In the old days of Yanjing City, there were sayings that the East was rich, the West was noble, the North was poor, and the South was humble. There are several versions passed down by the common people. Anyway, to sum it up, it is -
Wealthy businessmen mostly live in the East City, dignitaries live in the West City, North City is generally where ordinary people live, and people living in the South City are more complicated. In addition to poor people, there are also many people who travel around the world and perform tricks.
For many people in Yanjing, just looking at the structure of the courtyard house in the alley can tell the identity of the previous owner.
For officials, the tiles on the houses in the courtyard are double-layered, while the tiles on the houses of ordinary people can only be single-layered;
Officials are required to have pillars on their door frames, which are not allowed in common people's homes.
Those who serve as officials have stone piers in front of their doors. The round ones are for military officials and the square ones are for civil servants.
There are also lions squatting or lying in front of the courtyard, indicating that the owner is a relative of the royal family. The bigger the lion, the closer the relationship with the royal family.
Those with four pillars on the doorframe are the homes of officials above the fourth rank, and those with two pillars are the homes of officials below the fourth rank.
Entering the alley, Lin Erchun kept talking to Lin Chaoyang about the knowledge he had learned from looking at houses in recent days.
Lin Chaoyang couldn't help but look at him with admiration, "Okay! Comrade Lao Lin, we have only been in Yanjing for more than half a month, and we are almost catching up with Lao Yanjing!"
Lin Erchun showed a proud look on his face, but said in a low-key tone: "The more you see it, the more you will understand it."
Arriving in front of the courtyard gate, Lin Chaoyang looked at the courtyard gate as Lin Erchun told him.
There are no lions in front of the door, so they are not relatives of the emperor. There are no pillars on the door, so they are not officials. There is a stone pier in front of the door, but it is about the same size as a larger brick.
"Give me some guidance. What kind of family is this?"
"This one is an official, but not an official."
"What's the meaning?"
"The eunuch's house!"
"Eunuch?"
Lin Chaoyang couldn't hold it back and almost burst into laughter.
Comrade Lao Lin entered Yanjing, and his cultural level was obviously greatly influenced. He even knew the word "eunuch".
"What? You look down on eunuchs?" Lin Erchun asked.
"That's not true."
The father and son were chatting and knocked on the courtyard door.
The person who opened the door was a young man with a long face and triangular eyes. He was the landlord, named Li Quanfu.
After saying hello and entering the courtyard, Li Quanfu took Lin Chaoyang and his son to look around the courtyard.
After entering the courtyard gate, there is a landscape screen wall, the pattern on it has been blurred. There is an inverted room facing north to the south of the first courtyard, which is currently unused.
Entering the main courtyard through the hanging flower gate, there are two pomegranate trees standing on the east and west sides of the courtyard, both of which are bald this season.
There are three main rooms in the courtyard and three east and west wing rooms respectively. The layout is clear at a glance.
According to Li Quanfu, his great-grandfather's eldest brother worked as an errand in the palace in his early years. Because he was related to the eunuch Li Lianying, he became an internal official. Later, he married a wife and adopted his grandfather as his descendant.
Later, the Qing Dynasty disappeared, and his eunuch grandpa died a few years later, and the house was passed on to his grandpa.
Because his grandfather and father had a miserable life during the Republic of China, the house was actually saved in his lifetime.
"Then why do you think of selling it?" Lin Chaoyang couldn't help but ask after hearing Li Quanfu recount his family history.
"Hey! Isn't this because the work unit allocates a house? I have been married for several years and have a child. Logically speaking, the work unit should allocate a house.
But the work unit said that some colleagues reported that our families have ancestral homes, so we have to keep close tabs on those colleagues who don’t have houses.
It's my fault that our family owns a house! Tell me, where can I explain this?
My wife and I put it all together, and it’s ok! Let’s just sell this ancestral house. Doesn’t the employer say that we won’t be given points if we have a house?
Now that there is no room, let’s see what they do!”
Li Quanfu was a little angry when he said this, but it felt magical to Lin Chaoyang's ears.
