Estate Agents

I was trying to think of a witty title. You know the sort of thing - “The forth estate…”, “Agent of destruction.”, “Estate agents are all cunts…”. I gave up and just typed in “Estate Agents”, because they name itself conjures up such feelings of resentment and hatred there was nothing I could do to add any extra emotion or feeling. To append extra description would be like shining a turd.

If I was and estate agent, however, I may try an embellish the title. I may infact try and embellish it to the point where it stops being a title and becomes, say, a boat.

We are looking at houses at the moment (to buy - not because we are sad house watchers or something), and we went to see three properties near Sevenoaks.

I won’t bore you with the details - all three were unsuitable for various reasons. The thing that will stay with me though, is the estate agent woman.

Now, we’ve seen a few properties over the last few months and have therefore met a few estate agents. Oddly, all the agents who do the viewings are women, and most of the agents who answer the phones in the offices are men. Anyway, the women who show us round the houses are always one of two types.

Type 1: 21 year old, bored pretty girl with absolutely no interest in either you or the property. They are just counting down the seconds until Dan or Steve comes round in their Citroen AX with (big sounds and neons, natch) and whisks them away to ‘Roxies’ or ‘Flamingos’ or what ever the local club is called. Type ones will eventually turn into…

Type 2: Leathery, mid menopausal women with thick makeup, a packet of Berkley’s Menthol in a leather cigarette box cover (that they bought in the Canaries) driving small open top sports cars. They always sound the same and their sad clown -ike kohl encrusted eyes are the only part of their yellowy face that reveals the fact that they are a) lying and b) hate you.

We were shown around the three houses by a classic type 2.

What made my day was the most outrageous bit of positive reframing I have ever heard.

We walked through the house (which, by the way was horrible – teapots on every shelf, and the stench of emphysema and cheap fags). We opened the patio does and stepped out into the garden.

The first thing that struck me was the noise of the M25 at the end of the garden. It was really quite loud and, to be frank, AT THE END OF THE GARDEN.

I said to the agent – “The first thing that strikes me is…”

She jumped in; “Yes, I know… I realize the garden is very small”
I was a bit taken aback. Above the constant traffic roar I said, “No, the M25 is what I noticed first.”

Pointing at a distant hill she said, “That’s not the M25, it’s Beggars Lane – the M25 is way over there.”

I tried to argue the point, but gave up. Here’s the good bit though.

She went on to explain that you can hear the M25 everywhere in Westerham, and that people just get used to it and that once people move to Westerham, they never want to leave.

She then said, “I’d much rather live in Westerham that next to an airport runway.”

So there you have it. Live in Westerham. It’s a lot quieter than living at the end of runway 2 at Heathrow airport.

The people of Westerham can’t leave. No one would be stupid enough to buy their houses.

Written by exmonkey on July 23rd, 2006 with 2 comments.
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