I promise we’re not copying. We’ve been planning for months!

This post is primarily for Dr. No, but weigh should you feel the call, Norlosers.

Honey Badger:

Karin the realtor took me around North Point, Fortress Hill and Tin Hau. In general, the stuff closer to the park turned out to be nicer and cheaper. Not sure why this is, though Karin theorized it’s because North Point holds a lot of appeal for locals. The first five places are in Fortress Hill, the rest in Tin Hau.

One note on the market: It’s back. I didn’t see any steals like you saw when you hit the market with Stef a few months back. Part of this is the China stimulus package. Mainlanders are back in the market in the big way, which drives up the price of new stuff, and that ripples all the way down. Also, I think a lot of locals decided the market was down enough and started buying.

Also of note: The Tin Hau leg was enlightening in that there’s a strip of restaurants behind the AIA building I’ve never noticed before. There’s a burgers-and-beer place as well as a Vietnamese banh mi stand. Banh mis are pretty good. I’ll bring back a report on the burgers.

So here’s what I saw (Google map links embedded in title):

City Garden

• Asking Price: HK$16,800
• Details: 723 sq ft; two bedroom/1 bedroom; 8th floor
• Pluses: Sweet view of the harbor; supermarket, drugstore and Lei Garden restaurant right downstairs, nice neighborhood
• Minuses: Looks old; right over the highway

Here’s what you see when you walk in:

Could those floors be any shinier? So it’s not bad layout. Rectangular, with a living area that reaches the western wall of the building and has a northern face overlooking the harbor. A bedroom on either side.

Nice view of Kowloon:

But right over the highway. Karin points out both bedrooms have double glass:

Kitchen is tiny. Not much bigger than current kitchen:

Decent storage:

I thought I shot the bathroom, but I guess I didn’t.

My verdict: I really like the area, but the whole thing was sort of shabby and run-down. The countertops were rough and cracked. And that kitchen: divorce-inducing small. I say pass.

Provident Centre

• Asking Price: HK$18,000
• Details: 952 sq ft; 3 bedroom/2 bath; 4th floor
• Pluses: Your longed-for second bathroom, pretty decent location, big, closet, pool
• Minuses: No bathtub, no view, pretty charmless

This place was under construction, so it’s hard to tell what the final product will look like:

Layout is sorta like a Q-tip — Living area and kitchen on one side, a short hallway with closet that leads to bedroom area. Second bathroom is off master bedroom.

Here’s the best view the place can offer:

Bathroom serviceable. Note stickers!

Living room was decent size — this photo doesn’t do it justice:

Decent storage space in the bedrooms:

I don’t remember anything about the kitchen.

My impression: So it’s big, and I think you should take a look. It’s third on my list. But it just didn’t look very pleasant. A bit run-down, no light. I left it thinking it met most of our needs but it just wasn’t exciting.

Fu Kar Court — Three different apartments

First Apartment

• Asking Price: HK$18,000
• Details: 773 sq ft; 3 bedroom, 2 bath; 29th floor
• Pluses: Apparently there’s an elevator down to the Fortress Hill MTR station, but I didn’t check it out. Not one but two bathtubs!
• Minuses: Could the kitchen be any frakkin’ smaller? As it stands, there’s enough room to turn around, and that’s just too much room.

I looked at three place in Fu Kar Court, a high rise about 30 years old. They differed in details but had some similarities: lotsa bedroom space, not much living space. It’s a big building with a crappy supermarket downstairs, but hey, cool sliding glass down at the entrance. Like a downscale Star Trek set, with prize stamps good for a Mickey Mouse watch. Still, each apartment was quiet, which was nice.

Here’s what you see when you walk into the first one:

Layout, for all of them — door opens to the smallish living area, with kitchen (two small, one big) to the right. The hallway you see leads down two three smallish or two largish bedrooms.

Living area a bit on the dark side. I’m spoiled with our current big window. By contrast, the living room’s window:

Bathrooms in blue and yellow! You could take two baths:

Did I mention the small kitchen? Though admittedly it looks bigger in this photo than our current kitchen:

Here’s a bedroom:

I didn’t make any notes on storage. I remember not being wild about the place, both for its charmlessness and its relatively high price. I don’t recommend a second look unless our real-estate hunt goes goat rodeo on us and we need to lower our bar.