In order to get the house allocated by the work unit, he sold his ancestral courtyard house in Xicheng District, Yanjing?
At first glance, this seems very unreasonable. But if you think about it carefully, it seems to make sense based on the social conditions and people's ideas in the 1970s and 1980s.
First of all, nowadays, the house itself does not have financial or investment attributes, but only residential attributes.
Whether it is a mud house in the northeastern countryside or a courtyard house in the city of Yanjing, the gap between price and value is not that big.
These days, as long as there is a serious unit, employees can usually be allocated houses to live in. It's just a matter of size.
If Li Quanfu and his wife are both working, then they have completely given up the opportunity to share a house. Looking at this issue from the perspective of ordinary people, it is indeed a big disadvantage.
When Lin Chaoyang wanted to buy a house, didn't his relatives and friends also persuade them from this perspective?
It's just that Lin Chaoyang's perspective on thinking about the problem is different from that of most ordinary people today, so he firmly chose to buy a house.
At the end of his sentence, Li Quanfu showed a bit of slyness on his face. He winked at Lin Chaoyang and said, "Besides, isn't this a lot of money after our family's ancestral home is sold? If you put it in the bank, the interest for a year will be more than mine."
The wages are high.”
After Li Quanfu said this, he looked proud, leaving Lin Chaoyang speechless for a moment.
Since 1972, the five-year deposit interest rate of domestic banks has been above 7%, and it once soared to 9% in the mid-1980s.
From the current perspective, Li Quanfu's choice is a good move.
Even Lin Erchun on the side was very excited when he heard this. He loved to make calculations. The little calculations in his heart were going back and forth, and he pulled Lin Chaoyang aside.
"Er, what he said makes sense! If you have the money to buy a house, why don't you deposit it in the bank for five years, and the money will double in seven or eight years? Isn't it much better than buying a house?
This money has been deposited in the bank for ten years, and all the money for the house has come out."
In ten years, you won't be able to buy this house even if it doubles or triples the price, Lin Chaoyang muttered to himself.
"It just sounds reasonable."
"What do you mean?"
The father and son were whispering, and Li Quanfu seemed to have noticed something. He realized that what he just said might be self-defeating and gave up the buyer's idea of ​​buying a house. He regretted it in his heart.
He thought for a while and quickly went back to make up for it.
"But what do you think about this matter? My hometown girl left a few years ago, so her parents don't need to worry about it. A small house for two mothers in the work unit is enough to live in.
I heard Uncle Lin say that your hometown is in the Northeast, and your family will live together in the future. This house is just right for me. It has many rooms and a large space, so it is enough for any amount of trouble."
Lin Chaoyang smiled and nodded, "Indeed."
Lin Erchun touched him in a subtle way and signaled him not to agree with Li Quanfu, otherwise it would be difficult to bargain when the price was negotiated.
After chatting with Li Quanfu for a while, Lin Chaoyang and his son looked around the courtyard inside and out.
The overall structure of the courtyard is well maintained, but there is no way to take a closer look. If nothing else, just repairing it would probably cost a large sum of money.
This house is almost a hundred years old. When it was passed down to Grandpa Li Quanfu's generation, the family's conditions were no longer good and they didn't have the money to repair it, so they lived in a makeshift house.
If you want to make your stay more comfortable and renovate it, you will have to spend a lot of money.
After looking at the house, several people were sitting in the main room. Li Quanfu asked: "How was it? What did you two think?"
Lin Chaoyang said: "The house is not bad."
Lin Erchun frowned, "It looks good at first glance, but upon closer inspection, there are too many broken and messy places. If you buy this, just repairing it will cost a lot of money."
Bargaining is engraved in the DNA of the Chinese people. Li Quanfu naturally knew the purpose of Lin Erchun's words.
"Uncle Lin, you can't look at the problem this way. This house is more than a hundred years old, and it is very rare that it can remain as it is now. In a few years, it might be an antique."
Lin Erchun said with a smile: "Then if you keep it, I guess it can become a family heirloom."
Li Quanfu was stunned by him and looked at Lin Chaoyang again.
