit a backstage because of a financial setback. Initially we wanted to take out a personal loan to pay for the 5% deposit but after thinking hard about it, we would be paying both for the personal loan and housing loan later on which could be a real burden for us. Besides, there's a gazillion other things we need to pay such as the lawyer's fees, S&P and so much more that sometimes we wondered if we can afford to do this.

It pains my heart to drive past the apartment almost every day of the week and see all the tenants moving in and the price of the place steadily climb due to high demand. Before, we can buy the place for as low as 110K but today we'd be lucky if the price doesn't soar well above 120K. Time is definitely of the essence and right now they are not on our side.

We did found an angel financial that could help us with our dream but up until now we're still waiting for his final word. We were hoping instead of borrowing from the bank, why not borrow from him instead and avoid all those expensive interests.

If we failed to get his financial backing, I think we'd probably say goodbye to our dream home.