My husband and I had a dream: we wanted to sell our apartment in the city and buy a house by the sea. We wanted to make money by renting rooms to holidaymakers in the summer. When all our friends and acquaintances found out about it, they thought it was total nonsense.
– Oh, what are you thinking?! It’s only good to have a rest! And to live there all the time and take care of others – it’s very difficult! – All our acquaintances and friends told us.
But my husband and I decided to do it our way anyway. It helped us a lot that our children supported us. They said they would even help us with everything.
So we sold our apartment. We bought a big house by the sea, but it needed renovation. But we couldn’t afford to pay, because all the money was used to buy the house. That’s why we decided to take out a loan. And our son offered us this interesting option to solve our problem. He said that we had many friends and acquaintances who would like to take a summer vacation at the seaside and live for free.
– Maybe we can say that if they help us with the repairs, then they can come and stay with us for free. – our son suggested.
So we did. We wrote an ad and posted it on all the social networks, where we and our friends and acquaintances were registered. We wrote that we bought a house by the sea, but it needed renovation. We wrote that anyone who would help us make repairs or help us with money, then they could live with us for free at any time.
Many people just sent us smiley faces, others congratulated us on such an acquisition. But only four people actually agreed to help us. Two of our friends transferred us a decent amount of money. And one said he was just willing to come and help us physically during his vacation.
And another friend of my husband’s said he worked on a construction crew. And just now they were out of orders. They were willing to come and do our repairs quickly and at a big discount, because my husband’s friend would work for us for free. Of course, we got very excited and enthusiastically got to work. We made all the arrangements and set about the repairs.
True, we had to take out a small loan from the bank. But soon the repairs were completed, and we began hosting guests. And then many of our friends, relatives and acquaintances started calling us and asking:
– When can we come and visit you? We missed you so much!
And we sent them pictures of our new home after renovation and the cost of living in the rooms. They realized they wouldn’t get a free vacation with us. All our friends were very offended at us. They said we were bad and overpaid. But my husband and I do not think so. We communicate with those who agreed to help us and they live with us for free. They just give us money for groceries and we eat together. We are all fine with that.
We think we did the right thing. Do you agree with that? Or do you have a different opinion?