Second Place

Asking Price: HK$16,800

Details: 808 sq ft; two bedrooms/one bath/26th floor

Pluses: Open kitchen, build-in AV area for our electronic shit, open kitchen(!); lotsa closets

Minuses: No tub, same charmless view as the others, small living area

Best of the Fu Kar places. Here’s what you see when you walk in:

That glass to the left is the AV setup:

View is green but nothing to write home about:

I couldn’t believe the size of this bedroom. Karin said it had been a three bedroom and the landlord knocked down a wall. Didn’t occur to me then, but I wonder now if there’s photo-shoot space here:

Bathroom modern and clean but again not terribly notable:

Both bedrooms pretty decent closet-wise:

I know I took photos of the kitchen but I can’t find them. So I’ll do my best: It’s integrated with the living area. You know, “for foreign people.” Part of it is recessed. I think that was the original kitchen and the owners decided it was too criminally small. Appliances were modern. Dammit, where’s the photo?

Verdict: I put it fourth on my list. Maybe worth a look, but I think other places are better.

Third Place

Asking Price: HK$19,000

Details: 773 sq ft; 3 bed/2 bath; 23rd floor

Pluses: Open kitchen, wood floors, tub, interesting detailing in living room

Minuses: Price, 0 closets/cabinets

Same rough layout as the other two. Entrance:

Note the odd sci-fi lighting:

Newish kitchen, open like the last place but not as big:

Bedrooms not notable:

I would consider this place but for two major drawbacks: 1) Price and 2) Lack of storage space.

Maison Garden

• Asking Price: HK$16,800
• Details: 795 sq ft; 2 bed/1 bath; 10th floor
• Pluses: Everything’s new and trim; a closet big enough to call an amah’s room (and it has a mattress too. Un-frakkin’-real); big kitchen, view that’s just as good as our current view
• Minuses: No tub, we’d need a wardrobe or two, no new neighborhood to explore

This place is two blocks from us, on the same block as Dennis’ wine store. I could be wrong, but I think it’s the same building where Colette and Josh live. As I recall, that big space on the roof was public? Worth asking Karin when you go, and maybe she can take you up there.

The entrance:

A mirror at the entrance, showing the door to the kitchen. Say hello!

Below the mirror, drawer space:

The kitchen. You can’t see it from here, but it goes back to the right, where there’s a big modern refrigerator. The landlord told me there had been an amah’s toilet back there but she took it out.

Bathroom. Nothing special, but clean and new:

View from the bedroom. Look familiar? Basically, we lose a chunk of the park but gain a piece of the bay.

The closet/amah’s room. Just amazing:

This is the one place where I met the owner, a middle-aged woman named Winnie. Winnie moved into the place yet weeks ago, she said, thinking she and her mother could live there together. But her mother died, so she’s moving to a tiny place in Causeway Bay. She wants to meet her tenants, so we agreed she’d try to meet with you Monday after next.

The place isn’t perfect, but it’s the place that gave me the best vibes, and the one I put at the top of my list. It’s basically like our current place, but cleaner, newer, bigger and better lit. The living area doesn’t have our stellar view, but the bedrooms approximate the experience. The kitchen and the closet really drew me. The big drawbacks are the lack of built-in drawers and hanging space — we’d need one, probably two, wardrobes. We’d also need an AV setup, though that’s true of most of the places we’ve looked.

Harbour Heights — three locations

First Apartment

• Asking Price: HK$15,500
• Details: 710 sq ft; 2 bed/1 bath; 27th floor
• Pluses: Nice neighborhood, kitchen seems to go on for miles, tub
• Minuses: A bit on the old, run-down side

I looked at three places here, in a development in Tin Hau on the cusp of Fortress Hill, just a bit north of the hotel where we had that Singaporean New Year’s lunch with Elana a few months back. No pool or clubhouse or anything, but the grounds are nice and it’s near the water, though none of the places I looked at have a Central or a water view.

Hello first apartment:

Holy hell you could live in that kitchen. Karin says some people who live in such places put their amah in the kitchen. To which I shake my head yet again at the people here:

Decent living area, with a decent view of North Point:

Decent closet space in the bedrooms:

Bathroom ok, with your longed-for tub:

This place is second on my list. Not newish, not spectacular, not as pretty as the Maison Garden flat. A bit smaller, too. But the price is pretty good, and that kitchen will lessen the chance of divorce. I’m guessing we could bargain hard for this one and get a nicely lower price. If we pass on it, I’m going to suggest it to Tammie and Alex.

Second Place

• Asking Price: HK$15,000
• Details: Same as first place, but on 34th floor

Say hello, second place:

Very similar to the first place, though shabbier. Example: the kitchen

Nice industrial view:

Yeah, closets:

Similar bathroom:

Verdict: Pretty charmless, but economical if we need it.

Third Place

Same, except asking HK$15,000, and on 34th floor. And a dizzying tiled floor:

So that’s the story. I would say:

1) Maison Garden

2) First Harbour Heights place

3) Provident Center

4) Second Fu Kar place

What do you think?