DISAPPOINTMENT

Bad news, like buses, always seems to come in threes and it looks like the     3.55 pm to Shiteville has stopped outside our door.  Last week’s bad news-bus timetable went something like this:

First bus – Single to Rejection.  This one way ticket takes you to the go to destination for people like me that failed to cross the new job threshold. 

Second bus – Day rider to Homelessness. This ticket is usually purchased by unscrupulous landlords using the pandemic to evict tenants for no good reason and has recently been given to my son who is soon to be taking up residence under Boscombe Pier. 

Third bus – Return to No Sale.  This ticket covers a surprise journey back to the point you started from, a journey which has taken the longest time possible, is a complete waste of money and confirms the unreliability of other passengers on board.

In our game of property poker, the third bus has now dropped us back to Square One as after 8 weeks of conveyancing, our buyers have failed to successfully secure a mortgage.

It’s no fault of theirs and in truth, I feel more than sorry for them as victims of the economic crisis that is leaving a deeper scar in most lives than a touch of Covid.  With the end of the furlough scheme approaching, financial institutions are pulling up the credit drawbridge over mounting fears of mass unemployment and borrower ability to repay back loans.  Mortgage deals are in a continual state of flux, terms changing almost daily with banks/building societies executing more U turns on funding agreements than the Government.   

For first time buyers this truly must be their worst nightmare.  The average loan to value ratio has crept up to almost 15-20%, a hefty chunk of money for any prospective purchaser to find as a deposit on their own.  Credit from the Bank of Mum and Dad won’t wash either it seems as lenders now feel that this does not help borrowers adequately demonstrate their credit repayment capabilities.

So if borrowers are unable to get mortgages, what I can’t understand is how the media can be reporting an upsurge in the housing market?  Who is buying up all these houses and what with, magic beans?

Disappointment, anger, tears, blasphemy; I’ve ridden a rollercoaster of emotions since speaking to our buyer and listening to their latest tale of mortgage offer refusal.  Life sucks!  And no matter how much everyone tries to put a positive spin on things, this year is turning into one of the biggest catalogues of calamity in history.  

But when life knocks you down and believe me it does more times than you would ever think possible, it’s always a case of stiff upper lip and soldier on.  It’s back to the For Sale board for us and fingers crossed that all that tabloid reported pent up housing demand quickly produces a new (minted) buyer for our house.

THE 'C' WORD

And so it begins.  The dreaded ‘C’ word has been mentioned at work.  I’m not referring to Covid which does start with the letter ‘C’ or for those of you out there with gutter minds, this ‘C’ word is not associated with one of countless lewd-phemisms used to describe female private parts.  Fun as it might be to try and list these it would take up far too much time and blog space.  No, the ‘C’ word in question is ‘Consultation’, the process at work which usually precedes the appearance of an empty cardboard box on your desk containing your marching orders.

Page 44 - The Times newspaper 20 August 2020

An article printed on page 44 of yesterday’s copy of The Times only confirmed what I guessed would be inevitable especially for anyone working in the charitable sector.  With no physical fundraising taking place and legacy income falling like Newton’s apple, continued employment for charity staff will be nothing more than a mirage at the soon-to-dry-up Furlough Oasis.  If you still have a job at Christmas, it will be the greatest gift of all.

Talking of jobs, let me tell you that bagging one in these post-apocalyptic times is not as easy as waltzing into your local McDonalds to order a double cheeseburger with fries which you can now do at a discount under the Government’s Eat Out to Help Out scheme every Monday to Wednesday.  My recent interview encounter although a positive experience has made me realise that once you are nudging 60, your employment ‘currency’ devalues faster than the Vietnamese Dong. 

Prospective employers will give you all that guff about large numbers of applicants, others having skills that better match the role or that they were specifically looking for someone with experience of trimming elephant toenails (which of course you don’t have) when what they’d really like to say is that you’re far too old.  Yep, one look at your liver spots, wrinkles or pseudo-badger hairdo and in their book you’re on the employment scrapheap. 

Never mind that my organisational skills could plan a Napoleonic campaign or that my financial wizardry rivals that of Bernie Madoff.  Nope, as far as their pre-prejudiced notions go, a person of my maturity is bound to work slowly, spend all their time off sick or is just biding their time to retirement.  True?  Or is jaded cynicism clouding my judgement at being rejected for the job?  If I’m honest, it’s probably the latter. 

