Old Chestnut - Wednesday

Sat in my third lounge of the day, drinking another cup of tepid tea, and flashing my increasingly unconvincing smile, my teeth begin to ache. Recently my valuation visits have begun to resemble a dizzying merry-go-round of dissatisfied sellers coming to the end of their sole agency contracts and wishing to change agents.

‘So what makes you different from all the other suits who promise everything and deliver nothing then?’ Asks the husband with unsettling directness. He sits slightly forward in his seat waiting for my answer, as his wife eyes me with the sort of distain usually reserved for those times you fail to notice the house you are entering is a shoes off at the door domain.

Now estate agency, as plenty of punters have enlightened me, is not rocket science. And despite the Sir Bryan Carsberg report recommending a minimum entry requirement and licensing for practitioners – the author of which, idiot trainee F thought invented lager – it is still often a question of right price, right buyer.

Sadly with values falling many potential vendors find the medicine hard to swallow, particularly if they’ve re-mortgaged to finance holidays, ill advised home improvements and new cars, and are now flirting with the dreaded negative equity. If I establish early they bought in the last twelve months with a 100% mortgage, I don’t even stop for the refreshments, as both my buoyancy and bladder can’t take the strain.

Something about the couple in front of me makes me feel they want straight talking not obfuscation, although I’ve been wrong before and my cruel-to-be-kind abruptness has just hastened my journey to the exit door. But the fact that both co-signatories on the deeds are sat before me indicates I have a much-increased chance of a decision, albeit an unpalatable one. Their house is on the market for about fifty grand more than its worth.

Ignoring the overgrown mature tree in the front garden which might be a deterrent to some buyers and plenty of insurers, and before long will require a licensed snooper to inspect it every three years, I hit them with my reality check figure. They don’t take it too well, and momentarily I glance at my footwear to check if I’ve missed the slippers in the hall signal, or worse still trodden something unspeakable into the carpet.

‘But you only need one buyer.’ Grumbles the man, nose wrinkled in distaste at my suggestion, further unnerving me. I only just stop short of checking my leather soles, just in case.

His familiar line is one I was using not that long ago to justify absurdly optimistic asking price suggestions, when several other agents were pitching against you, each indulging in more price inflation than an oil company chairman. I might have gone on to spin an enticing tale of the mythical special purchaser, perhaps a Russian Oligarch awash with cash and whose security and privacy issues lead him to believe bars on your downstairs windows indicate a sought-after location.

Every agent has their own little invisible backpack of lines available to dip into for a convincing argument, although outside the M25 ring the cash-rich Cossack tends to be replaced by the ‘London Buyer’. A bonus touting escape-to-the-country character with money burning a hole in their designer pocket, wishing to exchange their dockland studio flat for a place with paddock and a pony. Needless to say this savvy city type is expected to lose all fiscal reason when an over-inflated asking price includes a rat-infested thatched roof and a stagnant well.

Gingerly I explain to the crestfallen couple that although it may be every seller’s fantasy - whether flogging a barn with a pottery kiln, or a flat with a view - to find a mug punter, the reality doesn’t often make it onto the television property shows.

‘I’ll want the money back on my next home.’ Warns the man as he eventually does show me the door. Compromise thirty-five grand lopped off, unlike the overhanging branches tapping on the upstairs window.

And I tell him earnestly, with the conviction of someone who has stayed too long; that what goes around comes around.

Dead End - Friday

I’m driving round a character-free 1990’s built identikit estate slung up by one of the national builders. Although the developers have regional headquarters that mushroom in the good times then contract in the bad, they pay no attention to local materials or architectural heritage.

‘Do you think I could ever afford one of these places on my salary?’ Asks negotiator S, who is alongside me as compensation for the bland elevations outside the car. And I gaze out at the mock Tudor façade of the homes we are passing, still having not found the road we’re looking for. Not unless you shag someone with a lot more money than you, I think uncharitably, as we meander into another mazy cul-de-sac that peters out in trio of squidged together homes, all sharing one drive access - a guaranteed recipe for future neighbour disputes.

