Penthouse Superiority in my Newbuild Complex

Georgie from 603 is obviously quite posh, but not very bright. I’ve never met her; never seen her, but recently she yelled out her flat number and complete name loftily from above at four am, while guiding party guests. Silly Georgie.

Her luxury penthouse palace exists in a vertiginous otherworld, like Shangri-La, with exclusive access to a private lift. Our paths seldom cross, but even chance encounters make it absolutely clear that they regard themselves as being of a ‘better sort’ than the rental property scum who inhabit a lower level, both metaphorically and in real life.

Middle flats in Dovecot Towers are bog standard newbuilds. We are stuck halfway, sharing a lift with the rest of the building. The other day someone deposited crap (no actual crap) in ‘our’ elevator. Now I resent that private lift even more.

The entire ground floor is owned by one landlord. It’s let short term to the desperate, owing to the danger of having scallies leaping over the balcony, straight into your lounge/diner/kitchen. They are cheaper, fitted routinely with a burglar alarm, and you wouldn’t catch me in one.

My ‘betters’ make a lot of noise. To paraphrase that wonderfully named Swedish band, they are suburban kids with biblical and Victorian names. Flats are twice the size of mine, and often given as birthday presents. One upper floor dweller keeps a teensy dog in her handbag (hence the mess in ‘our’ lift.)

Georgie was hosting a little soiree for Rachel, Charlotte, and the boys, with jelly, cake, lashings of lovely weed and screaming. They all sang Happy Birthday really loud; gawd, they were – like – reeeeeally wasted, you know? Georgie was responsible for the 48 hour party from hell a few months ago (rentergirl passim) and had been warned quite severely to shut up or else.

But, here we go again, fourth Sunday morning in a row. As usual, her poor, simple guests had lost their way. She observed their epic trek from her eyrie, and like a beacon, or a booming, braying satnav, coaxed them over hill and dale towards Dovecot Towers by screeching: ‘TAKE THE NEXT RIGHT!!!’

Patiently, I waited for the lost partygoers to appear. When they came into view, I requested forcefully that they told Georgie from 603 to please be quiet, as we could all hear everything she said (although apparently she can’t hear us remonstrating from below).

The insults flew: I was told to shut up, and mind my own business. One classy lady invited me down for a punch up; pointing out that she had the weight advantage, I declined. Then I was told I was full of shit for not fighting, and ‘....what did I expect living so close to town?’ (Actually, I don’t, but aaaanyway…) Festivities concluded at 8am. My neighbour starts work at nine.

Georgie from 603 and her chums clearly believe they own the place; that they rule Dovecot Towers by divine right. Our flats might be less luxurious, might not have a private lift, might not have been a graduation present. But when Georgie, way up in the clouds in 603, is excluded from the entire area by an ASBO, she’ll fall to earth with a mighty bump.

Evidence Of Actual People

A growing pile of half empty takeaway boxes appeared close to Dovecot Towers, stacked up and hidden in an alley. It was a forlorn and lonely sight.

Later, I spotted a man - somewhat on the large side of chubby – greedily, and guiltily devouring burgers. I suppose his home has been declared a health food zone. If he shares a typically tiny, one bed flat, then a dirty alley is a haven for that hurried junk food fix.

Such close encounters are unusual. I rarely see living people around here, just the fallout of human occupation, like rubbish, abandoned post, and scraps of food dumped hastily outside. Considering that our rubbish is regularly sifted by thieves eager to pilfer documents for use in ID theft, residents are cavalier about how they discard evidence. Bank statements, personal letters, even prescriptions, are all strewn laxly around. Some are harmless, whereas other papers could be misused.

They could be ghosts for all I know, because I never see them. The people who leave these traces are ephemeral, and mysterious; fleeting wraiths glimpsed from the corner of my eye. I know they must exist because they leave a trail.

I often hear doors slamming before I edge down the corridor. Everyone seems keen to avoid their neighbours. People open their front door, check the coast is clear, and hurry off down the way, keeping well away from other tenants. It’s a sad, strange and isolated existence.

Even so, there are clues. Empty packing boxes abandoned in the rubbish room reveal so much about the mysterious inhabitants: decoded cardboard cartons allude to shopping, hobbies and who’s moving in. I often find myself wondering: who owns all the posh furniture from Heals (classy for Dovecot Towers) and who eats an oversize, overstuffed pizza every single day.

Someone regularly replaces an enormous mirror. Even with the expense, there’s the terrible misfortune. Most furniture is cheap, either because landlords are cheapskates, or tenants will be moving on. The same items break with predictable regularity: coffee tables, computer desks and shoddy fold-up dining chairs which probably fall to pieces at moments of exquisite comedy potential.

