This summer my wife and I are flying to Germany to buy our retirement house, a house that we have never been inside.

Before you decide that we are both crazy, let me explain why we are doing it.

My wife, who is German, and I have been vacationing in Germany since we first met twenty years ago. We have divided our time between visits with her parents who live in Dausnau an Der Lahn and her sister and brother-in-law who live in Bad Ems an Der Lahn, about 50 kilometres north west of Frankfurt.

After my very first visit we decided that we would some day retire there, and that day is almost here. Next July I will retire.

We decided years back that if a house ever was for sale in Lahn River area, we would think about buying it. We especially loved the house next door to my sister-in-law and have joked with the owners about buying it if they ever wanted to sell.

Imagine our delight when my sister-in-law called to tell us that her neighbors had just decided to sell their house. We thought it over for about twenty minutes and called back to say we would buy it.

Within a week my in-laws had a meeting with the owners, a bank and a lawyer to agree on the terms of the sale. Then our work started.

We quickly found out how difficult it is to transact business internationally.

Our first step was to get a power-of-attorney for my in-laws so that they could sign for us in all the legal steps along the way.

That turned out to be the most difficult task so far, not because it was difficult, but because nobody knew exactly what to do or how to do it.

It became a contest with our German lawyer, my wife and I on one side and the German bureaucracy on the other.

We faxed standard notarised power-of-attorney forms to my father-in-law and sister-in-law. Our lawyer called to tell us that the system would only accept the official German form.

He faxed us a sample which we used to create new originals, signed them, had them notarised and sent back. That was not good enough for the bureaucrats.

Our US notary was not authorised to notarise documents in Germany! We would need an official document verifying the authenticity of the notary's stamp and signature.

After a flurry of faxes and calls to everyone concerned, and eventually to the office of the Governor of Virginia, we found that the solution was simple. All we needed was an Apostille.

An Apostille is a one-page document granted by a government body that certifies the authenticity of a signature. We filled out the on-line request form from the Virginia internet site, printed it and Priority Mailed it to the Secretary of State's office with a check for US$20 to cover fees and expedited handling.

We got everything back, sent it off to our German lawyer and presto, we were in business.

That left only the transfer of enough cash to our new German bank account to cover the down payment, taxes, fees permits and all the other minor stuff. Our local bank was able to wire the money with no trouble or bother.

Which brings me back to my first statement, the next step is to fly to Germany to sign the papers and become hausebesitzeren (home-owners).

Now if I can just figure out how to get a drivers licence...

July 2003

Subject: retiring in Germany