The week of exchange is an absolute panic. I hardly sleep, my mind is so frantic. Instead, I sit awake at my caravan desk doing catastrophe maths: totting up the cost of the woodworm, the damp; recalculating my monthly outgoings; making plans for what I’ll do if I move into my house, the roof collapses, then I lose an arm and can no longer write.

‘Hope for the best and prepare for the worst’ is a mantra I have taken too close to heart, a hangover perhaps from when things really have gone horrendously wrong in my life – like when I got my first tax bill, couldn’t pay it and had to move into my best friend’s bed for three months. Now I find preparing for a nightmare calming. If the worst happens, I’ll have a plan.

I’m dropping Laila off at work when my solicitor calls me to get my final approval to exchange. Having waited a whole year for this moment, it’s a weird anticlimax when it finally happens. Afterwards, I am in a state of disbelief. Have I really just bought a house?! It’s hard to make it seem real when I’m still shivering in a caravan.

The week between exchange and completion is petrifying. So much has already gone wrong, it seems inevitable there will be one more setback – like the walls will subside, the owner will pull out or I’ll be one of those tiny percentage of people whose bank pulls the mortgage before completion.

I distract myself by prepping: signing up for council tax at my new address, connecting the Wi-Fi, booking builders. Betty, the lady on whose land I am staying, gives me lots of helpful advice about the most economic places to order oil, introduces me to a local electrician, recommends a chimney sweep and advises me about the septic tank.

My mortgage advisor tells me she doesn’t know how I’ve remained sane because she’s never known a buyer with such bad luck. The estate agent tells me mine is one of the longest purchases they’ve dealt with. My solicitor points out his 18-month-old daughter wasn’t even born the first time we spoke. My ex tells me he’s so happy for me.

I don’t let myself feel anything until the morning we complete – until my solicitor calls to confirm the mortgage money has been received and I’m finally collecting keys.

There is sunshine on the road as I drive to my new home. Orange leaves coat the path to my new life. The house is completely empty, save for a card from the previous owner wishing me as much happiness here as they had.

My late dad told me a story about how he once bought a plot of land for my mother. She had grown up with four sisters in a tiny Birmingham terrace house. He says when he took her to see the land, she got down on her knees on the ground because she couldn’t believe she owned her own piece of earth.

I think about her as I open my front door, take my shoes off and walk around, my heart exploding in the silence. I go to the study where  I am going to write, open the window and delight in hearing the birds sing, looking out over the fields at the calves.

I thought in this moment I’d cry with relief. Or laugh with happiness. Instead, I sit down in bare feet on the carpet feeling something I haven’t known all year – a profound sense of peace.

Katie Glass will be answering any questions you might have in the comments section below on Saturday at 11am.

You can read Katie Glass’s column, What Katie did next, every Saturday from 6am on telegraph.co.uk

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