Something Personal
Sun, 11 November, 2007 – 3:17 pm
I missed last week's post as I didn't really have a great deal to say! This week things have gone up and down like a rollercoaster! We'd been holding out for the opportunity of renting this house, well priced, well located etc. The owner's manager had told us last week to call on Monday to arrange a viewing. We'd been discussing this house with them for well over a month, trying to get a viewing for the past few weeks. So Monday came and Dave gave the guy a call and was simply told 'oh that house has gone now'. I'm sure you can imagine how unhappy it made me. We'd spent so much time waiting on these people to just be told that the house had gone after we had done everything we'd been told to do! I don't understand why people can be like that to others.
After this low I spent the afternoon on the estate agent sites again, as our other contact hadn't bothered to phone us either, and figured that we'd just have to deal with losing £200-300 in fees. I found a couple of houses and Tuesday morning called up about viewing them. We saw a house on Tuesday afternoon, a 3 bedroom place, with a driveway, in a quiet area about 20 minutes north from here. Whilst it's not 100% perfect, we worked out how we could sort the furniture out and that it would be okay for a while. So we put in an application for it (Non refundable £220 fee) and we're just waiting to hear back about whether we've been successful or not. I have to say, I've never had this much hassle trying to rent somewhere before! It was easier than this in London! Not to mention fee free.
Monday also saw the release of my second plugin which I'd needed for client sites. It's not provoked as much interest as my first, however the comments I have seen have been good, often including 'why isn't this functionality already in WordPress?' Which is a good question, but with WP being a blogging platform, pages are not meant to take priority so I can understand it 
On Thursday my parents turned up (12 hours early!) after a few days in West Wales. They'd been planning to stay in Bangor on the Thursday evening but with the bad weather, no train to take them up mount Snowdon, and lack of much else to do, they arrived up here in the late afternoon. This was a nice surprise, especially as I'd been alone all day as Dave was in Yorkshire at a funeral. On the Friday we showed them the house we're hoping to move into and then popped over to the beach to grab the best fish and chips around for lunch. Afterwards they headed home and left us catching up with work for the afternoon.
This weekend has been a fairly lazy one. Dave's been ill with potentially fatal man flu (that'd be a cold to us girls 
) and besides going out for more Lemsips, I've just been catching up on a bit of work while trying to take it easy a little. I've got a day trip to Cardiff tomorrow for work, so I have about 7 hours on a train to put up with. Thrilling!
Renting and sorting it all out is so stupidly expensive and tedious its easy to forget your the customer!
Only one agent got back to us and we had to push them, to be fair, they got us sorted and we moved in within 2 weeks to our new place.
Jade wants to move again back to Kidderminster, but I dont think I can be bothered with all the hassle just 6 months after doing it all.
Wish Dave well for me, man flu is deadly, and I hope you are looking after him well.
Tis a womans place after all!
By Matt on Mon, 12 November, 2007
Sorry to hear you were messed about and didn't get the house you were after. Karl and I will be looking for somewhere bigger in the new year and I'm dreading having to go through that fuss all over again. I'll spare you a second rant about estate agents!
I'm thinking of doing an entry on WP plugins and I'll probably find time to give your new one a mention as its relevant to the topic.
By Jem on Mon, 12 November, 2007
Your site earlier used to be
http://www.stuffbysarah.net/ais (after ais.sarahfreelance.co.uk) and now it's /blog… isn't it affecting traffic?
By Jalaj on Tue, 13 November, 2007
Hi Guys, sorry I was away all yesterday in Cardiff.
@Matt – I've never known renting to be this hard. The moving is the easy bit, but sorting out somewhere to live has become so much harder.
@Jem – I don't envy you! As for being messed around, it just goes to show how ignorant people are. Oh and any mention on my plugins would be very much appreciated
@Jalaj – It still is. I've always had 2 blogs on this domain and the front page (for about 18 months) has displayed posts from both sites. In fact you've commented on both blogs
By Sarah on Tue, 13 November, 2007
Those estate agents just make a killing on fees don't they? Sorry to hear about the house and hopefully the next one pans out. What a PITA.
By ses5909 on Tue, 13 November, 2007
It is a bit of daylight robbery considering the credit report is free (as I've done it myself!)
However, the good news is we got the house so the fee hasn't been wasted!
By Sarah on Tue, 13 November, 2007
There is more to renting than meets the eye and it is shocking how different you are treated, when looking to rent rather than buy (from my experience).
We were going to rent after one purchase fell through but when it came to the costs of references/administration/etc, we decided to find another place to buy (quick!) and not have to repay survey/mortgage fee's and the like.
Our solicitors were useless and took some pushing, mind. Can't complain to much though, a fairly nice cheque turned up from them the other day; not entirely sure what it is for (got a rough idea from costs I queried) but am not going to question!
Good luck with it all, hope you get settled soon.
By Granty on Tue, 13 November, 2007
I can well believe the difference. Afterall, renters won't make the agents as much money. At least we've got sorted now and these agents seem pretty nice. Get the keys on Monday
By Sarah on Tue, 13 November, 2007
Woohoo,
I'm real happy for you guys as you are the person who deserves it most Sarah.
I had to laugh about your man flu description. It is funny how guys becomes wusses when they have a little something wrong.
By Monika @ The Writers Manifesto on Thu, 15 November, 2007
Thanks Monika
Yes men really have to make out their simple cold is life threatening. I guess it allows them to justify staying in bed and feeling sorry for themselves 
By Sarah on Thu, 15 November, 2007