By the summer of 2002 we sold our house in England and were ready to purchase a house in Hungary. We knew we wanted to live near Budapest so we rented a flat in the city for a month to use as a base, bought a map of Budapest and the surrounding area and decided that we would look at houses that were within a 35 km radius of the city.
We had definite ideas of what sort of house we wanted. In the past we had renovated several houses so we decided that we would like to buy an old house and renovate it to the way we would like it. We thought we would like a big garden so we could grow flowers and vegetables, have plenty of fruit trees and, of course, there must be grapevines.
We moved into the flat on Thursday, August 1st and the next morning, armed with a list of houses for sale that I had printed from the Internet, we set out to look at the first house on the list which was in Érd, approx 20km south of Budapest on road six.
We were not at all impressed; it was old, small and jammed in between neighbouring houses with hardly any garden. The streets were unmade and it was on a vast housing estate. As we drove around Érd we decided that we did not really like the town so we headed for the second house on the list which was in Dabas - south east of the city. They wanted 7 million for that one. It was old, ugly, had a tar-paper roof, and was on a muddy, unmade up road. We headed back to the city.
On Saturday morning we got up early and headed for Érd again. It was in the general direction we wanted to be although we didn't like the town itself. We decided to find an estate agent. We explained what sort of house we wanted, in what price range and were given a list. Unfortunately, within the price range we have given, the houses were within the town itself and all were on unmade up roads and built quite close together. We decided to give it a fair chance and looked at half a dozen but then gave it up as a bad job and returned to the city. On the way back we purchased several House magazines and over the next few hours I picked out quite a few, in our price range, that looked promising.
By the time we went to bed that evening we decided that perhaps we would look on the east side of the city. It was the side of the city where the Ferihegy international airport was situated so we thought it would be very convenient if we wanted to go anywhere. Also, the houses seem to be cheaper on that side of the city.
But, by the time we had finished breakfast on Sunday morning we decided that we really didn't want to live on that side of the city. We had seen, in one of the magazines, that there were several houses for sale in a small town called Ercsi, 14 km from Érd, further along road six. The first house we looked at had recently been built, it was on a good sized plot and the house was a nice shape but it was very poorly built – in fact it looked as if the guy who was selling it had built it as a do-it-yourself project and it had not quite turned out right. By the time we have viewed it the owner admitted that his brother had helped him build it. We made all the right noises but beat a hasty retreat.
We had only allowed ourselves six weeks to find a house before we had to go back to England. We were beginning to think that it was going to take a long time to find a house we really liked at a price we could afford. So, we came to the conclusion that we would have to return for a longer period of time at some future date as we didn't want to just buy a house for the sake of it and regret it later.
Unfortunately we are rather impatient and when we have set our minds to do something we want it to be done immediately. Buying a house is not something you can do in a hurry so we decided we would try to be very patient and phoned the next number only list, asked if we could look at the property and were told that it would be convenient and we were given directions.
There was a picture of the house in the magazine and it looked very nice but after just viewing a very poorly built house we didn't get our hopes up too much in case it was the same.
We stopped out side the house and immediately we knew it was something special. There was the veranda to sit on and a drive where you could park two or three cars. We were invited in to a light and airy open-plan kitchen/living room with a 4’ brick wall dividing the two areas (apparently, in Hungary they call this an “American” kitchen). There were 3 other rooms (2 bedrooms & a lounge), a bathroom, a WC and a pantry. It had a garden to the rear of the property.
But, it was a brand-new bungalow, finished just 4 weeks before we viewed it. The garden wasn't very big and it was virtually empty except for half a dozen old fruit trees. It was completely the opposite of what we had set out to find but by the time we had looked around we knew that we wanted it. We thought that it could do with a conservatory across the back of the bungalow and perhaps a garage and workshop but there was plenty of room to do that and it would be very easy to adapt it to our needs.
The property had not been on the market very long. The original asking price had been 16,500,000 forint but the vendor wanted a quick sale, due to personal reasons, and he had dropped the price to 13,500,000 forint a couple of days before we went to see it. We made an offer straightaway of 13,000,000 forint, the vendor accepted it so we got the property for well below market value.
We arranged to return the next afternoon to accompany the vendor to see a local solicitor, where we would pay a deposit of 10% of the house price and start the legal process of purchasing it.
We left the house feeling very happy that we had been able to find something we liked. We drove along the road for about 2 minutes and suddenly we were on the banks of the Danube. We knew the river was not far away but we never dreamt that it was so close. That clinched it; we knew we had done the right thing in agreeing to by the house.
Buying a house was proving to be more expensive than we had first estimated. We had only transferred the equivalent of 11,000,000 ft to Hungary but luckily our son was coming from England the following week so we asked him to bring the extra money with him. It was easier that way because when we made enquiries at the bank as to how long it would take to transfer funds from England, we were told that they could take up to 2 weeks to clear.
Monday 5th August 2002 – We had asked where the nearest OTP bank was to where we were staying in Budapest and were told that there was a branch just a short distance away. Banks open at 8am so we arrived soon after it opened and after making extensive enquiries over the next half an hour we eventually established that they did not deal with foreign currency accounts at that branch and we would have to go to one in the Margit Kerut which was “that way”.
