Beginning At Home - Monday

‘Nice lady coming back to see you in about half an hour.’ Says negotiator S, as I come through the office door.

This isn’t what I want to hear. Nice ladies don’t come to see me, unless they are selling something I don’t want - or can’t afford.

‘What is she flogging?’ I ask, to a frown from S.

‘A dead horse, if she’s pitching to you.’ Interjects assistant manager T, with a grin.

‘It’s for a good cause.’ Continues S, ignoring T and fixing me with that devastating smile.

I soften a little, which with S is a little counterintuitive….

‘Some sort of begging letter, with a collecting tin most of the deadbeats who come in here will try and steal if we don’t chain it to the photocopier?’ I demand, sourly.

‘You are so jaundiced.’ Says S, with a beguiling pout.

‘It’ll come to you with time and a lot more disappointment.’ I tell her, shrugging off my coat and heading for the message book.

Apart from being a magnet for every lunatic in town and all the sad lonely people who have nobody to talk to during the day, my office seems to be the first port of call for anyone collecting for spurious good causes, from the big terminal ones, right through to well-meaning old women rescuing damaged Greek donkeys and stray cats that should have been spayed at birth.

‘Was she wearing a hi-viz jacket and a fake smile?’

I ask, distracted by several messages in the book that don’t bode well for some of the sales in my pipeline.

‘No she was quite normal.’ Counters S, as I see Bomber the surveyor has collected the keys for one of my high-end sales. He’ll down value the agreed price and no doubt ask for numerous independent contractors reports. Investigations almost guaranteed to spook the purchaser and make them think they are buying a dilapidated money pit, not a period home that has stood for a couple of hundred years quite happily.

‘What makes them think I have time to collect cash for free and hand out cheap lapel stickers to prove to passers by how worthy you are?’ I demand.

‘They are just to stop the charity-chuggers in the high street from bugging you.’ Suggests T.

‘Well it’s not working.’ I counter. ‘If those ill-dressed, failed students, expect me to sign a monthly direct-debt to save pit-ponies in Siberia, they’ve another think coming. They should get a proper job.’

‘Think they are volunteers.’ Says S, with a hint of annoyance.

They’re not. They are on commission, like me, and unless I sort out these sales taking forever while solicitors, lenders and surveyors try to screw then up, I won’t be getting any.

Agents do their bit for charity. Those with a more active social media stream than the clowns at head office, manage to raise their local profile quite well and buck the perceived image of estate agents being a bunch of sharks in cheap suits. I’ve done my fair share of sponsored walks and bike rides, but fatigue and a chaffed crotch gets you eventually.

‘The British are amongst the most generous charity supporters anywhere.’ States S. Not sure she has the figures to substantiate that claim. It is probably just a result of almost constant television nights where you are coerced into ringing a premium number to donate, while the tears are still falling after another heart-wrenching video-tape of a starving child and a devastated village. Perhaps I should take the collecting tin, after all. A good cause is a good cause and our image could do with a little polishing.

‘Here she comes.’ Announces S, nodding through the window. I spot a late-middle-aged lady, in sensible shoes, approaching like an ageing head girl from a private school. She’s sporting a tweed skirt and jacket combo.

‘You look like the man who makes the decisions.’ She announces in a plummy voice, flashing a lipstick-stained smile. I’m sensing a nut-job.

‘I’m here to tell you about the mistreatment of Korean puppies.’

Barking mad.

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Waterworld Too - Tuesday

The rain is back with a vengeance, as I battle through rush hour traffic for a late viewing. You can see why the more sprightly pensioners head for Spain in their early dotage. I’d advise them to keep a foothold in the UK property market, not sell-up completely for the lure of all day piss-ups and a pool, but you can’t tell them. They trickle back when their health starts to fail and they discover the much-maligned NHS its still better than a paid for clinic, more used to dealing with drunken British teenagers than early onset dementia.

I pull out slightly to avid a great sheet of standing water adjacent to a bus stop. I’m rewarded with a nodded thank you from two people in the queue and a bolshie blast on the horn from some boy racer coming the other way. I open my hands in question at the spotty oik as he speeds past oblivious to the road conditions, and get a single rigid finger thrust at me in return.

‘Tosser.’ I mutter towards the headlining. Not sure if Ford deliberately targeted the Ka at semi-literate retards with more tattoos than brain cells, but they seem to have cornered the market in aggressive kids who have somehow passed their driving test, but have more chance of becoming Prime Minister than successfully parallel parking.

‘Terrific.’ I mutter to myself as I crawl down the appointed street looking for a parking slot. These terraced houses were built just post-war and planners didn’t envisage owners, or more accurately around here renters, with three cars per household. The rain is lashing down still, as I finally find a space half across the double yellow lines, and switch off. As the downpour refuses to abate I wonder how those new houses they plan to build on what everyone who 's lived around here for more than twenty years knows is a flood plain, will fare.

As the car clock approaches five minutes before the appointed viewing time, I twist awkwardly to retrieve my umbrella from the back seat. I’m rewarded with a stabbing pain in my lower back and a view of a slightly soiled squab - that old woman viewing the retirement flat turned out to be as incontinent as her aroma indicated - devoid of anything other than a yellowy stain.