‘I’m sure you’ll be able to one day,’ I answer disingenuously. ‘Particularly if you get to run your own office.’ And the market comes back; adds an unspoken inner-voice - oh, and you don’t get pregnant and leave.

‘How much do you think one of these would be worth now?’ Asks S her eyes misty with lust – the property kind, sadly. ‘If I could find the bloody road we’re looking for I’d tell you.’ I snap back angrily, as we reverse back out and I find myself unable to remember the route we took in.

The truth is, I could value one of these standard four bed detached boxes with internal windowless en-suite second bathroom, downstairs cloakroom, kitchen/breakfast room and through lounge/diner, without leaving the office, which as it happens I may have to, as I still can’t find the address we’re due at.

As we nose into another dead end and I screw my eyes up to try and read the house numbers - absurdly, too vain to wear the glasses with S in the car – I remind her we can find all the price data we need on the computer system in the office. The only variation we’re likely to find being the odd plastic conservatory addition, or a left over plot size bigger than standard that the architect couldn’t squeeze another unit on.

‘At least the drop in value will be uniform for all of them.’ I tell S with a sweep of my hand as I commit to the price I’m expecting to recommend shortly. S whistles through her teeth and says. ‘I thought so, still way too much for me.’ And she succinctly illustrates how one man’s property crash, is another woman’s foot on the ladder opportunity.

‘It’s eerily quite round here isn’t it?’ Says S as we gaze out at the empty double drives, the odd free standing unused basketball hoop and the occasional people carrier with twin baby seats in the back. These family vehicles seem to be all you need now to advertise your fecundity, now those baby on board stickers have fallen out of favour.

‘Young mum’s and pre-school kids are all you’ll find round here.’ I pronounce sagely as we judder to a halt down another dead end only to see an elderly gent prodding his front garden with a hoe, and eyeing us suspiciously.
‘Oh, and the odd pensioner who downsized because the plot was too big.’ I hurriedly add, as the crusty gardener squints towards us then moves our way.

‘Bloody marvellous.’ I mutter under my breath as I ponder a high speed reversing manoeuvre and a hand brake turn. ‘Here comes the neighbourhood watch busybody.’
‘Are you going to tell him you’re lost?’ Asks S through her fingers, suppressing a breast-jiggling giggle, as the man approaches signalling for me to open the window.

‘I think he thought we were looking for a quiet place to park up.’ Chuckles S as I back out again, the old man’s sneeringly given directions ringing in my ear, along with the familiar condemnation for my part in his property price fluctuations once he’d discovered my identity.

And as we zigzag to our intended appointment, passing a blank-faced young mum with pushchair and an equally bewildered Internet shopping supermarket delivery van, I can’t shake the vision of a now welcome empty road and a quiet tête-à-tête with S.

Think I might be losing it.

Flag Of Convenience - Tuesday

In to the office to a collective sigh, enter some habitual lookers. Some people make a hobby out of plaguing estate agents for the elusive property that they’ll “definitely buy” if it ever comes to market. Fact is, this type would balk or pick an imaginary hole in the home’s fabric- faster even than a surveyor – if you were to confront them with a place that met their criteria.

It would be too pricey, the wrong compass point for the garden, or just out of school catchment area. And then, even in the unlikely event your choice new instruction met all their fastidious demands they’d expect you and the owners to wait several months, not offering the prized instruction to anyone else, while they tried to get top dollar for their own not so perfect pad. Invariably placed on the marker reluctantly, with a cheap fee outfit that will waive or defer any up front cost. Messers.

‘You have a board in London road.’ Brays the man while his snooty wife nods in confirmation. F our amoeba-challenging trainee stares at the couple blankly, eyes blinking in confusion, mouth opening and shutting like some beached fish.
‘Have we?’ He eventually gasps uncertainly.

Normally I’d hurry across the office to enlighten F, or interject with the required information. Not that you should undermine a staff member in public – unless you are my bean-counter boss – but sometimes staff welfare etiquette has to be jettisoned, in favour of not upsetting a possible punter. Trouble is we don’t have a board in London road – or at least shouldn’t have.

