The case of the phantom door

I can't believe that three months have gone by since my last post and I am STILL no closer to snaring a property. Because 'snaring' is what it feels like. I feel I am a cowgirl in an urban jungle, racing around whirling my lasso in the hope that I will at last entrap some bricks and mortar.

I have had one or two in my grasp. Two weeks ago, I made a trip to East Finchley and viewed three properties. One was a top floor two-bedder in a purpose-built block far up the high street, almost by the North Circular but not within hearing distance. The flat was in a nice little modern enclave, neatly planted with shrubs and well-kept. The communal garden was an exposed patch of land, like a field. There wasn't a tree or a bench or a shady corner. I couldn't imagine sprawling on the grass with a book while the sun beat down on me - then remembering I had left my phone in my flat on the top floor.

It had electric heating. No radiators to dry one's clothes over. No room for a tumble dryer in the very small kitchen. Only one cupboard, most of which was taken up by a large hot water cylinder. It had a loft for storage, but I couldn't imagine myself scrambling up into it every time I wanted my art equipment, or a coat. For that was another thing. No built-in wardrobes. No room for a coat and shoe cupboard in the narrow hallway. It was just too... minimalist.

Flat number two was an even more modern one in Lancaster Road, even closer to the North Circular. The route to it was down an unkempt street full of litter. The apartment had been rented out and it had an air of impermanence, like a holiday flat. The tiny balcony faced east and held a pot in which one poor, wind-blasted plant was doing its best to survive, bent double like a poor old withered crone with osteoporosis. The view was uninspiring, over a weedy concrete wasteland. You could hear the North Circ traffic. It made me feel utterly depressed and I was glad to climb back into the agent's car and leave it behind.

Property 3 was a ground floor flat in a purpose built block on East End Road. The rooms were all good sizes, apart from yet another poky kitchen, but the room I would have had to work in had traffic flashing past the window. I couldn't have sat there writing book chapters, losing myself in an imaginary word, while the corner of my eye was picking up flashes from wing mirrors and reflections from windscreens and the gawping faces of passengers on the 143 bus.

There was an odd thing about that flat, I call it 'the case of the missing door'. I distinctly remember that there was a door from either the living room or the main bedroom which led directly out onto the communal garden, which was well-tended and leafy. I had imagined myself placing a planter on either side of the door, with a couple of lavender bushes in them to attract passing butterflies. Yet, even though I have studied the floor plan and photos on the agents' website with a forensic eye, I can see no sign of that door.

Did I imagine it? Or did I just hope there was one? Or was my soul trying to tell me I couldn't live anywhere where I couldn't walk out into a garden?

At the back of my mind, a project had been lurking. A pretty amazing but very scruffy house close to where I am living now. Five minutes from the tube, but impossible to park. Not that that would have worried me, as I don't drive, but I do have visitors... and I would have needed builders with white vans! I kept putting off making an offer but this morning, sitting in this room with my paltry electric radiator switched up to max and the temperature struggling to reach 59 degrees F (and it's not even winter yet and last December, I ended up in hospital with pneumonia), I made the decision. I would buy it and live in it without doing any work until the Spring, but be warm and happy, mistress of my own boiler.

I reached for the phone and made the call.

The house had gone.

Where have all the London properties gone?

I scan Rightmove and various other property websites every day, in the hope of finding somewhere I can squeeze myself into. I don't ask for much. Just one bed, a corner to turn into a study, a lounge and some outside space, as I am at home all day and would go mad if I couldn't go out and tweak a few plants, or pluck some of the herbs I always grow.

I don't drive, so I need to be close to transport of some kind, whether it be bus, tube or overground. Surely I can find something for my budget of around £400,000?

In many parts of the country, I could buy a 4-bed house for that sum. In London, I'll be lucky to get a studio flat! Trouble is, I have been looking for so long that prices have gone up and up.