‘F**k!’ I bellow, as a vision of my brolly, sat by the office door still dripping from my earlier failed valuation, swims - appropriately - into view. The car is still rocking from my expletive as a teenage mum, with a toddler on one arm plus twin babies in one of those double buggies struggles past, looking at me suspiciously. God knows what she’d doing out in this weather, unless she’s searching for the fathers….

I stand on the doorstep, clipboard in hand and watch the rain lashing down. The owners are at work, not home until late obviously, how else could they service a mortgage without both working punishing hours? They are, needless to say, childless. I try not to become a Daily Mail reader, as I pogoed to The Clash in my youth, but some days I can feel my angry middle-Englander trying to escape.

Fifteen minutes later I’m still surveying the soggy street and trying to avoid a persistent drip that is determined to get down my shirt collar. I could go inside, I have the keys, but there’s one of those passive-aggressive stickers on the door’s side panel, warning Hawkers, Circulars and cold callers to not knock. They might as well put up those offensive notices from the fifties telling Irish and blacks they can’t rent round here. I’m guessing the woman of the house will know if I’ve lurked around inside without potential buyers with me, and you never know when people have motion sensitive cameras rigged any more. It’s taken all the fun out of the knicker drawer…

‘Have they rung in to cancel?’ I ask when negotiator S eventually answers the office phone.

‘Do they ever?’ She answers, semi rhetorically.

‘They’re not coming are they?’ I say, completely rhetorically.

I’m sinking here.

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Over To You Danno - Tuesday

‘Oh great.’ Grumbles assistant manager T, here comes that bonehead with the books.’

I look through the window to see the object of his scorn, a man in late middle age with an admittedly naked bonce. His head is glistening with sweat as he attempts to traverse the traffic while balancing a large box in his arms. Behind him his ancient Ford is parked on the double yellow lines, hazard lights winking an invitation to the nearest traffic warden. They won’t be far away as it’s not raining.

The man has the look of defeat in his eyes before he starts, the sort of demeanour you see in British footballers every World cup. Many people think estate agency is a loathsome lot, what with opprobrium of public and commentators alike, but try selling leftover books to apathetic office workers who have moved on to iPads and Kindles. It would be easier to flog quill and ink sets.

‘I don’t know why he bothers.’ Continues T as the man takes a half step forward, then retreats to the far pavement as a lumbering lorry thunders past and the light fittings and floor joists rattle again. Full repairing and insuring lease with upwards only rent reviews. God bless you group legal…

‘Oh he’s quite nice really.’ Counters S my big-hearted, large-breasted negotiator. She always manages to be uplifting, I think warmly, as I wonder idly if she has a penchant for the more mature man? She rather ruins the daydream, as the bookseller leaves the sanctuary of the kerbside, by adding: ‘He reminds me of my granddad.’

‘I haven’t got time to read books. ‘Says T scornfully. He doesn’t buy a paper either, but he’s always pinching mine at lunchtime. My timing has never been great, something my wife will doubtless endorse. Too late to be a partner cashing in when all the financial institutions overpaid for estate agency chains, and an aspiring writer just getting the hang of it when the industry collapses due to free content and illegal downloads. Just as well I didn’t buy that guitar.

‘He can’t make enough money to live off doing that job.’ Posits T as the man approaches and I see his hangdog look miraculously replaced by a cheery demeanour straight out of a 1980s sales seminar. He’s faking it like everyone else.

‘Just be nice.’ Says S to T with a steely stare. ‘He can leave the box and you’ll probably be out when he comes to collect any orders anyway.’

‘There won’t be any orders.’ Counters T accurately. ‘Who wants end of run cookery and reference books when you can get all that stuff on-line?’

T is right, nobody with a router wants a set of encyclopaedias in a Wiki-world. But then, who would employ the world-weary man in any modern, digital industry? I see the sad CVs most weeks. One’s where they’ve taken out the schooling dates to try and fool the recruiters and even shortened the career history to show just the last ten years. But you know, you just know. The Government need people to work until their late sixties and few worthwhile employers want to recruit anyone over thirty-five. I can’t afford for it to be me trying to shift literary units. Except in an e-book format of course….

‘Morning everyone.’ Announces the man with teeth-grindingly cheeriness. I saw his face moments earlier. It was a bottle-top twist away from a whole pot of paracetamol.

T turns his back on the man callously. B in lettings picks up a line that wasn’t ringing, leaving S to feign interest in the motley selection of hardback books with garish photos and unknown authors on the cover. I walk over to join her.

‘Got some good titles this month.’ Says the man with admirable enthusiasm. I’m almost convinced. Then in the background I see the traffic warden approaching his ancient Mondeo.

‘I’ve never heard him swear before.’ Says S in surprise, as the man bounds through the traffic to plead his case. I’m willing to bet he spits a few expletives out in the privacy of his, now ticketed car. I’ve started to issue it, sir. The appeals procedure is on the reverse.

Booked. 

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