After walking for about 1 kilometre and asking several people we found it but by that time we were hot, thirsty and tired. We queued at the information desk for 15 minutes and were told that desk 7 was the one we wanted and that we were to take a ticket and wait, and wait, and wait….. there were a lot of foreigners in queue 7 but no one came to serve on the desk. We were getting used to waiting in queues in Hungary so at first we did not think it was unusual but eventually we got fed up and asked to see the manager who then realised that the desk 7 clerk was not at work that day and nobody had bothered to transfer the work to another desk – after another ½ an hour we were seen and were able to take out the necessary money for the house deposit. We were told that the safest way to bring in the extra money we needed from England was by travellers cheques and yes, of course, they could be cashed at their at the bank.
We went back to the flat and phoned the vendor who told us we had to be at the solicitors at 4pm. Unlike England, in Hungary, both buyer and seller use the same solicitor as they are not seen to have conflicting interests.
At 3pm we collected the vendor and drove to Szaszhalombatta, a small town about 3km from Ercsi, to the solicitor’s office.
We were quite surprised to find that the office was on the second floor of a block of panel flats, quite unlike the plush offices of a solicitor in England. At first we wondered where we had been taken as our surroundings didn’t seem to be official or legal. But, we were pleasantly surprised to find that when we were shown into a flat it had been made into offices where a secretary was preparing documents on a computer and a very pleasant young solicitor greeted us and who turned out to definitely know what he was doing.
The contract was drawn up; we paid the 10% deposit to the solicitor who promptly handed it to the vendor who counted it. We then agreed to return the following week, when the balance of the money had arrived from England, to complete the purchase of the property.
The rest of the week seemed to go by very slowly; we had driven to Ercsi a couple of times just to look around and to spend some time by the river. Then the following week-end our son arrived from England and on Monday 12th August we cashed the traveller’s cheques he had bought with him. Not at the OTP bank though. When we took them in to cash them they said they could only cash £1000 per day and as we had £5000 worth it would take a week. We tried the city bank and they cashed £1300 then, luckily, we found a branch of American Express in the city and they cashed the rest, much to our relief. We withdrew from the bank the balance of the money and took it back to the flat in a carrier bag. I don’t know if I will ever get used to the practice of paying cash for things especially when it means drawing out such large sums of money from the bank.
The banks are heavily guarded with gun carrying security guards scrutinising customers closely but once you leave the bank you are on your own and open to being robbed – but, there were 3 of us and we were prepared to fight off anyone.
We phoned the Vendor and told him we had the money for the transaction and he said we were to be at the solicitor’s office the next afternoon at 3pm.
We were at the office promptly on Tuesday afternoon, the paperwork was completed and we handed over the remainder of the purchase money to the solicitor who in turn, once more, handed it to the vendor who counted it, put it in his bag and in turn handed us the keys.
That was that –the house was ours - just 9 days from the time we had first seen it.
Summary of the house buying procedure:
1. Find a house
2. Agree a price – you will be expected to barter for it.
3. Arrange an appointment with a local solicitor.
4. Vendor & buyer go to the solicitor’s office where the buyer pays a 10% deposit on the property. A contract is drawn up, signed by both parties and a date agreed when the sale is to be completed. Alternatively, The house purchase can be done immediately as long as the buyer has all the cash for the purchase but whether a deposit is paid and the transaction is to be completed at a future date or the transaction is to take place immediately the vendor has to obtain a copy of the deeds (tulajdon lap), (which must be under 3 months old at the time of the transaction) and forms to transfer the property to the new owner both of which he would have obtained from the Land Registry Office (Füld Hivatal).
5. The house ownership document will show who the property belongs to – in some cases, because of the complicated inheritance laws, more than one person will own the property so their signatures will be needed before the property can be sold. Also if there are any debts against the property the document will show what is outstanding as no loans can be taken against the house unless they are recorded at the land office. Recently, the documents have had some security built into them so that they cannot be forged, therefore protecting a buyer from being sold a house by someone who does not own it – apparently, something that was quite common in the past.
6. If you are a Hungarian Citizen and have valid documents to prove you are then buying a house is a relatively simple procedure. If you are a foreigner wanting to buy property then you may do so but it takes a little longer because you have to ask permission from the government to buy the property which takes about 6 weeks.
7. Once you have paid a deposit to the vendor if he backs out of the agreement he must pay you back double the value of your deposit, if you back out then you just forfeit your deposit – I can only surmise that this guards the buyer against gazumping. You must pay the deposit in cash to make it a legal contract– if you pay it by bank transfer or any other means it is not legal so if the vendor backs out you have no protection and you loose your money.
8. Vendor and purchaser return to the solicitor on the agreed date where the balance of the cash is handed over by the buyer to the solicitor who in turn hands it to the vendor who counts it. Completion papers are signed and the sale is completed.
9. It can take anything from 6 weeks to 6 months for a revised copy of the deeds to be sent from the Land Registry Office to the buyer then a bill will be sent for the amount of tax to be paid on the property which, at the time of writing this, is 2% of the purchase price.
