The good news: finally we completed. The bad news: our sellers had not. As in not completed anything, their packing, their cleaning.
We knew things had gone awry when Tim turned up at the estate agents and was asked if we wanted some pet goldfish. The estate agent told them they had until 7.30pm to clear the property of everything including all marine life.
We waited until 8pm, despite having completed at 2pm that afternoon, and discovered the seller looking ashen and like he was about to collapse while his cheery wife chatted to a neighbour on the landing drinking what looked like a teacup full of advocate.
The house was still full of their belongings. Cupboards full. Drawers full. Piles of old Irish newspapers. Basically the random rubbish that accumulates over 70 years spent living in the same house.
We said hello to our neighbours who has been roped into helping out and then told the couple they could come back in the morning to finish cleaning up and they duly scampered into the night with promises of cleaning echoing back to us.
Outside our new house, piles of rubbish, bits of broken furniture, overflowing wheelie bins and a small tupperware bowl full of oversized goldfish.
We knew things had gone awry when Tim turned up at the estate agents and was asked if we wanted some pet goldfish. The estate agent told them they had until 7.30pm to clear the property of everything including all marine life.
We waited until 8pm, despite having completed at 2pm that afternoon, and discovered the seller looking ashen and like he was about to collapse while his cheery wife chatted to a neighbour on the landing drinking what looked like a teacup full of advocate.
The house was still full of their belongings. Cupboards full. Drawers full. Piles of old Irish newspapers. Basically the random rubbish that accumulates over 70 years spent living in the same house.
We said hello to our neighbours who has been roped into helping out and then told the couple they could come back in the morning to finish cleaning up and they duly scampered into the night with promises of cleaning echoing back to us.
Outside our new house, piles of rubbish, bits of broken furniture, overflowing wheelie bins and a small tupperware bowl full of oversized goldfish.
