We have been in the new house in Harrogate for just over two weeks now and we are pretty comfortable although it is a bit of an old persons house at the moment. No curtains at the front, just the previous owner’s net curtains which I can’t wait to bin. NO DISHWASHER because the small kitchen will be redeveloped soon. VERY LITTLE TELLY as the previous ownwer didn’t have one and the aerial is a little antiquated for DVB-T/FREEVIEW. NO BROADBAND so it doesn’t really feel like a home yet – according to our soon to be new ISP Eclipse anyway who reported the following survey results recently:
32% of people could not live without their curtains and only 8.5% could not live without their microwave. This compares to a staggering 92% of people who said that in the first month following moving into a new home, the one thing they wouldn’t be able to live without was their broadband connection.
The house and location are great though, 10 minutes to walk downtown, 5 minutes walk to Sophie’s school, 5 minutes drive to my office and a less pleasing 50 mins to Jean’s new office in Wakefield. The house consists of 4 large bedrooms, two on each floor, two large bathrooms, a large walk in wardrobe on the first floor. The ground floor isn’t huge – but we will join the kitchen and dining room together to create a large family room. Having the cellar though is great, we’ve got the laundry down there, an overflow fridge freezer and a larder room for storing veggies and drink. Means we don’t need to pack out the kitchen with storage.
Some oddities though. My car insurance has been hiked by £50 for moving to Harrogate from Hull. English average for car theft is 4.5 per 1000. Hull is 10 and Harrogate 2 per 1000. How does that make sense? I suspect an affordability issue. That or the fact that the theft of one Range Rover or Aston Martin from the neighbour blows more insurance company profit than 20 Citroen Saxos nicked in Hull?
Also wonderful Lib Dem Harrogate has possibly the worst recycling service anywhere. Rubbish is piled in big black binliners at the side of the house – the bin men hand you two new bags when they pick up. They don’t recyle plastics either. Jean called the council and asked why they can have a top-class service in Hull and a third world one here are the response was
“well the government likes to invest in services like that for deprived areas”. What about the £1,350 we’re investing in Harrogate council fees on an annual basis then!
Anyway, I’ll post some pictures of the house and get a before and after series going AS SOON AS I GET BROADBAND!
Adam