‘Don’t give me that smoke-screen sonny.’ Snaps the man aggressively, as F starts to look for assistance. ‘What’s the game, you flogging it to a friend or something? I know how it works.’
‘I can assure you sir,’ begins F pompously before tailing off spectacularly, only serving to exacerbate the couple’s suspicions.

‘Tell him they have to tell us.’ Urges the wife, tugging insistently on her husband’s sleeve, as I hesitate to intervene while I rack my brains as to other boards we may have nearby. Often people muddle our boards with a similarly coloured opposition flag, or it might be another pissed-up student who considered it amusing to be the first drunken oaf ever to redistribute for sale boards, in the absence of any traffic cones.

‘I expect they are selling it to someone who is doing the mortgage with them.’ Speculates the woman, warming to her task just as our financial services man M waddles through the door clutching a bulky bag from the bakers, one corner already sporting a greasy see-through hue.

The fact is we don’t have anything to offer in the road they are referring to. I’d love to, as it happens, as they sell particularly well. The fact also remains that if we did, the last people I’d be thinking off to contact would be this pair of argumentative time-wasters. By the time they prevaricated over the décor, garden, and who to grace with their own crummy home to sell, I’d have a queue of motivated buyers ahead of them – in any market.

‘I don’t belief you for a minute.’ Concludes the man, when F finally grasps that if it is our board at all, it’s in the wrong garden. F looks momentarily hurt by this damning judgement upon his character. You’d think he’d be used to the public’s default to animosity mode when dealing with us, but he still has a lot to learn.
‘Let me speak to the manager.’ Demands the man, as his wife pushes him forward like a cattle herder, with little nudges to the ribs. Reluctantly I walk across the office, catching a smirk of satisfaction from B in lettings as I pass.

Using all my years experience and my extensive customer service skills, I gently enlighten the man as to the likelihood of some jolly-japer from the nearby college having re-located the board after a night getting tanked-up at the student bar.

‘I can’t trust a bloody word.’ Spits the man venomously as his wife picks up a leaflet about the Ombudsman, with a poisonous look.
‘It’s no wonder everybody hates you lot.’ Snarls Mr Angry as he stomps from the office. ‘You’re worse than politicians!’

That hurt.

Slice Of Pie Chart - Friday

B our dipso letting lady staggers to my desk and informs me rather gloatingly, that some commentator in the paper has predicted her segment of the market will continue to grow. Apparently, she explains between ever more alarming wobbles on her unwise heels that the rental market is going to benefit from uncertainty in the sales arena.

‘It’s counter intuitive,’ she enlightens me with a suppressed hiccup, before frowning and making the caked-on concealer on her forehead start to crumble, resembling a dusty furrowed field.
‘I think that’s counter-cyclical,’ Explains assistant manager T. ‘The slowdown in buyers is supposed to generate more people wanting to rent.’ And T looks at our window display, and in particular one half sold new build block where we can’t flog them and B is struggling to find tenants. ‘Although, on reflection, that might be bullshit.’

There’s a great deal of that particular bovine fertiliser in this industry. I muse, as I motor towards a brace of afternoon appointments, glad to be out of the cloying quietness of the office. Phones having to be checked half way through every morning now, to see if the itinerant cleaner hasn’t inadvertently knocked the line from the socket with the inappropriately smiley-faced vacuum cleaner.

Then on the radio comes another phone-in for disgruntled homeowners. Everyone’s an expert all of a sudden, I think sourly, as another ranter bemoans the cost of housing but I suspect, is still one of those property pervs, who checks on-line for neighbours sales prices religiously.

‘Of course a lot of the surveys are predicated on very narrow, market specific parameters.’ I hear myself telling a well-dressed lady as we look round a low-beamed cottage and we discuss whether now is a good time to buy. ‘Still, I think there’s more pain to come.’ She announces, before turning back to belatedly seek the opinion of the beta male she has in-tow.

Fortunately she doesn’t see my forehead thump sickeningly into the age-darkened supporting timber and I manage to disguise my anguished grunt as appreciative groan of admiration, as she drools over the inglenook fireplace. I happen to know the fireplace will billow smoke back into the room when the winds in the wrong direction next winter, but hopefully I’ll be long gone.

