In Search of an Italian Casa

We’ve had many people tell us, oh we looked at about 10 houses and ended up choosing the first house we saw.  That sounds easy.  We can totally do that!  Right.  Well they clearly weren’t moving to Italy at the end of PCS season (meaning all the good one’s had already been snagged) nor were they moving to Italy in the month of August.  What does August have to with anything?  I’m glad you asked.

In Italy, August is vacation, or as they call it, holiday, month in Italy.  Only, the Italians don’t spend a week at the beach or Euro-Disney.  No, no.  They “holiday” for an. entire. month.  It’s so serious that GAS STATIONS close for the month of August.  That one floored me.  Not all of them close.  The bigger ones stayed open, but many of the little stations were closed all month long.

Well, as you can imagine, gas station owners aren’t the only people on holiday.  Many landlords are too.  It was not uncommon for John or I to make a phone call to see a house and be met with, “I’m sorry.  I’m on holiday.  Would you like to see it on the 27th?”  Given that we started our search on the 10th, that was not going to work.  Thankfully, with much help from our sponsor and his wife, we were able to find a few houses to view.  And when I say a few, I mean 21.  Yes, it took 21 houses to find “the one.” 

Don’t panic, I’m not going to make you sit here and read through each and every house we saw.  But I’ve got some highlights.  Let’s get started, shall we?

The first place we saw was a cute town house in the town of San Quirino.  Just walking through the front gate, through the little garden to the front door, we were busting with excitement.  This is it.  We’re are actually looking at houses in Italy!  The photo below is one I stole from the online listing because I didn’t have my wits about me enough to take a picture of my own.

This townhouse was great.  The kitchen was very “American” in that it has an American size refrigerator, plenty of cabinet space, and a dishwasher.  Apparently, dishwashers are rare in these parts.  Look at that ceiling!  If you look closely, just behind the light fixture is a set of pull-down stairs that lead to a loft that overlooks the adjacent living room.  At little bizzare, but kind of cute.  Definitely not the weirdest thing we’d see by far.

One of the “selling points” the agent, Sergio, was eager to point out was the jetted tub.  Apparently, when trying to get Americans to rent your house, you install a jetted tub.  We actually saw quite a few of these.  Sadly, none of them had any bearing on our decision.

This townhouse was much larger than it looked from the street.  There were 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms on the main level.  But what we didn’t know going into the showing was that this house also had a full basement with 2 more bedrooms and another bathroom.  On top of that it also had another FULL kitchen and den with it’s own fireplace.  Sorry, Moms, we didn’t end up getting this place even though it came complete with the mother of all mother-in-law suites.

We were so excited about this place.  Like, ready to sign the lease on the spot, excited.  And then Segio dropped a bomb.  No dogs.  What?!  He knew going into the showing we had dogs.  We had already designated a room for Randy.  Why on earth did this guy just show us this amazing house if he knew we couldn’t have our dogs?  Apparently, he had some problems with American tenants before leaving their dogs at home alone, rotting in their own filth, while they traveled Europe having a grand time.  And he had the photos to show us.  STUPID Americans ruin everything! 

There was a glimmer of hope though.  Sergio had a house available just down the road that was dog friendly.  Knowing we had nothing to lose and a little time before our next scheduled showing, we followed him out to it.  Let’s just say, his idea of “dog friendly” properties and my idea of “dog friendly” properties don’t exactly align. 

All of the light fixtures in the San Quirino townhouse were made of Murano glass.  All of the fixtures in the “dog friendly” house were, well you can see, not quite up to par.  As a matter of fact, nothing about that house was up to par, including the big as Biscuit spider lurking around in the basement.  So we parted ways with Sergio and continued our hunt.

Another house we checked out was this cute-from-outside farm house in Aviano.

And that’s where the fun ends.  For starters, here’s the kitchen:

Note the lack of a refrigerator.  We probably wasted a good 5 minutes trying to figure out where we’d put a refrigerator when we realized it was a moot point.  Partly because we had to duck to get through the doors to the bedrooms and then could barely stand up straight, and partly because we knew there was no way we were living in a house where the refrigerator was anywhere other than the kitchen.

I apologize for the super blurry picture, but at this point I was laughing too hard.  You can’t really tell it in the photo, but John’s head is less than an inch from the ceiling.   The ceiling in the upstairs bathroom and the guestroom was even lower.  And the bathroom downstairs?  Oh, it was outside.  Next please!

  We looked at a new construction near a town called Cordenons.  This place was gorgeous and the perfect size for us, and it was dogs friendly.  We were super careful about triple checking that before seeing the house after our San Quirino experience.  Look at all of that gorgeous wood!  Be still my heart.

Look at all of that gorgeous wood! Be still my heart.

Do you see that ceiling and the brick floors and walls?!  I loved, loved, loved this house.  It had the only en-suite master bath that we saw.  Pay no attention to the lonely bulb hanging from the ceiling.  The house wasn’t completely finished when we walked through.   Even though this house was great and we totally loved it, we totally hated the drive to the base.  It was much longer than what we wanted and we were willing to sacrifice some of the nicer amenities to keep the commute short.

If you’re wondering about the other couple in the picture, they are our wonderful sponsors.  They went to most of our showings with us to help us know what to look for in an Italian house.  They were able to point out the things that you take for granted in the States, but rarely see in Italian homes (like a dishwasher, or a dryer hookup).  We have been so thankful to have them here to help us through this process!

Here’s where we’re going to break for now.  I’ve still got a few more houses up my sleeves, but you’ll have to wait for another day! Don’t worry though; I’m not planning to blog about every house we visit.  But after seeing 21,  we have quite a few highlights!