The reason why I have been searching for so long is because there is so little on the market. For months now, long before Brexit, every time I open Rightmove I find myself staring at the same photographs of the same old flats, all of which, for some reason, haven't sold. None of them suit my requirements. They're either too far from transport, too close to a major road, have no outside space or not enough storage. Then, when something suitable does appear, it's gone by the time I ring up, even if the details only appeared on the agent's listing that morning. Or else I am invited to one of those soul-destroying Open House viewings, where it's always raining and everyone is made to take off their shoes and leave them amongst the heap by the door so as not to sully the carpets - which means you can't go out and look at the garden because you're in your socks and it's raining.

Lack of storage in flats is another of my beefs. I have seen many new-builds and new conversions which are obviously aimed at first-time buyers whose belongings consist of three shirts and a cheese-grater, as there are no storage cupboards for anything else, and the rooms are so poky that there is no space to build any, either. No wonder so many interior shots are cluttered with guitars, clothing rails, sports and gym equipment and heaps of... well, things.

Get real, developers. People have lives, they have interests, they have computers and clothes, books, musical instruments, cricket bats and balance balls. They have kitchen equipment, too. I have seen kitchens - usually the ones integrated with the living room - where just a juicer and a mixer would take up the whole of the worktop area. We ladies have shoes! And I would need a cupboard just for my coats and jackets, let alone the rest of my clothing.

But back to my main topic: where have all the properties gone? Why, over the last three or so years, have so few people been selling? I can only think it's because, when they move, they decide to hang onto their previous flat and rent it out. Indeed, when I go onto the Rentals section of Rightmove, I can find plenty of places that would be perfect for me if I didn't mind spending £1600 per month - which, I can tell you, is a lot more than my pensions and monthly income combined.

This brings me to a sad conclusion, which is that the only way I shall be able to move to my ideal area, or even the fringes of it, is to buy something - anything - elsewhere, rent it out, then use the income to rent the property of my dreams. I might just about break even, or even have to fork out £200 a month or so extra, but what price happiness? Right now, Rightmove, it looks like my only way forward.

Missed out again! Why I don't trust estate agents.

Last Saturday, I was booked in to view a first floor flat in East Finchley. However, the agent informed me by email that he would shortly be getting the keys to another one round the corner, which had a garden, so I told him that, as I live 25 miles away and it takes me two hours to get there by public transport, he should let me know as soon as he got the keys and I could then view both on the same day.

"I'll make sure you're first through the door," he promised.

It is now Thursday and I hadn't heard from him, so I emailed ten minutes ago, only to be told, "The vendor has changed his mind about selling and is going to rent it out instead."

So much for being first through the door! With steam puffing out of my ears, I zapped an email straight back asking if I could still come and see the original flat, only to be told that unless I could get there tomorrow, it would be too late as he had had lots of viewings since Saturday and people had said they were going to put in offers by the end of the week.

I am at a funeral tomorrow so I can't go. I have missed out again and all because of being misled by a damned estate agent. I am furious. How does anyone ever get to see a property, let alone buy one, in the present cut-throat market? Is there any agent anywhere in London prepared to help this desperate damsel who couldn't even vote in the referendum as she was of no fixed abode?

I truly am The Desperate Housebuyer.

The loo that turned into a kitchen

Property No, 9

The aftershocks of the terrorist atrocities of 2001 affected the global economy in many ways, property being one small element. I spotted a private ad for a Victorian cottage on the outskirts of Highgate. The owner had just lost her buyer, who had pulled out due to worries about tumbling property prices following 9/11 and was desperate not to lose the cheaper property she wanted to buy. If her sale did not go through, her mortgage company would foreclose on her, so I came along at the right time.