‘What’s this bar chart business.’ Ventures the woman’s partner, speaking for the first time since his reluctant, lettuce-limp, doorstep handshake. And he gestures at the energy performance certificate graph appended to the property details. Each newly marketed home now requiring one of theses A to G ready reckoners, on the building’s energy saving potential.

And reluctantly I explain how another statistician, about as reliable as the price survey producers, has been engaged to produce theses largely ignored pieces of paper. The draughty period property we are in has a poor rating, one unlikely to improve all the while the listed building authorities refuse to allow double-glazing to be fitted.

‘So we ought to get a reduction on the price then?’ Concludes the smirking man irritatingly, as I curse the Eurocrats who foisted the whole paper-pushing exercise on us once more. Granted, if I owned a seafront home, soon to become a scuba diving destination, I might care a little more about global warming. But like most people the turning tide of a crumbling economy is a little more pressing than a far-off flood.

Haltingly I fumble for a suitable rebuttal, knowing I persuaded the owners to lop twenty grand off the asking price only two weeks earlier, until the woman bails me out by announcing, voice thick with property-lust.
‘I don’t give a flying fig if it has the thermal quality of a colander Nigel, it’s cute and I want it.’

And the clouds miraculously part, as the lady jumps straight to A on my rating card. I should have remembered, no matter how gloomy the outlook and completely against economic sense and surveys, once the property pixie dust works its magic no amount of downbeat forecasts will stop the nesting instinct.

As I drive back with an offer - the radio rant still running - belatedly I remember how I survived the last downturn and mentally mark the lesson on the only chart that matters.

Experience.

Ghost In The Machine - Monday

A sale, days from an expected exchange of contracts, falls through for the third time in a row. Reluctantly I steal myself for the prickly phone call to the thrice-packed vendor advising they might want to unload the boxes again.

‘It must be jinxed, or something.’ Muses assistant manager T with his customary nonchalance. As he’s yet to buy his own home he can’t quite grasp the gut-wrenching despair of a dream move evaporating on the whim of an unknown party, somewhere down a protracted property chain. He’ll only feel the pain when the commission statement arrives at month end.

‘Do you reckon some homes are cursed then?’ Asks buxom negotiator S with a distracting shudder. It’s a good question, as I’ve had my fair share of slightly batty owners claiming to have poltergeists. On balance I’ve had to tell them shifting furniture isn’t the best selling point, at least until the removal van arrives.

Some homes, like the one we’ve just taken the gloomy phone call on, just seem to be unlucky. Although from experience the reason for a property not selling tends to be personal ghosts, rather than third dimensional ones.

Apparently the whole ghoulish process of moving has turned the owner’s life into a nightmare she tells me, as I relay the bad news in a familiar phone call. And she’s also not sleeping at night, with all the stress and uncertainty. That explains my disturbed nocturnal patterns then, I want to tell her. Instead I promise another advert in next week’s paper, as she threatens to change agents.

Then as fate would have it, T books me a valuation in the same road ten minutes later. Some locations have known difficulties, such as proximity to a less than desirable sink estate, or susceptibility to individual sinking if the homes are built on clay. But this road has sold well, with healthy price increases in the last few years, as the area has been gentrified. Although every location has its price ceiling and with buyers able to be pickier, I have a feeling owners are in for a fright.

‘How much, you must be joking right?’ Snaps the owner when I pitch a suggested asking price a few hours later, in his minimalist lounge. I’m pretty sure stand-up as an alternative career to this faltering one isn’t an option, so I assure the disenchanted seller I’m deadly serious. As amateur speculators all around the country are finding, secondary and tertiary locations aren’t the best place to throw good money after bad in a cooling market.

The man, a junior doctor, who can seemingly afford over-ostentatious personalised plates on his premium priced Porsche in the driveway, but doesn’t like the sound of 2.0% sole agency, isn’t too keen on my suggested marketing figure.

‘What gives you lot the right to dictate prices?’ snipes the doctor, with an off-putting bedside manner. And a mischievous, self-immolating voice aches to remind surgeon scissor hands that he tends to have his mistakes cremated, while we just put the for sale board up again. Instead I begin justifying my suggestion.

