A Visit to Our Lawyer’s Office

Wednesday February 4

Jayne and I went to Quito. First I had to change my Euros. I was told the rate is $1.14 for each Euro! I thought that was low so Jayne said that she has $100. Thus, I just changed what I needed. Then we went to Maria’s office. As we entered the building Maria was walking out. She told us she was going to another meeting but to go to her secretary and pay the visa tax and for Jayne to give her passport. The tax, as mentioned previously, is $350!

I thought to myself, this tax is an indication of getting as much money out of the foreigner as the government can. I just paid my property tax on my house, lot and apartment and the total came to $166. This is less than half the price for a damn visa! When I first came there was no visa tax.

After stopping at the lawyer’s office we went to get something to eat at Magic Bean. Then we walked to the English Book Store (one that he hadn’t been to in months). From there we went home.

Gonzalo got the garden started and planted the seeds that I bought a few weeks ago. It looks real nice. This should add a little value to our home.

In the afternoon my neighbor in the back handed me some papers she said was from Maria del Carmen (the woman that I bought the house from). When I saw the papers it was the blueprint for the house. This is what my lawyer asked her over a month ago.

I was surprised to see the architect plans with the date on it which said December 1993. When I bought the house I was told that it’s 25 years old, which makes it 30 years old now. The truth is that the house was only 10 years old when I bought it and now its 15 years old. Since the plans were at the end of 1993 that means that the house was not built and finished until 1994.

I’ll have to change the advertisement as I put in there 1984. I used this date as the construction worker thought it was younger. This is a good selling point now that I found out that the house is really younger.

Jayne had thought that there was an addition to the house. Maybe it was but it didn’t show on the architect plans. Even if it was so, so much was built around it that I can see the whole house was built in 1994.