Using packing box divination, I have discovered that someone in Dovecot Towers recently bought a trampoline. Just how they will use it, when flats are so small that even energetic gesticulating can put you in the spinal unit, is a mystery to me. Wary that I am being similarly evaluated, I wrap all my rubbish and shred everything, which is hugely therapeutic.

When post is stolen, I wonder if the thief is reading up on me, forming a picture of my life. I wonder if I should ask my friends to send consoling advice about invented tragedy; maybe thieves will pity me, and leave well alone. Or should I plant fake letters from terrified ‘victims’, begging me to stop picking off and murdering their family, encouraging fear, and respect? Thieves have given up with bank statements (useless for ID theft, so I’m advised) but as for everything else – what will the sifters make of me?

Blame It On The Buy To Let Tenants

Mea culpa. It’s all down to me, and those of us unfortunate enough to rent newbuild buy to let flats. It’s true: everything is our fault (well not mine specifically, but you take my point.)

The brothel on the floor below was run by but to let tenants. How they managed such a scheme from a tiny, one bedroom newbuild flat with plaster membranes instead of brick walls is beyond me. It must have led to a hurried service. Our benighted caretaker pointed out that some of the ‘girls’ were entertaining clients on the stairwell and also - when demand was high - in the recess on the landing. How resourceful.

And the graffiti? Guess who. The scoundrel who uses a stolen credit card to order takeaway food from someone else’s address? Yeah, you’ve guessed it. Who dumps rubbish, vandalises our management company’s feeble attempt at landscaping, blasts out horrible techno, while screeching abuse at visitors from their balcony? The git breaking the main door every morning by pulling it open (and no, that shouldn’t be possible)? Stealing post? Why, that’ll be the buy to let tenants.

Neophyte, ‘hobby’ landlords must accept some of the blame. Frequently laissez faire with the pre tenancy screening, they are apparently unruffled by the destructive effect of noisy, aggressive occupants on neighbours, and indeed - their own flat.

Of course, most wicked deeds are perpetrated by an energetically active minority of tenants who laugh in the face of outrage and complaints, caring not one iota what their landlord thinks. Then again, dedicated villains can forge a reference afterwards, so conclusive vetting is virtually impossible. And what is to be done when the accused is renting from his loving parents, blindly incapable of accepting that their darling child is creating havoc.

Around eighty per cent of flats in Dovecot Towers were snapped up unseen by Chinese property speculators. Being as they’re mostly based in Hong Kong, it’s little wonder they take no interest in the distress of neighbours they will never meet. They’ve invested long term in the bare bricks and mortar, and might be admirably less twitchy about smaller concerns like painting, but are unlikely to rush over on a jet plane if their errant lessees play music a little too loud.

The proximity of new developments to the city centre, and the accompanying clubs and bars, causes major problems. It doesn’t take a genius to work out that cheap flats next to the red light area might be commandeered for use as brothels and make-do ‘pharmacies’, although housing associations, councils and landlords feigned surprise when this happened. Such flats became highly desirable locations for criminal gangs to sell drugs or live close to the office, so the dodgy bloke next door really was the gun toting, crack dealing, pimp your mother warned you about.

There is no central control. Perhaps buy to let landlords should be obliged to notify management agents when they rent out the property. Perhaps tenants should form residents associations, encouraging a sense of community to fight against the temporary ‘just passing through - whatevah’ mentality that blights my home. Perhaps kitchen taps should dispense chilled champagne on demand.

To The People I Barely Knew - Adieu!

Dovecot Towers is in a state of flux. It’s moving time, both in and out (allowing for a certain amount of shaking it all about.)

People come, and they go. On the carousel that is Rentergirl’s nomadic life, it can take ages to reach even basic nodding terms with neighbours. But don’t set any store by those halfhearted greetings; next thing you know, there are packing boxes stacked up outside your new friends flat, and surly removal men in the lift.

I will sort of miss 4pm Cigarette Girl. Living in a nearby flat, she habitually enjoyed very loud sex in the afternoon, then - giggling in her dressing gown - would hammer frantically on neighbours’ doors to beg for that post coital fag.

Snotty Boys I will not miss. They were thin, and stylish. Whenever I met them by the lift, my cheery ‘Good Morning!’ was greeted with a reluctant, terse, grunt, implying they’d require rubber gloves, a face mask, and a translator-cum-minder to converse with me. Same for the woman who actually turned her face to ignore me, but later knocked on my door in urgent need of toilet roll, whose exit I will not mourn.

