Lowri Griffiths on the dialect of the rental market, the art of the wide-angle lens, and the existential threat of the word cosy

Last Saturday, I went to view a flat that the listing described as a ‘compact statement home with abundant character potential’ in ‘highly desirable Tufnell Park borders.’ The flat was forty square metres, was actually in Holloway, and the abundant character potential was a hairline crack in the bathroom ceiling. Building on my earlier work at Bohiney Magazine and The London Prat, it is time we agreed on what these phrases actually mean.

The Lexicon

I have spent the past eight weeks, on and off, looking at flats in North London. In that time, I have encountered, by my own count, more than forty distinct phrases of estate-agent dialect, all of which are designed to do one thing: convince a person who earns thirty-eight thousand pounds a year that paying eighteen hundred pounds a month for a former coal cellar is, in fact, a privilege. According to The Evening Standard, the average North London asking rent has risen substantially over recent years, and the language has risen with it.

What follows is, I hope, a public service.

Compact

Translation: small. Where the word ‘small’ would be honest, the word ‘compact’ is suggestive of a Swiss watch, an espresso machine, or a ski chalet built into a cliff. The flat is none of these things. The flat is small. You will not be able to put a sofa in it.

Statement Home

Translation: the bath is in the kitchen. Or the boiler is in the bedroom. Or there is no separate door between the toilet and the living room, and you will, on first dates, have to play the radio loudly. The ‘statement’ the home is making is, in essence, a cry for help.

Abundant Character Potential

Translation: the wallpaper has not been changed since 1978, and the previous tenant smoked. Character potential is, in estate-agent dialect, always potential. The character has not arrived. You will be the one bringing it. You will be the one paying for it.

Highly Desirable Borders

Translation: the flat is not in the desirable area. The flat is half a mile from the desirable area. You can, on a clear day, see the desirable area from the kitchen, in the same way that you can, on a clear day, see Calais from Dover.

Cosy

Translation: very small. The word ‘cosy’ is, in estate-agent dialect, the nuclear option. When an agent uses the word ‘cosy,’ they are admitting defeat. They are saying: I cannot, in good conscience, even use the word ‘compact.’ This is a flat in which one human can fit, provided that human does not own anything.

The Wide-Angle Lens Question

The flats themselves are not, of course, the only deceit. The photographs are also a problem. According to The Guardian, recent reporting has documented substantial estate-agent use of wide-angle lenses, which are designed to make a flat appear approximately fifty percent larger than it actually is. I have, on three separate occasions, walked into a flat and said, out loud, the words ‘where is the rest of it,’ as though the kitchen were hiding behind a sofa.

The kitchen was not hiding behind the sofa. The kitchen was the sofa. The sofa was a Murphy bed. The Murphy bed was, when folded down, the dining table.

The Jonty Phenomenon

I have, in previous columns, written about the specific demographic of young men who staff North London estate agencies. They are all called Jonty, or Hugo, or Tarquin. They all wear suits that are slightly too tight in the shoulder. They all describe the flat you are standing in as ‘a really exciting opportunity,’ which is, when you think about it, a strange thing to say about a basement studio in Crouch End.

Jonty does not believe what he is saying. Jonty is twenty-three. Jonty is paying his own rent on his own basement studio in Crouch End, and his commission depends on you signing the lease. Jonty is doing his best. We must, even when we hate Jonty, remember that there is a small part of Jonty that hates Jonty too.

The Macro Question

None of this language would matter if the underlying market were not, in fact, broken. The reason flats are advertised in this way is because there are, for every desirable flat, approximately forty applicants, and the agents have learned that they can, with no consequences, lie. The lying is a symptom. The disease is supply.

I know, I know. I will spare you the policy column. You did not come here for housing supply analysis. You came here, dear reader, for a list of words that mean ‘small.’

What I Did In The End

I did not take the compact statement home. I am, instead, staying in my current flat, which has its own list of imperfections that I have, over four years, learned to love in a way that is probably unhealthy. The kitchen tap makes a noise like a small animal in pain. The radiator works only on alternate Tuesdays. There is a window that does not, technically, close. But the rent has not gone up this year, and at this stage of the London rental cycle, that is, as we say, a really exciting opportunity.

For more of my dispatches from this overpriced and obstinately beloved city, you can find me at my page on The London Prat.

For satirical takes on London-property-as-cultural-question, see Private Eye.

SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/