A huge bill

Following the last post there was initially good progress on site. The mountains of earth were removed and work was completed on the services. But once that was done the site went very quiet, and it still is.

However there has been more progress on the paperwork side. Following my strong words to G+S Wohnbau they started the process of transferring the land to my name, which needs changes to the land registry, confirmation from the notary as well as tax considerations before actually paying for the land and development costs.

Just as before the tax office was first off the mark with a bill on the same day as the land was transferred, if only everything was so quick! One of the bills was in Deutsche Marks as they refer to legislation put in place before the Euro and not changed since, only in the last line was it converted to Euros.

Finally, last week was the actual bill for the land and development. Needless to say that was the largest bill I’ve ever seen in my life. My agent at the bank took care of it all for me and I received confirmation of the transfer on Friday. That means that the mortgage is now being used and the clock is ticking!

Unfortunately the ground test (for foundations etc) people are unwilling to do their work before the new road is finished, even though it’s marked out, there’s no one working on it and my plot has access from a completed road on the other side. Also Allkauf have apparently put the project on pause, which is understandable given the delay but this is something I need to get going again.

Of course the easiest thing would be if G+S Wohnbau actually finished the development work. They had ignored me again so I sent another frustrated email and only then got a response. In an attached letter from their contractors it seems that the stoppage is due to the cold weather (no surprise there) but that all the work is done except the widening of the road, streetlights and a noise reduction wall (but this doesn’t affect my plot). Of course if they had been on time there wouldn't have been a problem with the weather, in fact they've been lucky that it's not been a problem earlier.

This week is due to be warm. It’s been forecast for a while so I hope they’re ready to go and will make use of it, but somehow I doubt they will!