She needed a cash buyer who could do the whole deal in two weeks. It was sheer bad luck that I was about to depart for a two-week holiday in Turkey. As I attempted to relax on my sun lounger by the pool in Ovacik, my mobile phone beeped incessantly, with ever more hysterical calls from my vendor who appeared to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

After three days of constant beeps and jangles, I and my mobile were banished from the poolside by the hotel owner, who had receives numerous complaints from other guests, moaning that they couldn't relax and that I was spoiling their holiday. Fair enough, I thought, as I moped wanly in my small room with its white curtains that let in every bit of daylight, and the tree outside that was a haunt of chattering sparrows by day and monotonously hooting Scops owls by night. My holiday was being spoiled, too.

None of the solicitors I had approached were willing to get the deal done in a mere two weeks, so once more my BF came to the rescue. He knew a young solicitor who he had helped train (the BF is a retired lawyer, amongst many other things) and I think he must have stood over him with a stick, beating him if he so much as dared stop to blow his nose.

One odd thing came to light in the searches, which was that, although the cottages in this particular street had all been taken over years ago by the local council, they had originally been built by the church and each one had a statute attached which permitted the church, at any time, to raise a tithe towards church repairs. None of the householders had ever been asked to stump up, but the solicitor warned me that it could happen. However, I was willing to take the chance.

By the time I returned from Turkey, sans suntan due to having spent so many days in my room and with a giant phone bill running into several hundreds, the house was mine, my BF having signed the paperwork on my behalf. I say 'house': it was more like a hobbit home. It wasn't even two up, two down; it was two up, one down!

Originally, it had been a 3-bed house with an outside toilet and I assume bathing was done in a tin bath in front of the fire in the small living room. Through the lounge, there was a very small kitchen, the size of a large cupboard and the garden had a view of tall trees beyond which were allotments. The outside loo still existed, only some idiot had poured concrete down it so it was no longer usable.

It was a real writer's nest and I was in heaven for about an hour after I moved in. Then it started. Bang, bang, bang, for seven solid hours, as a gang of unruly boys booted a football against the wooden doors of a garage right opposite my house. I was shaking. My heart was racing. I couldn't believe that I had made yet another property mistake. How could one tranquillity-loving person have such relentless bad luck? I knew I would never be able to write a word in that house, yet I worked as a freelance writer. How on earth would I manage? I went to the pub with a friend, to drown my sorrows.

In the two years that I owned it, I did a lot to that house. I borrowed cash from a family member to build a conservatory and the BF built a terrace with steps down to the sloping, rather soggy garden. The long-suffering BF also removed the outside loo and somehow incorporated the space into the tiny kitchen, so that I had an alcove in which to place a small table and two chairs. It made a tremendous difference. I also had tons of gravel delivered, and gravelled over the ragged clumps of grass, put down some paving slabs and bought a nice stone bird bath. I hung those Moroccan lanterns in the trees and suddenly, the garden had a touch of magic.

The noise situation gradually improved, too, as I learned to adapt. I had several quiet hours during the day while the kids were at school. It was weekends and school holidays that were the worst. I spoke to the people next door and they had gone through exactly the same reaction as me, the day they had moved in and discovered the football gang. Then one day, I shall never know why, the boys vanished. Either they had found somewhere better to kick their ball, or they had given up football altogether. But peace descended!

External peace, anyway. Internally, all hell had broken loose as a routine eye test had revealed that I had the start of macular degeneration. I looked it up and found I was eventually going to go blind. This coincided with the cancellation of my only regular freelance contract. Then, to cap it all, the person who had lent me the money for the conservatory suddenly needed it back. I couldn't add another £10k to my mortgage as I had just lost my major client. There was only one thing I could do - sell up.

Estate agents that have driven me mad, Part 1.

Once again, I am going to interrupt the property history side of this blog by telling you of the latest encounters I have had with estate agents. Yes, I am sure there are some good ones out there. I could name one, from a large, rather pushy agency beginning with F, who hasn't yet given up on me and every week I hear his cheery voice on the phone, telling me of a 'great property' I should view instantly. It usually turns out to be too far from transport, or lacking storage or a balcony, but at least he's trying.

Not like some others I could mention.