Oh well, their loss not mine.  I guess I’m lucky to still have a job (for now) and as I’m currently being paid 80% of my wages to do nothing then I’m in a better position than a lot of other people out there.  More time to blog.  Now where do I sign up for an elephant toenail trimming course? 

PLANT HIRE

Well Friday was an eventful day that’s for sure; job interview in Bognor Regis in the morning and moving furniture in the afternoon, certainly a day of two different halves.

Moving and lifting heavy plants is definitely not what the chiropractor recommended as a means of alleviating an irritated sciatic nerve and I spent most of yesterday in a chemically induced recovery coma to overcome the worst of the pain.  Thanks to a good night’s sleep, I live to blog another day!

Like me, the patio is now looking a bit sorry for itself having been strafed of potted plants.  The pick of the bunch have been temporarily deposited at St Leonards until such time as we can move them across to their new Chichester home. 

What's left on the patio

Transporting heavy potted plants is not the easiest task but having invested a great deal of cash and effort nurturing them over the years, why leave them behind for someone else to enjoy?  With a bit of care and a large van you can easily move your favourite plants to a new home.

You're gonna need a bigger van - Luton with tail lift

When hiring a van for this task, pick one that has a mechanical tail lift and also remember to hire a large sack truck.  (Cost to hire Luton van and sack truck for a day just over £100 from UDrive)  Even the smallest potted plants/trees are surprisingly heavy and bulky in size to lift and I wouldn’t recommend lifting heavy pots above waist height unless you want to end up with a serious back injury.  Remember to bend knees and keep elbows tucked in when lifting.  A wheelbarrow also helps in moving potted plants from A to B. 

'Scientifically' position items so they don't move about

Tail lift helps with moving heavy stuff

It goes without saying that packing stuff into a hire van should be done with some thought in mind.  It’s not a case of just chucking it all randomly in the back, items should be ‘scientifically’ packed so that you make efficient use of available space, stop things moving about in transit and minimise the risk of damage especially to fragile plants.  We placed our furniture in first then plants last so that they could then be unloaded first at the other end of the journey. 

All packed and ready to go

So we now have a bedroom set up at St Leonards ready for phase II of house move and the daughter has acquired an instant patio garden. All we are waiting for is for our buyers to get their finances sorted and exchange on contracts then we can press on with the next part of our relocation project.

FROST FREE

Cripes is that a penguin?  I’m not talking about the smothered in chocolate variety soon to cost about £20 a packet under the Government’s new anti-fattist regime, I’m referring to those monochrome wibbly-wobbly birds that live in very cold places.  I think I’ve just seen one standing on an undiscovered ice floe behind a box of frozen potato waffles.

Global warming may be responsible for a hike in temperatures over the past decade but the back of my freezer has been in its own unique ice age since 1999.  It’s going to take more than a few bowls of hot water and an ice pick to shift this little lot.  There are bergs in here that could sink the Titanic. 

Great Scott - we've stumbled across the Third Pole

I hate defrosting freezers.  It’s got to be one of the soggiest jobs on the planet.  When this one finally konks out, I’m definitely going frost free!

So why have you wasted the day chipping away at oversized icebergs I hear you ask?  To prepare for phase I of house moves.  A large van has been hired for tomorrow to shift potted plants and a few items of furniture out to the wilds of St Leonards which is to become our temporary ‘in-between properties’ home.  It’s our Plan B in case we complete on the sale of our house quicker than we can move to Chichester. 

It’s kind of daughter to take pity on us poor Charminster refugees, giving us a roof over our heads rather than making us sleep in a cardboard box under Bournemouth Pier or in the pee-smelling Richmond Hill underpass.  This favour will not go unrewarded.  

I shall of course repay this debt in baked goods thus becoming her nemesis in that never ending fitness and dieting regime she strictly enforces.   (Yeah, it’s my fault you’re fat!)  With a bit of luck I might lose a few pounds as her house guest.

PROBATE/UNREGISTERED PROPERTY

Shock horror I left my house twice last week to go to public places other than Lidls! 

First visit was to the Etches Collection, a wonderful museum dedicated to a collection of fossils gathered by Steve Etches who like me, must have frittered away many an hour hunting for ammonites on Kimmeridge beach. As a kid I always loved looking for fossils and this passion has not diminished as I’ve grown older.

