[Ben Reeve Lewis has got a dog …]
Puppy hell continues.
I was bagging up Hector’s crap at 5am this morning with the mother of all hangovers and once I got the Faecal offender into the bag he whipped in, grabbed the bag in his mouth and did that mental head shake thing that puppies do and scattered the contents all over the garden and me.
I probably cant write the expletives I used here without Google shutting Tessa down.
Life with a puppy!!
I cant wait until he goes thorugh gun-dog boot camp and I get my life back and have people comment “He’s very well behaved isn’t he?”.
Oh No!
Newsround this week begins with a ‘NOOOOOOOOOOOO’
Renter Girl is leaving the blogging market. First Planet Property Blog and now this
Her blog has never pulled any punches. We didn’t always see eye to eye on all things landlord but even when she has been at her most outrageous I could never hide a wry, knowing smile at her vitriol.
She has been the uncensored voice that I carefully hide behind a measured reasonableness but with whom I heartily agree so much of the time.
But she is a journalist and photographer with better things to do than feel angry all the time.
If you are a landlord in Edinburgh, seek her out, invite her to lunch and she will stab you ha-ha
Renter Girl is dead….Long Live Penny Anderson. Go Girl.
Aspersions against Mr D
Random Landlord Law Blogger Samir Jeraz sent me an in interesting link this week about Hackney councillor Michael Desmond and his letting agency ‘On the House’
Turns out that our Mr D has been running a homelessness charity, routing people through the homelessness system to be re-housed by a letting agency, conveniently run by guess who????? Mr Desmond!!! Do try and keep up at the back there.
Of course denials and recriminations run the game now and far be it from me to cast aspersions on this innocent saint of Broadway Market, who clearly only had the disadvantaged in mind when he set this system up.
Why do they do it?
Dodgy dealings further in mind I sat down this week on a sunny day in the garden of yet another large cannabis farm, as you do, feet up on the garden furniture chewing the fat with the attendant cops and my mate Dave who disconnects the things and we were bemoaning the morals of the criminal shit-bags we have to deal with on a daily basis.
So much money can be made from the lettings business legitimately, why do so many milk it?
Between the 8 of us sunning ourselves within whiffing distance of the stinky weed we decided that it was one of two things:
- Some people just like being bullies
- Greed.
Having solved the riddle of the criminal landlord mind I staggered back to the car, as usual intoxicated by the smell, unsure whether to have a lie down or buy a Mars Bar.
The mystical appeal of Foxtons
My continuing puzzlement with the mystical appeal of Foxtons continued this week with the news that they have received a huge accolade from Credit Suisse and rated with ‘Outperform Status’ after their share prices increased 30%
The article in Investor today reports:
“Credit Suisse has added the stock to its small and mid priced focus list for investors and has predicted that over a 10 year period Foxtons may well triple the geographical area its offices currently cover”
How scary is that???????????
A branch of Foxtons on every street corner with their strange ‘Is it a Vodka bar, is it an estate agent’ appearance and those muddy green cars with skeletons on the side.
From a client perspective the fees are huge and they have comparatively recently been done for ripping off landlords with excessive renewal fees.
Questions from would be Foxtons employees
In an attempt to understand their lure I went onto a website containing the top questions asked by would-be estate agents Number one is:
“Will I get a Foxton’s mini?”
Why would you want one? Is my immediate retort. Everyone will know that you work ridiculously long hours and are permanently on the verge of being sacked for failing to deliver on your targets and therefore a nervous wreck.
A couple of other regular questions intrigued me:
“Do I need to know London as well as a cabbie”
I could see why knowing a bit of London would be handy but I fail to see why having a cab driver in your circle of friends as well should be an employment qualification.
And my particular favourite:
“What if I don’t want to be an estate agent?”
The obvious answer “Don’t apply for a job at an estate agents then”.
Paramedics being priced out
On a less amusing note I read a piece on the BBC News website that the number of paramedics leaving the profession in London has trebled in the last three years.
The reason being the lack of affordable housing, according to the report “Making a case for London”.
Presumably these people aren’t giving up the job, it seems exciting and important but are probably relocating to Herefordshire or Somerset, where the chances of being stabbed by a witless drunk whilst trying to save his life are greatly reduced.
The article states that even with new paramedics training they will still be well short of the numbers they need.
So presumably, if you have a heart attack in Herts, a dozen ambulances will turn up to help but if you are struck with Palsy in Peckham you will be loaded onto a hand-cart pushed by a Romanian working for £5 an hour cash in hand.
“The real issue for us here is the high cost of living and working in London. Not only for us but all public sector workers.”
Said London Ambulance service Director Jason Killens. An unfortunate surname given his job.
A minister calls
And finally 24 Dash told us of the visit by Housing Prefect Kris Hopkins to a new estate built in Batley.
In order to make it seem as if the government is getting Britain building again he dropped in for tea with luckless mum of five Johanna Hemingway who commented:
“When I moved in I didn’t expect a government minister to be calling round for a cup of tea.“
I’ll bet you didn’t you poor thing. Remember, as a tenant you enjoy exclusive occupation of the property and can exclude anyone you want.
You shouldn’t have let him in, it only encourages them. If there is publicity to be had they are like moths to a flame or flies around a piece of…..well you get the picture.