On May 10th, I had an email from the agent about a bargain property in Finchley that had been reduced by a whacking £60k for a quick sale, bringing it into my price range - just. I emailed back, suggesting dates and times that I could view and heard nothing. On May 18th, I finally made contact. Apparently my email had gone into his Spam folder. Strange, considering we had emailed each other before.

I whacked an email straight back, suggesting times to view on the 20th May. On the 19th, I emailed again with a few important queries. My friend had kindly checked out the exterior and reported back that it was very scruffy and in need of exterior repair and redecoration so I asked the agent if there was a sinking fund for repairs and if there was anything planned, which was a fair enough question as the buyer could have got stuck with a large bill. He never got back to me. I can only assume someone else snapped it up - an investor perhaps, who didn't bug him with awkward questions - and he couldn't be bothered to reply.

Then I found a cottage on Rightmove and rang the agent last week to ask for a viewing. I was told that the owner was away and he was waiting for keys and would ring me on Monday. It's now Wednesday, Aaargh!

Meanwhile, on the 19th May, another agent rang about a 2-bed flat that was about to come on the market in my ideal area and he had no details or photos yet but it was perfect for me. However, it was £20k over my price limit. He said he was organising a block viewing (I loathe them!) and would let me know when. Later that day, Ping!, a viewing appointment landed in my In-box for 10.30 am this Friday. As I live 25 miles away and don't drive, it would take me 2 hours to get there, and in the rush hour, too. I replied, saying I'd try to fix up a bed for a night with a friend in north London.

Friend couldn't oblige as she had someone else staying that night, so this morning I emailed the agent - to be told, and I quote verbatim: 'No worries the vendor has found a buyer the property has been put on hold I will let you know if something else comes up.'

Aaargh again! I was fuming. He hadn't told me, so I could have stayed on my friend's hideously uncomfortable sofa bed, gone to the viewing and found nobody there! I suppose I should give him the benefit of the doubt and concede that perhaps he would have emailed to tell me, but I have a feeling that he would have forgotten. In fact, his words, 'the vendor has found a buyer' makes me think that perhaps this was a private deal and the agent was deprived of his commission and had developed selective amnesia about that flat.

I do have something momentarily 'in the bag' if I wanted it. It's not in the area I want, it's in the area I live now, that is boring as hell and has nothing remotely going for it, but it's a private sale through an online agency, Purple Bricks, and the owner led me to believe that she was willing to drop the price for a quick sale. But - several 'buts' coming up now - the master bedroom was in the converted loft and had no ensuite, which would mean me trekking down the stairs and along the corridor in the middle of the night (if I had an attack of Delhi belly, I'd never make it), there were no wardrobes - she had all her clothes on portable rails of the kind you see at car boots, the lounge was very cramped as she'd had to nip 5 ft off it to create a hallway and staircase leading to the loft conversion, and the garden can only be accessed by going out of the front door and unlocking the side gate, then creeping through the downstairs flat's garden.

But at least it's a sale that doesn't involve bloody agents, so I am seriously considering going in with a bid. Yet... I do long to get back to my old patch and be able to nip onto buses to see friends and go into town, instead of making my present journey which involves a half hour journey to the tube, an hour into Kings Cross, then another half hour to wherever I'm going.

Will this three year long search ever end?

One fire door too many

I'm interrupting my property history with news of my latest excursion to view. It was yesterday, Saturday 30th April and the Northern Line was only going as far as Archway and I needed the far end of East Finchley high street just before it joins the North Circular.

I had sore feet, as I am on cat-sitting duty in Camden for a week and have brought the wrong shoes. I walked to the nearest bus stop, caught the 46 bus to Kentish Town, then the 134 to Archway. The traffic was terrible. My appointment with the agent was at 3.30 pm and it was 3.10 by the time I reached Archway. I had 10 minutes to wait for the 263, but it steamed along and obviously got ahead of schedule because, just before it reached E. Finchley station, it stopped. For ages. I rang the agents and said I might be a little late and was told the agent I was meeting would be there till 3.45.