Second visit was a spontaneous drive out to Kimmeridge for an evening picnic. Sadly that idea got canned when we turned up to find that there is now a huge metal gate preventing access to the beach after 7 pm. No more twilight strolls looking for fossils or photographing sunsets. 

Here's one I took somewhere else

All this unnatural gallivanting around in times of Covid is but a means of alleviating the boredom of furlough and waiting on property matters which have almost ground to a halt. 

Two words to say to all house buyers out there – probate/unregistered. 

Estate Agents for all their preparation of marvellous marketing material designed to make a sow’s ear look like a silk purse, cleverly fail to mention many things that may affect your purchase like whether the house is a probate property or has an unregistered title. I guess they feel that the sin of omission is not quite the same as telling a blatant lie so it’s often the case that you don’t stumble across info that might have made a difference to your decision or the cash offered to buy a house until a lot later when you are well down the expensive conveyancing road. Buyer Beware! 

Make it top of your list of questions for the estate agent and your conveyancing solicitor to find out if a property being marketed is a probate sale and whether or not the house has an unregistered title. These two things could make a difference especially to your wallet as legal fees stack up when having to deal with both these matters. 

Turns out our biddy bungalow is both of these – a property being sold under a grant of probate and with a title that isn’t registered at Land Registry. Problem? Not really. You can still go ahead and buy such a house but be prepared for a) lengthy delays in the process and b) a big legal fee at the end.

Lucky for us, our seller had already got a grant of probate to sell the property which appears to have been owned by his deceased father. If you’re unlucky enough to have had an offer accepted on a probate house without a grant in place then it could take weeks even months before the seller is able to move on their side of the transaction. 

Unregistered titles it appears are also not uncommon since this only became a legal requirement a few years ago. Older properties that may not have been sold for decades may not have been registered at Land Registry so again delays can be encountered as rightful legal ownership has to be proved by the seller before it can be transferred to you. Kerching! Another few hundred quid added to the solicitor’s bill. 

So, in hindsight, the 3 key questions we should have asked BEFORE making an offer on this bungalow: 

1) Is it a probate sale and if so, do you know if the seller has a grant of probate in place? 

2) If it’s an older property that hasn’t been sold in decades then ask if the seller has registered the title at Land Registry 

3) Ask your solicitor before you begin conveyancing, how much extra they will charge to deal with probate sales or unregistered titles so it doesn’t come as a shock when they bill you. 

If you are not in a hurry to move house or have piles of dosh languishing in the bank then these issues won’t make a difference – it’s just going to take longer and cost more.

CAKE ANYONE?

Congratulations to Laurian and Thibault, winners of this year’s Bake Off: The Professionals. Got any tips on how I can creatively use up the contents of my baking cupboard?

Don't pack the pantry, just eat it all beforehand

I’ve made it my mission in life to eat my way through house and home as it’s the only effective means to deal with the problem of packing the pantry. Food or other edible substances cannot be placed into a storage unit so there’s no other choice but to bake for Britain. 

Bournemouth Bake Off

Since our house sale was agreed about 5 weeks ago, we’ve munched our way solidly through a catalogue of cakes like a pair of box tree caterpillars strafing through a hedge. Mmmm white chocolate cheesecake. Mmmm treacle cookies. Mmmm banana bread. Every day it’s a different recipe. By the time we’ve cleared the contents of the pantry, I’ll need a hydraulic crane to hoist me out of bed every morning. When the Fat Tax comes, no off-shore bank account is going to save you – lard ass! Visitors – remember to bring your PPE and a hearty appetite when you pop round. Doggy bags will be provided! 

Chocolate crackle tops

Fingers crossed, it’s safe to say that we are probably half way through the selling process. Draft contracts have been prepared, buyer enquiries answered and most of our personal possessions have gone into storage. We’re now in that peculiar limbo faced by those in a property chain of waiting for an exchange/completion date. 

Legal llamas move slowly but estimated conveyancing costs are rapidly increasing almost in line with the national debt. Why am I being charged £40 by the solicitors for archive documents when they’re all held electronically? Who knows and being OCD, I’ve printed off my own copy of everything anyway so there’s no need for them to store any hard copies. Always challenge your solicitor’s bill to ensure you know exactly what you are paying for as these sharks would charge you for sneezing.