Although gushing with praise for Hoppo, the sixth Marx Brother, she revealed in a simple comment the quandary facing all private tenants when seen in relief against their social tenant brethren:
“We needed to move because our previous landlord was selling up – It’s brilliant to have the security of knowing we can stay here as long as we want.”
Ah…..from the mouths of Batley babes.
See ya next week.
Oh I love landlords! Honest! But thanks Ben. I hope be saying my things elsewhere… And I’m an artist not a photographer ie I can’t take photos to save my life! And I don’t live in Edinburgh. But I am vitriolic at times. Bad renting makes me angry. It always will.
Thanks for all your comments and support!
And the great thing about Rentergirl – besides the blog, obviously – was that she wd leave all comments up and warn anyone about taking any similar comments down, if they did it again. (in fact, she gave them many chances). It’s called transparency Tessa. You should try it.
(wonder if this will get through).
Rentergirl did bar (according to her) some people.
I don’t know if you have ever run a popular blog but you get huge amounts of spam, marketing pitches and comments which are so offensive that it would upset everyone if you allowed them to go online.
I have a comments policy here http://www.landlordlawblog.co.uk/comments-policy/
If I think a comment is offensive or is going to upset anyone (including me) it gets deleted (although I have allowed a few of yours through which I should have probably zapped).
I suspect your idea of what is offensive and mine are vastly different. However it is my blog.
Just Saying, I want to say that I am posting this independently of Tessa, who didnt prompt my response.
I only now write for her blog. I dont get paid and I made friends with her and began writing for Landlord Law Blog because she is a decent soul who is just as concerned with criminal landlord behaviour as I am as an enforcement officer for rogue landlords.
Some landlord website turn me right off. they are completely tenant hating concerns.
I’m not only a rogue landlord enforcement officer but also a private tenant myself, so I have a double axe to grind in many senses.
The Generation rent Manifesto is a breakthrough in so many ways. Read my piece on this blog from Wednesday, and what makes it radical is that it makes an attempt to get at a balanced system.
In my article I commented on criminal landlords, who I have honestly seen stab and beat their tenants and also worked with tenants have deliberately driven landlords into bankruptcy through various acts of fraud.
I started in this business on the 2nd of February 1990 so I have genuinely pretty much seen it all, got the T shirt etc and although I can be angry that my rent constitutes 70% of my take home pay I dont hold the view that landlords are by sheer definition corrupt or evil.
This whole renting malarkey is a far more complex animal to unravel.
I have absolutely no time for landlords who petulantly threaten to leave the rental market “Ok go on then”, and I am angered by landlords who glibly pronounce that they will pass any costs of licensing onto their tenants.
But similarly I have no time for the viewpoint that says that landlords are corrupt by definition.
It’s a juvenile perspective and one that the Generation rent Manifesto goes some way to expel.
My Wednesday article was criticised by Jamie for promoting an extremist view and my response was to point out that it isnt extremist to ask for for a fairer renting system.
Tessa and her husband Graeme work hard and long for a fairer rental system, without any backhanders.
Although Tessa earns her living as a landlord law lawyer she has as little time for the criminals as I do and also is working hard through her participation in government think tanks and letting agent redress schemes to do her bit to bring that fairness and education to fruition.
If we are to move towards a fairer system we have to drop puerile arguments by disgruntled tenants and blackmailing demands by clueless landlords.
There is a real chance of change at the moment. Stop knocking people, who if you knew them personally you would realise were more on your side than you think, and that includes many landlords who post here.
Oh Ben, the loyalty is sweet, but the length of your last comment does seem vastly over the top.
(tho it still got through :)
You are right: the internet can be very deceiving. You sound rather like a parent talking to a child. But I know you don’t mean to!
Hey there Anon aka Just Saying!
You’re ‘mate’ rentergirl here!
I took comments down whenever I felt like it. If the comments were abusive, discriminatory or just got on my nerves. The thing with free speech: yep I’m all for it. But I don’t have to provide a platform for idiocy/abuse/iritating landlord trolls. So I didn’t.
With all my sincerest bestest wishes.
@Rentergirl That is so true. I have nothing against free speech, but if people want to say things I think are offensive, they can say them on their own blogs (and see how much traffic they get).
AND by the way, I have zapped landlords offensive comments as well as tenants offensive comments. Despite what you may think @justsaying I am not a tenant hating maniac and try to provide something for both landlords AND tenants here.
But this blog is not a ‘platform’ for either. Its mostly a place where people in distress can find some help and guidance.
Nice Guardian piece Penny http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/jul/08/renting-home-every-tenant-should-know-uk-private-rental-sector
A perfect Swan-song for Renter Girl, no punch pulled and certainly an accurate description of the shadow world of renting that I have to work in.
For the record Rentergirl, I’m a tenant – not a landlord. And i’ve never posted as Anon. Best of luck with new ventures. I do have a blog, don’t worry.
I thoroughly enjoyed the Rentergirl blog, entertaining and revealing with no pretence of a balanced view.
The moderation of inconvenient facts was particularly enlightening and amusing.
Thanks Ben! And keep up the good work.
Just putting this out there: a fact is something that is true. I will still be active and vigilant when it comes to renting, mind. But my world will be less cluttered.
*exits stage left singing My Way*