I was fuming and fretting and also needed the loo. Eventually, the bus chugged off again, though I was losing the will to live. It was 3.35.I had left my friend's house at 2.15. At 3.44 I leapt off the bus, raced across the road, read the sign to flats 35-46 and found myself trekking up a wide metal external staircase. I counted the numbers on the doors: 35, 36, 37, 38, 41. Where was flat number 40, the one I supposed to be viewing?

I clanged back down the metal staircase. A woman was getting into a car so I hailed her and she told me she thought it was up the stairs and through the fire door. So back I clanged, found a small turning with a fire door, pushed with all my might and it didn't budge.

Gathering my strength, I hurled myself at it and it gave a little and I squeezed through. There was only one way to go - through another heavy fire door. This time I leaned all my weight on it - I'm 5'4", 71 years old and weight 9 and half stone! I should not be heaving heavy fire doors open, I thought as I climbed yet another staircase - a stone one this time.

At last, I found number 40 and rang the bell. The agent, resplendent in shiny grey suit and gelled hair, was showing a couple round. I was left to my own devices. The flat was big enough. It had plenty of cupboards. One window had a nice view over greenery. The others looked over the grim rear of the tallest part of this local authority block.

They say you know whether you want to buy a place or not within the first 15 seconds. I had made my decision after the metal stairs and first fire door. No way!

The young agent told me he was hoping to buy his first property and was praying for a price crash. Him and me both!

Hills and Hoodies

Property No. 8

After my other homes in North London, Muswell Hill seemed quite a way out, especially as it wasn't on the tube. But I soon learned a short-cut through Cranley Gardens of multi-murderer Dennis Nilsen fame, (last year, I saw a lovely looking flat on the market, rang the agent and lo and behold, it was Nilsen's old flat. No way!), which got me to the station in about fifteen minutes with a few creepy shudders along the way.

It was an end-of-terrace three-bedroomed ex-council house with the most spectacular garden, with a pergola that ran up the side of the house and was draped with clematis and jasmine in summer. It also had a raised pond with a brick surround where you could sit with a glass of wine, watching the... well, watching nothing, actually, as there were no fish in it and it didn't cross my mind to buy any, so it was just water and duckweed. 

My long-suffering boyfriend laid a laminate floor  in the living room for me. I bought a comfy, squishy orange sofa and armchair as I had donated my previous sofa to my god-daughter. I made my own curtains and bedspread and transformed the smallest bedroom into a study.

Within weeks, it all started to go wrong. The house faced onto a small green with a huge holm oak on it, right in front of my front door, to the right of which was an alley leading to the next street. I soon realised that after dark, that tree was a meeting place for the local hoody brigade and I witnessed spliff-smoking and various drug deals going down. It got so that I was scared to come home and would literally race to my door, heart hammering as I yammered ostentatiously into my mobile phone, hoping that it would put off would-be muggers.

There was also a lot of noise from the house adjoining mine, which housed a tenant who looked after a mentally ill relative who did a lot of shouting. The nail in the coffin was the wretched steep hill itself, up which I had to climb in order to reach the shops. It went on and on and on. It felt as if I was toiling up Everest without crampons. It did my ankle in. A ligament got stretched and I wore an elastic bandage for months - and God, I was too bloody YOUNG for an elastic ankle bandage! It didn't suit my hip image one little bit. After all, I was only 50!

After a year, I realised I simply had to move again, but not before I was filmed there as part of a Channel 4 (I think) TV series called Home Stories, about serial house movers like myself. 

I wasn't sad to bid that house farewell. I should have listened to my dear, sensible friend who, when she drove me there while the purchase was going through. so I could show her where I was moving to, said, "My God, that's a hell of a hill. Are you sure you're not making an awful mistake?" 

She couldn't say that about my next purchase. Not only was it in a non-hilly street, it was in a part of London that was to capture my heart - a place I yearn to return to, though the lottery win is taking a long time coming: Highgate.