Dressing Gown Weed Man was mostly harmless. He’d stand, dazed and stoned on his first floor ‘terrace’ gazing into the distance, wearing his dressing gown whatever the time of day. Apparently, his washing was persistently stolen from the line (easy to reach on the ground floor) so perhaps he was self medicating and had no clothes left.

I will not miss the man (okay, people) with terrible mental health and drink problems who used to summon help by urgently ringing door bells at all hours, but I do worry for them all.

I am nostalgic for the flat which held meetings for unconvincing transvestites/transsexuals. I was often met in the lift by muscular gentlemen in nasty dresses, asking in a gruff bass profundo which floor I required. Their progress was heartening: they eased swiftly from hefty bloke in a frock, to an elegant lady in just a few weeks. All it took was a manicure, a shave and a guided trip around Per Una at M&S

In my previous home, the neighbours were convivial. The man who made his living from car boot sales was cheery, and grateful for the junk I gave him. If he made any money from my donations, he’d give me a tenner here and there. Other neighbours varied from chatty, to protective, to mad. A few of us reached the cup of tea/borrowing a cup of sugar phase, but in this transient life, friendships are unsustainable.

In one block, Rebecca and I were the only tenants not in profitable employment as burglars or prostitutes, and neither of us had recently been released from a long term facility of any kind, so instantly we felt a bond. We once chatted amiably in the foyer, until we were threatened by another tenant, aggressively begging for money. We’d catch up when waiting at dawn for the all clear after the resident pyromaniac had set another fire, and often met in the caretaker’s office, reporting a neighbour’s door being kicked in. Rebecca and I still exchange Christmas cards.

Landlords and villains

Yesterday day I drifted into the weird world of those mysterious beings who dwell on The Other Side, the dark side, the outer edge of the property map marked ‘….here be dragons’.

Actually, I was looking at some blogs posted by landlords, researching what these creatures of the night were saying about me and my fellow landless peasant scum.

Most landlord sites are quite straightforward, posting and answering queries about tenancies, rogue traders, and insurance, etc. Their current concern (or obsession) is staying strong and not selling up in the face of ‘The Oncoming Crash,’ believing that if too many of their comrades sell up in the face of fear, a chain reaction will begin, and they will lose everything in that dreaded scenario of plummeting house prices, and worthless investments.

Others are vile. One suggests boosting rental income by advertising a flat without stating the precise rent, but requesting sealed bids. The highest offer wins the flat. One blogger refers to his tenant casually throughout his posts as ‘that bitch’. She paid her rent late; not good, but part and parcel of the landlord experience, for those who know. Now she’s paid up, he is set on evicting her, seemingly because he can. This attitude is pretty rich considering the great evil landlords themselves are occasionally known to do.

Many landlords openly despise even blameless tenants for no clear reason. They assume we are evil. Where does this resentment come from? We need a home. They need our rent (we pay their mortgage, and ergo their pension fund) and usually this works out fine, so why the hostility?

Elsewhere, there are innocuous hints on improving the property, confirming what we all know: effectively maintained properties decorated in neutral colours, supplied with sturdy, pleasant furniture and decent white goods will raise more consistent rental. One site basically agrees with many points made here: don’t skip repairs, don’t abuse the tenant relationship, don’t be a bully and turn up unannounced.

These pointers are presumably aimed at dilatantte landlords, dimly aware there’s a flat somewhere around these parts, which they vaguely remember acquiring, which would account for the money that comes in sometimes (how lovely!) These hobby landlords must fondly imagine that repairs are done secretly at night by kindly elves, and anyway: just who are those dreary ‘tenant’ people squawking about the leaks and collapsing ceilings?

The majority of landlord sites discuss methods of securing a mortgage; there's much less chatter about the benefits (and obligations) involved in keeping the property in an appealing condition. What landlords need is consistency; encouraging happy, settled tenants to remain in place and reliably pay rent must surely be their aim.

We are in this together. Tenants need well constructed homes, intelligently and sympathetically fitted out. We need flats we can live in for some time, a sense of security, but above all else, a home, a real home, not rat runs for lab animals. Landlords would also benefit. In so many ways, we are on the same side. So let’s not fight.

If The Tenants Are United

Bluebirds are flying over Dovecot Towers. Peace has been declared. Love rules once more.

Last night, the man in the flat below screamed up from his balcony, demanding that I turn down my music, except I wasn’t playing any. It emerged that he’s just moved in, and his predecessor - who had tormented me with shouting and appalling musical choices - has gone.

In an instant, more shouting heads had appeared over each railing; inquisitive neighbours wondering who was playing the nasty, thumping techno loathed by us all, admitting that we’d all been blaming each other.

