Wednesday, April 18, 2007

The Big News

Last weekend K bought a condo in Marin.

Which is a bit nutty, since it was the first to-buy place she looked at. But, in her words, she had written a very tight "brief" for her agent on exactly what she was looking for. And this place was, in fact, exactly what she was looking for.

It's 2BR, 2Ba, with a loft, on top of a high hill with views of the creek in which I row, the bay, the mountain. And the complex has a pool and a hot tub, and it was in her price range. And the kitchen is nice and it's bright and has high ceilings.

I've been trying to be rather Zen about it, not getting too far down the road in terms of consequences. I admit I'm a bit freaked out by proxy: I'd certainly not be buying any condos right now, given where I'm at in my life, so it scares me for people I know to be buying real estate. Too many zeros there. Too much obligation. What if your life blows up? Scary. I realize that's all me being cozy in my non-blown up life with minimal obligation getting nervous about expanding out again. But it does make me nervous.

But when I do think a few moves out, I can see it putting a subtle pressure on our relationship. With her located about 5 minutes from my place and closer to the boat house than I am, it'll be easy to go from weekend sleep overs with a few weeknights to spending every night together. And if she replaces my key to her SF place with a key to the new place, I can see us rapidly moving towards a de facto cohabitation scenario. With two addresses. Which is financially a bit silly if the effective co-habitation exists. Creating pressure for official co-habitation.

I genuinely feel no pull to figure out the solution to all of that right now. So much looms between now and the move-in date, and her place is so cool that I genuinely look forward to having her in there and spending time there. I expect that by September it'll be a point of serious discussion.