So today Gretchen, Josh, Mary, and Dave left for Rome. I got the invitation to go but decided that I should probably settle in a little more here in Germany before venturing off to other countries. Plus I think that this is the best decision for Tyson’s wellbeing. I am not sure how he would have taken to a German kennel quite yet. Also, when I got the invitation a couple of months ago, I wasn’t sure what I was going to be doing with work. Now I realize that my work schedule is not really set and I could have gone.
However, I am really glad to have this weekend to sorta relax, get my bearings, and get settled in a little. I am also happy that I don’t have any “drinking buddies” around this weekend since I don’t really have any “buddies” around this weekend since the two people that I know and love on post (Josh and Gretch are gone). Since getting here there has always been a new beer to taste and am sad to report that I love German beer (a little too much). I don’t even really like beer but German beer is really good. It is also nice that there is such a difference between the beers. Not that there isn’t a huge difference between Bud Light and Miller Light but you can really tell the difference with taste tests here. I guess there is even a popular beer called BitBurger that most people don’t like. However, I like this one too… go figure. So I am happy to take a break from the beer testing for the weekend and just lay low and eat a lot of salads :).
Mary and Dave arrived in Frankfurt at 3 pm yesterday. When Gretchen and Josh went to pick them up it was snowing pretty hard again. I guess this is par for course if any Minnesotan travelers are arriving into Germany. People here are really taken aback by how much snow they are getting but it is really nothing compared to Minnesota. I stayed back to make some appetizers for their arrival and three other people came over. We had a lot of fun! Or at least I did! I really like all the people that Gretchen and Josh hang out with and it is always fun to talk to Mary and Dave.
So I got bad news on Wednesday night followed by the opportunity to negotiate with a German (which is a hard and scary task especially for me because no matter what Germans say, I always think that they are yelling at me… even in emails).
Here is the story with some background information. So I have offered to pay the landlord a fairly hefty amount for the monthly rental cost of the place because I like it a lot and really it is not my money. Since I have the housing allowance, I might as well use it and I am happy to know that it is going to a nice hardworking German man. But what I didn’t figure into the whole situation is that I would have to pay the realtor her immobilien fee. Most of them go for one month rent.
Now let me explain something that I find interesting. Most fees are based on the fact that you go to an immobilien and say this is what I want, please find it. They then search for a long time and show you many houses/apts til you find one you like and then you pay them one months rent whatever that is and most places go for about 700-900 euros here (and those places are nice places). But what I did was find this place in a local newspaper, call her because her name was in the ad, and have her meet me at the house and show it to me. It took me about 10 mins total to look at the house and decide that I wanted it. Now she is a vital part of the process because she talks to the landlord that only speaks German BUT at the end of all this she might have done a total of maybe 2 hours of work TOTAL to seal this deal. So I was trying to talk her down from the one month rent. She did agree at the house to do 80% but that was still 1600 euros which is more than $2000 American money. Which is mind boggling to me… to say the least since she really just had to show up to make the money.
So I wrote to her and said that I talked to other people who spent 400 to 1500 euros on an immobilien (which is true) and was wondering if she would settle for 1100 euros. This is what I got back.
“thanks for reply
about immobilien-charge: First of all: I am not other people !
I am out to rent a project about ca. 2100,-- min. -
My fee is € 1600,00 (80% thats what we talked about on Monday)
Let me know if you still go with that asap.”
I then decided that I could not and did not want to pay that amount of money for someone who did not do much work so I wrote her back and said that I had only asked other people the amounts to know what to budget and had only budgeted 1200 euros and was going with an immobilien that charged a flat rate. And got this back.
“i will agree with 1200 for the whole complex, because i was focus to rent this house for you, because u liked it from the start, thats why. This is a special offer.
kindly regards”
I was very happy with this because it saves me 400 euros which is about $530 and did feel this was more than fair compensation since I have never made close to 600 euros/hour in any job that I have had . However, I figured she must hate me, which I was willing to get over but did feel bad about nonetheless. So I thanked her and got this back in return!!!
“thanks so much too, you are a very nice person.”
Needless to say, I am still confused by Germans. I thought she was being short with me and was disgusted with me but instead gives me a compliment. So the house is still a go so far and I have learned a little more about Germans in general.
I have also included a picture of the dogs relaxing. I know that I said that I would take pictures of Germany for you, but I thought I would start with the dogs to see if I could even successfully post pics. Mom, Elsie is looking out the window right now bird watching... I am pretty sure she gets this behavior from you!
Until next time…
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