With sales data more transparent and available then ever before agents, buyers, sellers and nosey neighbours, can all access historical price information at the click of a mouse. Contrary to popular belief, we don’t have as much influence on the market as some would think.

In the final analysis owner’s can ask what they want for their home. Whether they get it or not is, granted, dictated by the effectiveness of their chosen agent, but just as importantly by supply and demand, and critically by the availability and affordability of mortgage finance.

‘I want a second opinion.’ Sniffs the medical man as he shows me the door and repeats what I’d be saying, on the receiving end of his imperious diagnosis. The chances are his home will be on the market at the wrong price with the wrong agent before the week is out.

‘Any joy?’ Asks T with a yawn, as I trudge back through the office door. And I repeat my expectation that we might need to play a waiting game with the good doctor - until he’s ready to take his medicine.

Terms Of Endearment - Tuesday

‘When you said we’d try something different this bank holiday weekend, I didn’t think you meant this.’ I grumble to my wife, as we approach the destination.
‘What did you have in mind then?’ She asks seemingly benignly, as I see the queue of down-market saloons yet to take the less than convincingly government scrapping offer, mixed in with a few 4x4 leviathans.

I decide it’s best not to tell her precisely what I’d been dreaming off, as we reach the scruffy individual in a dayglow jacket handing out cheap raffle tickets for the privilege of parking in a rutted field, before we visit the Country Fair. Then my mobile rings.

‘Who the hell is that?’ I ask even before I’ve fished the item from my jacket, to see the office number flashing insistently. And as we shuffle through a gate staffed by a ruddy-cheeked tweed-clad woman with the look of someone who loves her dogs more than her husband, I have a fractious conversation with the weekend lady who can’t find a key an irate vendor wants back after we’ve failed to flog his over-priced pile.

‘Everything alright?’ Asks my wife as I close-up the clam angrily, with a suspicious plastic cracking sound, once I’ve discovered F the imbecilic trainee was the last to sign the key in question out. Is everything all right? I muse to myself, as she stops to look at some sort of bizarre garden ironmongery display that resembles a first year metalwork students discarded smelting. Not really.

‘I feel over-dressed.’ I whisper to my wife as we approach another lop-sided gazebo, surrounded by a disparate band of planet savers dressed in garish coloured home-knitted cardigans. A woman with more facial hair than the now seriously imperilled F, is painting, by hand, on to some sort of un-fired pottery vase, while the viewers peruse her finished products, most of which resemble the sort of output you’d expect to see at an inner city playgroup.

‘God what a bunch of oddballs.’ I mutter, as we move on past a variety of stalls. ‘Just tell me no, if I ever begin growing a pony tail and start wanting to whittle in public.’
‘You’re just being ridiculous,’ chides my wife.’ I expect they are a lot happier in their work than you.’

‘There you are poppet.’ Announces another crone, as she hands me a bag of over-priced homemade fudge. ‘I think she fancied you.’ Giggles my wife as we move on past a display of crappy low-grade chunky jewellery and a bloke stencilling farmyard pictures onto sheets of cheap ply-board.

‘It’s only the ugly ones who lust after me now.’ I announce, quickly realising my error and assuring my missus the description doesn’t include her. ‘Anyway,’ I continue eager to change the subject. ‘Is it me, or is some of this tat just not very good?’

I don’t get an answer as we’re accosted by a desperate lad incongruously trying to flog double glazing appointments from a trailer tent, parked next to a wild-eyed woman hawking tired looking bedding plants, and a eco-warrior in a wide-brimmed hat with some sort of dead game bird’s feather protruding, attempting to peddle re-cycled compact discs made into crappy clocks.

‘Christ,’ I chuckle dryly after I’ve shaken off the double glazing lad but kept his card for when I finally ditch F. ‘All we need now is one of those comedy companies trying to persuade people to flog their home on the cheap.’ And I explain to my wife, as we eat a chunk of the sickly fudge, then instantly regret it, how chancers spring-up relentlessly with the offer of a rough-sawn for sale flag and an internet listing nobody will find, all for £199 plus vat and a link to a back-street HIP’s provider.

