Disconnect 

How do you disconnect? What does it even mean?

Disconnecting from the Every day, A Week in my Life and What I am Working On 

Allowing yourself to disconnect. How do you disconnect, the balance between work and life? Moving from one part of your life to another, not answering a work call or email or sms out of hours, turning off from the everyday, disconnect can mean many things.

A big weekend last weekend as I disconnected from my local life and work and ventured into Regional Victoria. 

I attended an information session on Saturday in Castlemaine about cooperative housing. This provides a solution to our housing problem, in particular, the housing problem facing older women. I was fascinated by the process and the rigmarole of planning permissions. Generally, the neighbours were okay but of course, there is always someone who is unhappy. 

I understand this. We buy our property based on the existing situation, changes to this may impact on how we live our lives. For extreme example, a new airport may be needed but how do the locals feel?

Some locals feel the same about the Ridge Walk project. It has been plagued by staff coming and going, leaving community input on the periphery. Even something as wonderful as our parks and gardens changing to free entry creates chaos at certain times of the year in neighbouring streets. We love living here but I well remember struggling to get to a party in Ferny Creek from Olinda during the Cherry Blossom season at the Rhododendron Gardens a few years ago. Parks fortunately addressed this problem and the traffic hasn’t been as dramatic since thankfully. 

The Castlemaine project will have 32 small (not tiny), mainly one with some two bedroom homes where once there was one home. It’s on quite a bit of land and had planning permission to be subdivided into 4 lots when it was purchased. Social housing and two community centres are included in the plans. I loved it, it will really address a local issue and is not the first community cooperative housing project in the area 

As someone who travels around quite a lot for work, I was dismayed that I got confusingly lost after Castlemaine on my way to Ballarat to visit some school friends. It seemed straightforward, fortunately my friends were patient and we enjoyed a lovely afternoon discussing the merits of regional life. Similarly to Castlemaine, locals are concerned about changes to their way of life with increasing housing estates happening, swallowing up farmland. The housing is needed without question however traffic is crazy and the infrastructure to support thousands of new residents not yet in place. 

It was a wonderful weekend, the Saturday out of the office and Sunday afternoon spent at a meeting at Korowa in Glen Iris. An opportunity to disconnect from where my usual head space is, meet new people, see new places and talk about new things. 

What I am working on

I am compiling a library of pdf resources. The pdfs revolve around buying and selling a home and will be included in a course, a workshop or perhaps available for individual sale.

The pdfs are an accumulation of knowledge, real estate experience with a smattering of life experience to round them out. As an experienced operator in real estate, these are the things that I know so well that it’s an assumption that everyone must know them too.

I will be running a program to teach people about the ins and outs of buying and/or selling their home. It will go for around 6 weeks and be strictly limited in number. As with everything I do, the personal contact, the human to human, is a huge part of the programme. I want participants to have direct access as much as possible, to have their questions answered as quickly as possible.

Buying or selling real estate can be a huge distraction, it is often a steep learning curve particularly if you are venturing into an unfamiliar area. When a call comes in about a property, the need to disconnect from your current task and tune into the real estate scenario can be a clunking transition. I work with clients to avoid the clunk, easing their path and their learning.

You can find out more about working with me by clicking here

Love what you do they say, it’s an exciting time buying and selling, and I love accompanying clients on their real estate journey.  

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