Getting organized

Not long after the agreement to acquire the land for the cabin was finalized, the transfer of the land in North Lane went through, so we suddenly had two building plots to deal with. There had been a lot of interest in the land in Haynes over the years so it seemed to me quite likely that selling the plot wouldn't be a long process. Agreeing a deal didn't actually take that long... the legal formalities however were not so quick or straightforward, but I shall return to that later.
I think we ended up with the best solution possible. Helen is going to build on her plot and the new owners of my old plot are people we know.... so I hope that everyone is happy.
At the same time we were in the process of deciding the design of the new cabin. The procedure is to choose the basic design from a number of different formats and then customize to your own specification. We decided quite quickly on the model we wanted, which will look something like this.....

There will be 3 bedrooms, plus a mezzanine space which will be "owned" by the kids and have  potential sleeping facilities. 

First step

In the winter school holidays in February 2018 we got in touch with Kjetil from Bolig Partner, who we'd seen the previous autumn. As he'd told us previously, a new area had now been through the planning process and so a new batch of building plots were due to come on to the market. At that point they weren't actually for sale because they hadn't been measured and staked out by the local authority..... mainly because they were under two metres of snow. He suggested that we could try to make a deal to buy one subject to the local authority registration.... that way we would get almost first pick of the new plots. So we had a look at the snow covered terrain, and the maps, and decided to pick the biggest and best positioned plot they had available.... as you do!!
So we got an offer from the organization which owns the land and by March 20th we were the proud owners of 1,358 square metres of land, which we had only seen from a distance, whilst it was under snow. The words.... "leap", "of" and "faith"... spring immediately to mind.

To be or not to be

As we entered 2018, all the reasons that would stop us going ahead with the cabin project had disappeared. Obviously there were lots of things that we needed to resolve and decide upon but we had a clear vision. At that stage it was more a case of... "is this something we really want to do?"
Cabins / Holiday homes is a concept that is embedded in Norwegian culture. It is primarily the desire to be out in nature, whether that is by the sea or up in the mountains. There is definitely an element these days of "look at how big my cabin is", but generally the reason that every Friday afternoon in both winter or summer, the roads are full of traffic is because most Norwegians are off to find fresh air and nature.
For us, the driving factor was family time. The great thing about cabin life is that it is fundamentally relaxing. You are away from everyday stresses and strains.... which have become increasingly difficult to escape. We decided that, even if we only have the cabin for a few years it was still worth the effort. Getting quality time together as a family and with friends is the goal. I don't really have a relevant picture to post with this entry so this one will have to do....

Catalyst

So, we had the cabin idea, and after looking at the first plot and investigating the building process we soon had a fairly clear vision of the way forward. We met with Boligpartner, who are the company that basically control the process, from acquiring your plot to ending up with a finished cabin. We went to see a couple of cabins they had built and were very impressed with what they were doing.
By the end of 2017 we had decided that Vangsåsen was an ideal place to build. We liked the idea of getting a brand new cabin in the design we wanted. We were happy with the building contractor, and at around that time the local authority were just about to give planning permission for a new batch of plots. There was one issue left to resolve.... the financial plan. Whilst we felt that it was definitely possible to finance the project, we knew that this was probably going to impact us in terms of what cash we had available for holidays etc. This was difficult. We felt the cabin was an investment in family time, but we have always liked the freedom to travel to different places and have never skimped on our holidays. At more or less the same time as we were mulling this over, another event was about to resolve our problem.....

  Above is an aerial view of 12 North Lane, Haynes.... where I grew up.... and in December 2017, the orchard, where I used to kick a ball around in my childhood, was suddenly the answer to the missing piece of the cabin jigsaw. Mum was successful in a planning application that would allow for 2 houses to be built in the orchard, and she had very generously decided that Helen and I would get the chance to build one each. I had to think quite hard about what to do next because there is an emotional tie to the family home, but in the end the best solution for me was to sell my plot and use the funds to finance the cabin build.

Genesis

Marit and I had discussed the idea of buying a cabin for a while. Sometimes those discussions didn't go anywhere, but by the time we got to Autumn 2017 we had a pretty clear idea of what we wanted to do, and where.
Vangsåsen is a nature reserve, for want of a better description, about 15 minutes drive from Hamar. We generally go up there for ski trips in the winter when visiting Dagrun and Kåre, and Marit was obviously very familiar with the area. This part of Hedmark is elevated quite a long way above sea level and covers a huge area. We have been a few times to Sjusjøen which is a bit further north, which is a very popular place to have a cabin.
So when we started looking at areas that were convenient to get to from Oslo, Hedmarksvidda soon became the main focus of our attention. We eventually came to the conclusion that here might be a good possibility. Compared to the Sjusjøen and it's surroundings, the area around Vangsåsen is relatively under developed in terms of cabins. During the summer we saw some advertisements for building plots, through a company that supplies and organizes cabin builds.... and so in October 2017 we went and had a look at a plot that was for sale up close to Gåsbu.
In the end, that came a bit too quickly for us and we backed out. It had never been the intention to build something ourselves necessarily..... but now the seed was sown.