"Brother Lin, this house is not one of those large courtyards outside. Since it was built, this family has lived in it.
Have you seen the tiles on the roof? They are double-layered. The beams and columns were all made of yellow pine back then, and they were all good stuff.
With the materials used in this house, you will have no problem living here for another hundred years."
After Li Quanfu finished speaking, he felt a little uneasy when he saw Lin Chaoyang was silent.
Although the number of private housing transactions is now greater than before, without an intermediary and without the Internet, it is not easy to meet a buyer who sincerely wants to buy a house.
What's more, Li Quanfu also knows that the price of his house is much more expensive than ordinary houses, and it will be even harder to find a suitable one.
It really made him feel sad to think about how much interest the money would earn if it was delayed for an extra year and a half.
"If Brother Li is sincere in selling, he might as well give us a sincere price." After waiting for a while, Lin Chaoyang finally spoke.
Li Quanfu felt relieved after hearing what he said. It would be nice to be able to negotiate the price.
But at the same time, he was in a bit of a dilemma. Lin Chaoyang asked him to make an offer first, which was disadvantageous to him.
"Brother, you have also seen my house. There are good things inside and out..."
Before Li Quanfu finished speaking, he was interrupted by Lin Erchun, "Xiao Li, let's talk about something affordable."
"How much do you think it will cost?"
Lin Chaoyang and Lin Erchun looked at each other, opened their lips slightly, and spit out a number: "Four thousand yuan."
"That won't work!"
When Li Quanfu heard the price, he stood up and said, "Please ask around Yanjing, when did a second-level courtyard house have such a price?"
Lin Chaoyang looked at Li Quanfu's reaction and didn't curse? Good news!
He said with a kind face: "Brother Li, no matter how good the materials used back then, it was only then. After a hundred years, if this house is not repaired, how many years can we live in it? If your house is new,
, let alone four thousand yuan, I can accept ten thousand yuan. Do you think this is the truth?"
"It's your business to spend money when you come in. It's no problem for our family to live in this house, right?
Four thousand yuan is definitely not enough, I am in Xicheng, and the house I entered is not worth this price!"
Lin Chaoyang asked: "Then tell me what you think. How much do you think is appropriate?"
Li Quanfu hesitated for a moment and did not dare to report more, "Six thousand eight."
Lin Chaoyang shook his head, "It's high."
Li Quanfu was still waiting for him to continue bargaining. Unexpectedly, Lin Chaoyang fell silent after saying these two words.
The atmosphere in the room fell into silence.
After a while, Lin Chaoyang made a gesture to get up, and Li Quanfu's heart skipped a beat.
Before Lin Chaoyang could speak, he took the initiative and said, "Tell me, how much does it cost?"
Lin Chaoyang looked at Li Quanfu and said: "You are sincerely selling, and I am also sincerely buying. In this way, five thousand five hundred yuan. If you think it is OK, we will go to the housing management office tomorrow. If not, you can meet again, maybe
I can find a buyer willing to make an offer."
Lin Chaoyang's words were tantamount to an ultimatum. After hearing these words, Li Quanfu hesitated and looked embarrassed.
His psychological price is actually six thousand yuan, which is also the common market price for second-time houses in Xicheng nowadays.
Lin Chaoyang offered 5,500 yuan, which was just at the limit of what he could bear.
This price seemed to be five hundred yuan less than the reserve price in his heart, but if he missed Lin Chaoyang as a buyer, he would have to wait an extra year and a half, and the money would not be received, and there would be no bank interest. It would be the same inside and out.
, might as well sell it first.
When Li Quanfu frowned and thought, Lin Erchun secretly observed his expression. After making eye contact with Lin Chaoyang, he understood.
“Xiao Li, selling a house is a big deal, and there’s no need to rush it.
We have finished bidding. You can discuss it with your family later. Don't force it. Maybe you will meet a buyer who bids higher than us later.
Let’s do this for today, and we, father and son, will leave first.”
After Lin Erchun said this, the father and son stood up and prepared to leave.
Chapter completed!