“Just as I headed for the airport, they did accept my offer – what a rollercoaster.”
Jenny from near New Romney in Kent took her brother Richard with her to film in Kefalonia with Ben Hillman. The super-close siblings were looking for a one/two-bedroom house for holidays that they could use individually, and for Jenny’s two grown-ups sons. Jenny, a former estate agent and publisher, fell in love with the Greek island on holiday and the filming took place in June 2021. The episode ended with Jenny’s second offer – on a second property – being rejected as too low, but that was by far the end of the story…
As Jenny left for the airport to fly home from the filming, she had assumed that the lovely, one-bedroom Villa Athina (on which she made her first offer) had slipped through her hands. Yet just after she’d left the bar and said her goodbyes to the TV crew, she got a phone call. Her offer of £205k had been accepted after all. “So I turned around and went right back to the bar, and we celebrated!” says Jenny, 60.
She didn’t realise at the time, but the reason that the offer had been accepted after all was that the vendor was ill. “It was going to be something of an emotional rollercoaster,” says Jenny. “The villa was a popular holiday rental property. The owner wanted me to honour the holiday bookings that had been postponed [due to Covid in 2020] to 2021, so the completion would be October. But then he died in the September.”
The resultant probate process meant that the villa purchase had to be completed in the same calendar year so there was suddenly a need to push on with the paperwork. “But then the estate agent tried to sell the house to Italian buyer for more money!” says Jenny. “To cut a long story short, by talking direct to the late owner’s family we sorted it out together. But naturally it was hard dealing with a grieving family.”
After this, Jenny was not going to lose the villa by failing to complete within the Greek legal framework, so she flew out to Kefalonia on Boxing Day and stayed with her lawyer to complete the paperwork. And it was worth it. “I just adore the place – it is the only place in the world where I completely relax,” she says. She hasn’t got round to building the mezzanine, but they have been managing with a put-up bed and a blow-up mattress.
“I had three weeks out here for my 60th birthday this summer and for most of that time it was just me, with the odd goat visiting. But both my sons have been out – and Richard four times. When I’m here I hardly leave the house, it’s just so lovely. I haven’t needed to do much to it as it was already just how I liked it. Kefalonia is a magical place and I would love to move out here permanently at some point.”
