Total Pageviews

Saturday, March 9, 2013

the first principles of buying

The day began with a visit from the architect uncle . It was one of the "purposeless " visits which luckily is still common in my ancestral home . For that was how visits were always in my childhood when people used to visit simply for the sake of visiting .

Anyway though he was a reserved person he started chatting with me on high rise buildings and why people should buy in the  higher floors compared to lower floors etc . Then he asked me the first principles of buying  a house/apartment . Having pride that i know something about everything  ( its true ask me :)  )  i was suddenly taken aback by the question . I was thinking he was asking some architectural question in laymans terms . But his answer was simple which we all know but seldom follow . Its not the square feet or the choice of flooring that is the first principle but "Why " you are buying the house and "Why u need it at this point of time "  .  Being a learnt man he didnt give a one hour lecture on the random rush of most people to aquire things from dress to cars without thinking "why  "  .

Its a pleasure buying and enjoying the beautiful things money can buy  . There is not even a need to feel guilty about it . But a brief thinking of why is always good ..  And that may also prompt you to decide on luxuries which are more in tune to your need and personality than anything else .

                                                             Especially in kerala i have seen people who build enormous houses after return from gulf often by taking huge loans , spending extravagantly on marriages and landing on big debt and lastly buying and gifting expensive cars and later having no money to maintain it . Then there are people who buy apartments etc on loans because every other person is buying an apartment as "investment " . All these things are fine as long as the first principle is applied "why "  ?  Why spend a fortune on a house which will take an hour to walk from one end to other when all the children are away .  Why not buy a smaller house which is as beautiful but easier to maintain ?

Why spend lakhs on marriages especially inciting random people who complain after eating a kilogram of biriyani about the excess salt in it ? Why bedeck the girl with the entire gold given as dowry so that her neck gets sprained ?  Why dont you invite less people and still luxuriously conduct a marriage with lesser ornaments . ?

And lastly there is nothing wrong in spending lakhs on all these goodies . But you should realise why you are spending that much and consciously make a decision .  After all there is nothing wrong in following my wise architect uncle in his "first principles "  ...

No comments:

Post a Comment