My Journey to Bedsit-Land Part Two: Welcome to the House of Misfits
Stories from the Rent Trap
The setting is a small English city in the midlands of England in the early 1980s, and change is in the air.
My journey into bedsit-land began in an area of the city that I knew well. I came across an advertisement in the local paper for a bedsit available in a property on the road where I had lived for the first ten years of my life. It was a property that I must have passed a thousand times on my way to and from school. At the time, I did not take much notice of it. In terms of location, it was ideal.
It was a long time ago, but I can remember what the advertisement said.
Bedsit to rent, shared bathroom, electric coin meter, £13 a week, no students or pets.
I called the telephone number provided.
The person who answered told me that he was the landlord. We had the following conversation:
“You’re not a student, are you? I don’t rent rooms to students anymore. No pets either.”
“No, I’m not a student, and I don’t have any pets.” I replied.
“Are you working?”
“I have a temporary job at the moment.” That was true, but what I didn’t tell him was that it could end at any time. Some weeks, there was no work.
I was “between jobs,” as the local career officer had once told me to say. It was a much better way for me to describe myself than being unemployed.
Being unemployed was not that unusual a state to be in at the time. The official number of unemployed hit three million after a couple of years of the political ideology known as Thatcherism. The actual figure was probably one to two million more, as the government regularly found ways to massage the figures to make them look better. The landlord didn’t seem to have an issue with my being in temporary work.
I made an appointment to visit the property the next day. On the way there, I passed my old home. It looked small. The property with the bedsit for rent was much bigger, with three floors. The downside was that it looked like it had seen better days. The rent was cheap, and I could see why.
The front yard had a small brick wall that I was able to sit on while waiting for the landlord to arrive. While I was there, I noticed that the bins were overflowing, with rubbish on the floor. For a property with several bedsits and flats, the dustbins provided were clearly not enough. Residents were not required to recycle their waste back then. The front yard looked like a rubbish tip.
I found it a little ironic that next to this property there was a small scrapyard where you could recycle no longer wanted items. It would certainly take old tins and cans, a boiler, video recorder — anything that was metal. Metal was valuable, and the scrapyard would regularly send out a van to collect any old iron that they could get their hands on.
As I sat on the wall, a man approached the front door. He looked like he had been drinking. I guessed that he was not the landlord.
“Who are you waiting for? Who do you want?” He asked.
“I’m waiting for the landlord. There’s a bedsit available here to rent.”
“You are not a student, are you? He won’t rent it to you if you are a student. You don’t have a cat do you? He hates cats.”
“No, I’m not a student. No cats.” I replied.
“I’ll leave the door open for you. Wait inside if you like.”
“Thanks, but I will wait here. What is the landlord like? Other than not liking students and cats.” I asked.
“Well, he only smiles when it’s rent day. He is okay as long as you pay your rent on time, but don’t expect him to fix things that go wrong; it’s not Buckingham Palace, and you don’t look like royalty. The place is nothing special.” He laughed.
Eventually, the landlord arrived. He seemed okay, not at all seedy, although I did notice that on his jumper there was a small dark stain in the upper chest area. I wondered what might have caused it. Spilt Coffee? Tea? Gravy?
“Hello, are you waiting to view the bedsit?”
I nodded.
“I was just having my tea when I remembered the appointment. I’m Mr. Harcourt.” He searched in his jacket pocket and took out a large metal ring that had about twenty keys on it.
“The front door is open,” I said.
“The door left open again? That’s the trouble with tenants; there is always one who will leave the front door open. They make it easy for anyone who wants to break in. It’s not my fault, I tell them. It’s not that difficult to shut the door.” He put the keys away and led me inside.
The first thing I noticed was that there was no carpet in the hallway, just the floorboards and a long mat. The only furniture was a small table with several letters waiting. Straight ahead, were the stairs.
The bedsit that I was going to rent was on the ground floor.
“It’s one of the best rooms in the house.” He said, with some optimism.
He opened the door, and we went inside.
I looked around. If this was one of the best rooms, I didn’t want to see what the worst ones were like.
“What do you think?” He said.
“You want thirteen pounds a week?” I replied, almost in shock.
“I can do twelve.” He came back at me. “You’re not a student, are you?”
“No,” I replied (to the question about being a student).
“Eleven then, and that’s my final offer.”
He must have thought that I had said no to the twelve-pound-a-week proposal and was negotiating hardball. When he said eleven pounds, I said okay. Clearly, my negotiating skills were on a level that even I didn’t understand.
“Welcome to the house of misfits,” the landlord said, as we completed the deal.
Misfits?
I didn’t really ask much about the property or the other tenants. In fact, I didn’t ask anything. The law did not require landlords to tell you anything, either. It was, I suppose, an example of the free market at work — a negotiation between landlord and tenant. I didn’t know what to ask. I had no checklist of questions. I didn’t even ask to see the bathroom upstairs. The first time I saw it was after I had moved in.
The truth is, I didn’t know what I was doing. I had no idea about tenant rights, even though at that time they were better than now. Over the years, I have found out that many landlords rely on tenants not knowing their rights. I was a pushover. I was quite pleased with myself that I had managed to get two pounds a week off the rent.
I moved into the house of misfits a week or so later. It was my welcome to Bedsit-Land.
If you like this story, you might be interested in my other stories of life in the Rent Trap.
