Help To Cry - Tuesday

‘Seen this guys?’ Questions fat finance fiddler M, as he sways into the centre of the office, waving his laptop.

There’s a long, indifferent silence. If it’s the McDonald’s website again and a Happy Meal offer for morbidly obese chubsters who blame genes, not intake, I’m not interested.

‘What is it?’ Asks negotiator S, eventually. She’s far too nice for this industry.

M spins his laptop, an action that causes the hint of an exhausted wheeze, and shows us a banner headline followed by the sort of facts and figures, interspersed by indecipherable graphs, that still make me shiver nearly forty years after my last math’s lesson.

‘Over 23,000 mortgage products to choose from currently.’ M replies, with a podgy grin. ‘That’s why you lot need to keep wheeling the confused and desperate in to me.’

‘Didn’t think you could tuck them up with endowment mortgages any more.’ Says assistant manager T, sarcastically.

M scowls at T. ‘That was along time ago,’ he says defensively. ‘And anyway products are much more sophisticated nowadays.’

‘People still don’t understand them though.’ Ventures trainee F. He’s right, but not the best advocate as he still hasn’t grasped how to work the franking machine, without clearing our complete credit balance on one mis-stamped envelope to Spain. If only I could post him somewhere….

‘What you mean,’ argues T. ‘Is there are more ways to confuse vulnerable borrowers and flog them insurance policies they don’t need, that won’t pay out if they are actually terminally ill.’

‘That’s a very jaundiced view.’ Snaps back M. ‘And you might not want that repeated at the next sales managers’ meeting. Particularly with your level of introductions.’

There’s an uncomfortable silence, one I feel I need to fill. But then I’m more aligned with T, than M. I hate flogging mortgage and insurance products, I’m here to sell my clients’ homes at the best possible price. But sometimes you have to swallow your pride, particularly as individual targets leave you more exposed than a flasher on a breezy beach.

‘We are a team.’ I say, unconvincingly, as loose lettings’ lush B, totters through the door on inappropriate heels. She ignores us all and heads for the kitchen, where I hear a kettle filled with enough water for one.

‘It’s not the product range that causes young people a problem.’ Says S, with raised eyebrows in the direction of B and her solo beverage. ‘It’s the fact that people will never be able to save up enough for the deposit, if they are paying rent at the same time.’

‘Exactly.’ Agrees T. ‘And that government Help to Buy scheme was a shambles. You save, they are supposed to add to your pot and it turns out you can’t use the funds for the 10% deposit. It’s a joke’

T is spot on. The hastily launched proposals, like most Government plans for UK housing in the last two decades, were clumsy and without detail. But as ever, by the time the schemes were called in to question, the clowns who launched them were long gone and lunching in the city on a lucrative consultancy deal, with a featherbedded pension. Come the revolution….

‘All you need to worry about is getting them in front of me.’ Says M, with a queasy smile. ‘I can do the rest.’

‘Yeh, but I’m nor sure I’d want any friend of mine taking on a thirty-five year mortgage.’ Counters T.

‘Or my granny being coerced into an equity release plan on her house.’ Adds S.

‘Yes, but I’d like my own flat with an en-suite and a gym in the basement.’ Says F, with a glassy-eyed stare.

‘That’s more like the attitude we need.’ Concludes M triumphantly.

‘They not need any financial advice?’ Quizzes M, later.

I’ve just seen new clients to the door. They’ve verified my draft particulars, signed up on a sole agency, entrusted me with the sale of their home and I really want them to do well. I don’t want them hurriedly stitched up, they can go to A & E on a Saturday night for that.

‘Got their own financial advisor.’ I tell M, fingers crossed under the desk.

A man needs some integrity.

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Beat It - Wednesday

I’m in the main office, covering for snatched lunches and outside appointments. I like to show I can still do the front line chores. It’s the reason I get chased by dogs on leaflet drops and still make a mess of the tea and coffee orders when I show I’m a milk, no sugar, man of the people.

‘Tossers looking in the window.’ Hisses loose lettings’ lush B. She’s my only companion and a less than alluring - rescue the human race - procreation choice, should the world end like that guy standing outside the newsagents has been predicting for the last six months. Just my luck, help save the planet and be stuck with a nasty STI, a drunk pregnant woman and no antibiotics….

‘They look fairly normal.’ I whisper back, trying to banish the unwelcome thought of raising more than a smile, in B’s direction.

‘Time-wasters.’ predicts B, as the late middle-aged couple move hesitantly towards the office door.

‘Buying or renting?’ I ask softly.

‘Well the buy-to-let lot have dried up since the chancellor screwed around with stamp duty,’ answers B. ‘ So I’m thinking you’re the lucky one.’

True to form, B ducks behind her monitor and I am left with no choice but to stand and welcome the couple. I insist we greet people in the old school fashion. I hope it’s a point of difference to all the other new kids on the block, in polo shirts and chinos. We don’t do free coffee dispensing, but I do see everyone to the door. Not least to make sure they are safely off the premises.

‘How may I help you?’ I begin, as I show the pair to S’s vacant desk. The seat is vaguely warm as I sit down. Probably just the unaccustomed sunshine streaming through the window. Probably.

