On estate agents from HELL

On estate agents from HELL

"Do you know what I can see here?" said the middle-aged man in a shiny suit that had once seen better days, its one jacket button straining to hold everything in place.

The man, I decided had seen better days, too. Some time in the early 1970s.

No, I couldn't see what he saw there: "What?" I ask. "What?"

"I can see you buying small, young trout, growing them in the garden pond, then whipping them out at a later date to sell from a stall at the end of your drive. Perfect business opportunity."

"Riiiight..."

Yes, dear reader, we are house-hunting again, and the lunacy had begun before we had even got through the front door, for this time McMad Brothers Estate Agents had sent along Mad Jake McMad to view an enormous house that stunk of dog wee and featured the thickest flock wallpaper on the planet.

Come to think of it, the flock might just have been mould.

"And this bedroom with admittedly ancient ensuite bathroom facilities. Do you know what I can see here?"

"No. I have no idea."

"I can see you sub-letting this room for up to £75-per-week," he said, hands rubbing his thighs Vic Reeves-style, "Perhaps to a young, female nurse, who'd be able to shower – naked and soapy – in the privacy of her own room, where she'd bring a friend home to entertain, with you just the thickness of a wafer-thin plasterboard wall away as the two innocent young things explore the delights of Sapphic love."

"Now you come to mention it, so do I."

"And now the kitchen," he said, still sweating from this particular bout of red-hot estate agenting, "Do you know what I…"

"Yes. Yes I do. The Battle of Agincourt re-enacted with kittens while Sarah Beeny pole-dances in the background."

"Actually, it's Kirstie Allsopp."

"We'll take it."