‘They’ll never kill off proper estate agents.’ I say louder than I meant to, and half a dozen ageing hippies scowl at me as if I’ve just parked my Range Rover on top of the gluten-free vegetarian stall.

‘Enjoy the cheese friend.’ Calls a home-churner cheerily, as we move on to purchase some cut-and-replenish lettuce. ‘Thank-you lover.’ Intones the crusty Wiccan-woman vendor, much to my wife’s amusement.
‘Is there something I should know?’ She laughs, as we leave the arena.

Probably.

Would Love To Meet - Friday

Back from the sandwich shop clutching a low calorie meal deal – I nearly succumbed to the fat-laden all day breakfast buttie – an alluringly breathless S, my well-upholstered negotiator, accosts me.

‘I’ve just taken a cracking valuation,’ she announces excitedly, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet and jiggling unnervingly. ‘It sounds gorgeous,’ she continues as my stomach knots. ‘Can I come with you?’

‘Are you alright?’ Asks S as I choke back a cough and try to banish the thoroughly unprofessional vision her naïvely ambiguous statement has occasioned. I wave the flimsy tuna-lite and sweetcorn sandwich; nearly dropping the flavour-free yoghurt and carbonated drink I collected with it – no bag due to the new shame-the-shopper environmental pressure.

‘No, I’m just a bit hungry.’ I splutter, before blustering something about a missed breakfast.
‘Never skip a proper start to the day.’ Pronounces S, before adding. ‘Unless you’ve got a very good reason.’ I tell S I’ll look at her appointment once I’ve fuelled-up and she skips out the door to get her own lunch.

‘She doesn’t know what she’s doing.’ Says B from her lettings desk with a world-weary shake of her head. ‘But she’ll learn when she’s been screwed over as much as I have.’
Sometimes a smart-arse comment is best left unsaid, so I head for my office.
‘Enjoy your mastication.’ Calls B with a dirty chuckle, as I scuttle into my sanctuary and have to physically stop myself from closing the blinds.

Still not satiated, I emerge twenty minutes later brushing wholemeal crumbs from my suit trousers and catch up with S. The valuation she’s booked does sound alluring I realise, as I concentrate on the matter in hand and discover there’s a rarely available house in a sought after location to look at.

‘Apparently they’ve had architects supervise the restoration and designers in to re-model the décor.’ Enthuses S as I scan the paperwork and look for clues as to motivation. If they’ve overspent, they’ll struggle to get their money back in any market, let alone today’s, although a good location can count for a lot no matter how gloomy the economic forecast.

‘Says here,’ I tell S reading her notes. ‘That we’ll be meting this lady,’ I jab a finger at the name on the form. ‘And her partner.’ I look at S and she blushes, before I ask. ‘Male or female?’ S has forgotten to ask in her excitement, now I’m missing vital information.

Gay or hetro, I really don’t mind if the seller is sensible. As long as they are straight - in a business sense - what people do in the privacy of their own homes is their own concern, as long as it doesn’t involve children or pets. That creepy guy who kept a shorthaired Norfolk Horn in his cramped back garden never really convinced me he was pursuing the Good Life - more like a woolly wife.

Trying not to turn cranky, I press for more detail on the pair. It doesn’t help that the woman styles herself Ms. A term most salespeople hate, as it gives no clue as to the prefix-owner’s status. From experience it can flag-up a prickly female with more issues than the homeless guy, with the dog on the string, flogging magazines.

‘I don’t think she’s a lesbian if that’s what you are wondering.’ Counters S, as B calls out unhelpfully:
‘Don’t disappoint him love.’
‘Anyway,’ continues S undaunted. ‘She said we had to be there before three o’clock, as she has to pick the kids up from school.’
‘You not heard of a turkey baster then?’ Laughs B.

Irrespective of sexuality, I want the place to sell – as long as the price is right – it’s just whether taking S will help my pitch or not. If the partner is a bloke, the last thing I need is the guy drooling over S like an over-salivated Great Dane. If it’s an all female couple, S could make them feel more comfortable if they’re man haters. But then what if one of them fancies her too?

And the public think all we do is stick a photo in the office window and charge an outrageous fee.