I wait as the wife responds to my question. She’s clearly the decision maker, first qualifying item obtained, now I just need to establish their needs and motivation. The basic contact information, names, addresses, email and phone details could be taken by a performing parrot. I want to know how these people can generate income for me. Do they have a home to sell? Can they proceed promptly? Would they like fat mortgage man M, to sell them some inappropriate insurance product? One that will doubtless be a future miss-selling scandal, but for the moment will satisfy head office’s increasingly demanding sales targets.

I takes a few minutes to get the dreary but necessary data. The pair probably think I’m putting them on our mailing list - something of a misnomer now most people communicate electronically - but I’ll decide whether we’ll be wasting any more time on them. You need quality control in this business, or like a prostitute with an absent-minded pimp, you’d spend all your time servicing f***ers who never pay you.

And then the woman utters a familiar, but still intensely irritating, line.

‘We’ve been looking for the last five years.’ She says earnestly, as the husband nods wearily. I catch B’s smirk across the office, as she theatrically mimes: time-wasters.

‘There’s never anything as nice as our house.’ Continues the wife, as I detect a frown of transient disagreement from the long-suffering husband. I almost feel sorry for him. Almost.

Of course I’ve had plenty of properties that would suit this picky pair, over the last half decade. But with the supply and demand imbalance still out of kilter, why would I make the transaction any harder than it is, by involving unmotivated messers? If I’m going to do sado-masochism I’ll do it in my own time, with appropriate sheets and privacy. There’s no safe word with these types. They'll just keep hurting you time after time.

‘Oh no, we won’t put our house on the market until we’ve found something.’ Replies the wife, to my half-hearted attempt to get a valuation for a sister office half way across the county, where this pair live - and will doubtless die.

‘Told you they were time-wasters.’ Crows B after I’ve seen the couple out.

Feel my pain.

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Forecast Folly - Monday

‘So, predictions for the property market in the year to come?’ I ask, after delivering my morning meeting. There’s a group look of bemusement from my slightly overweight and overwrought team. They were probably expecting a quiet start to the new year, with just a bit of disinterested grazing on the remaining chocolates in the tin the board man gave us, but now I’ve challenged them.

And why not challenge them? I’m going to be challenged by the cranked-up office targets the bean counter boss has lumbered me with. He’s made assumptions on what prices and activity will do during the next twelve months. They might as well stick their fingers in the air too.

‘Rental market will be busy again.’ Volunteers B, our loose lettings lush. She’s filing her nails again, something I’m thinking of sending the way of eating at your desk and smoking in the office, if she continues to inflict powdered cuticle flakes in my direction.

‘You think?’ Challenges assistant manager T.

‘Yes, of course. Owner occupiers are going the way of the dinosaur with prices the way they are.’ Crows B. ‘You’ll all be under me soon.’ It’s not a pleasant image.

‘Rubbish,’ says T. ‘ It’s still cheaper to buy in the long run and renting is just dead money.’

‘That’s a cliche.’ Spits B.

Yes, but cliches are usually founded in truth.

‘What do you predict?’ I ask negotiator S.

She tilts her head alluringly.

‘Well,’ she begins. ‘If supply stays as restricted as it has been and with demand not slackening, prices will only go one way.’

‘Yes.’ Agrees fat mortgage man M, with an unpleasant grin. ‘And if you shovel those naive first time buyers my way, I can source cheap money and some tasty insurance products.’ God I yearn for simpler times, when we just acted for the vendor of a property and didn’t have conflicted loyalties.

‘What do you think will happen if interest rates climb several points?’ I ask, remembering the time when my mortgage payments were levied at 15% and I was one missed payment away from having an unpleasant man in a cheap business suit repossess my house. In retrospect, I stubbornly kept paying a crippling amount only to avoid the humiliation of a rival putting their For Sale board up at my, just vacated, home.

‘Interest rates can go up?’ Asks trainee F to muted laughter. I think he’s joking but you can never tell with him, plus he’s only ever known an environment where rates are low single figures and pensioners constantly complain about poor returns on savings.

‘You’ve seen a few property crashes.’ Says S.

‘Not that many.’ I counter sharply.

‘Yes but you know what I mean,’ persists S. ‘Do you think it will happen again?’

I’ve been expecting it for some time. I just don’t want to voice it too loudly. Historically all the markers suggest a big price correction is overdue, but maybe a once in a generation change is taking place. Maybe the old figures and multiples don’t apply in a world of cheap money, not enough new homes being built and a burgeoning population. Maybe.

‘It could.’ I venture to a sniff of distain from M. ‘But with out targets for the coming year we’d better hope it’s not in the next twelve months, or nobody will getting a bonus.’

‘It won’t.’States M firmly. ‘Too many vested interests in finance and Government. There’s more chance of on-line estate agents catching on.’

Everyone laughs. Now apart from the great solar roof panel con, I can’t think of a more over-hyped, under used development in the property market for years, than on-line estate agents. An oxymoron if ever there was one. It’s a local knowledge and expertise business , always will be. Good luck to any investors in an industry I still don’t fully understand after half a working lifetime, if they think they can make it work from a glorified call centre. 

‘How’s the week looking so far?’ Asks the bean counter when he rings late in the day.

‘Promising.’ I tell him, fingers crossed.

Probably.

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