In this increasingly Pinteresque scenario, a growing multitude of disembodied faces popped out of windows to join the debate. None of us had ever met before. People don’t normally speak round here. Tenants are more than naturally unfriendly; some are actually scared.

And so began the weirdest tenant’s meeting ever, where we discussed repairs, rubbish collection, and just who was responsible for the truly awful thumpage rentergirl has complained about many times here, with more and more heads speaking out.

A representative from the now numerous array of talking heads ventured down to visit the noisy culprit, and stated our case for some quiet. The thumping horror house was turned off. I could hear myself think for the first time in months.

It can be scary in Dovecot Towers. I never answer my door, as visitors know to call before they get to mine. People who bang on doors and ring bells randomly late at night are always trouble, and I often wonder what could be done to make life a little more hospitable.

Tenants/residents associations seem like a great idea: everyone working together against the evil management company/council/rogue occupant. Unfortunately, my only experience is of such organizations is that they are run by people who are strange and misguided. They convened meetings in the pub, and negotiated cut price real ale as refreshment. The first resolution they agreed concerned solidarity with Cuba. Then they came round at closing time to rustle up interest in their organisation, calling on the younger, female residents.

Buy to let owners are appalled by the intimidating atmosphere in Dovecot Towers: prospective tenants and purchasers have been glared at, or sized up as potential victims for later on, at the muggers convenience. Residents avoid eye contact in the lift, and I never use the stairs (especially at night.)

But it pays to be cautious. One neighbour ostentatiously greeted me everyday, until he became quite threatening. Tetchily, he ticked me off for being ‘stand offish’ and was later found loitering outside another female neighbour’s flat, playing hangman with her name on the wall outside before launching into inquisitorial chatter whenever she emerged. They came for him in the night.

That night though, I listened to my own music, with no invasive thumping house ruining my happiness. Then, the man who had complained loudest about the rogue music, and who had ventured down to arrange its cessation, turned his telly up full volume, but - realising what he had done - immediately lowered the sound again. No actual bluebirds, and not quite peace in our time, but hopefully a change in attitude.

In The Neighbourhood

I live in the city, not a village. There are no elegant spinsters cycling sedately to evensong, no cheeky cherubs playing hopscotch in the street. I live on what is practically a motorway. It discourages humanity. We don’t even have a Spar.

My new, temporary neighbourhood is experiencing a large influx of new inhabitants, which is causing some resentment. The established locals pass through the buy to let developments as they walk from the estate on their way to town, and consequently the comments, and shovings, seem to be increasing.

Recently, the newest buy to let block was ‘dressed’ for sale, with primary coloured bins placed outside, presumably empted of flowers. At night, I saw four scallies on bikes heading off into the sunset carrying one bin apiece on the back of their bikes.

Perhaps I am doing them down. Perhaps they said: ‘…I say Tarquin; you know those bins we bought from Heals that we keep on the patio? Well those would make a perfect match - let’s offer to buy one, pre-owned, and ready distressed?’
But that’s not what happened, is it?

A local shop opened up. Gratefully, I called in for my Sunday paper, telling the owner how good it is to finally have some useful amenities - like his shop. He grunts, and ignores me. I think – well, that’s me back at Smiths. The miserable news agent stares at the wall. His Thai bride stands outside in the rain with her feet in a bowl of warm water. He sells vegetarian food, you know.

One local pub offers ‘accommodation’ more as a threat than a promise. Another pub was just put up for sale. Its windows were smashed every Sunday, and during Karaoke Tuesdays, the same rugged matron belts out ‘I Will Survive’ with tears rolling down her face. Friday afternoon they have an Elvis impersonator. A few houses down, the pub exquisitely decorated with Edwardian tiling is still boarded up.

There is a beautiful church, which manages to maintain stained glass windows and pretty flower beds. This area was formerly a Georgian slum, and salvaged gravestones exhibit the engraved names of god-fearing labourers, dead at thirty five and all called John, or infants killed at six months by weaning (one family mourned successive babies named Ann). The bells ring out every Sunday, summoning a congregation consisting mostly of sumptuously dressed African families, who don’t seem to live in the new flats, or the estate up the road.

It’s not as if hordes of incomers and blow-ins have edged out the locals. There weren’t any locals. There were no flats around my way; for years it was bleak, and desolate, with busy main roads, some small industry and warehouses, but no housing. Many years ago the Georgian hovels were demolished to make way for roads, a stadium, and car parks; it’s only recently that homes were built again. In time it will be lovely - or rather, lively - round here, with bars, and restaurants, and people mixing. As it is now, there’s a sense of different tribes suspiciously passing by, rubbing each other up the wrong way, but never really meeting.