Where have all the door handles gone?

I was catching up with a dear friend of mine, and in our conversation they confessed they had had a bit of a week from hell.

What started as a day full of production and a list full of life admin ended up being a little more stressful and unexpected than planned.

Whilst getting some tyres changed on their car, they took the decision to focus on mind, body and soul and go for a bit of an afternoon walk around a local park near the tyre fitting centre.

All very wholesome.

Until they decided to use the facilities on the park and ended up getting trapped in the toilet because there was no handle on the inside!

After a frantic panic, some screaming and shouting, a good Samaritan eventually came and let them out, but not before my friend had had the opportunity to call the fire brigade and explain that they may need rescuing from a public toilet.

What really made me laugh with this story wasn't my friend's trauma, although that was hilarious, it was the fact that a little less than two weeks before, a very similar thing had happened to me.

I'd gone to view a property and, as the agent took me out to the courtyard, they shut the door behind us and locked us out.

Now granted, I had substantially more space than a public toilet so I wasn't too worried. Claustrophobia wasn't really the concern on the table.

I've never seen the colour drain so quickly from somebody's face as that poor agent.

I, on the other hand, found it hilarious.

We were in a garden. We COULD have jumped a wall if absolutely necessary. But we didn't need to get that far!

We had a solid exit plan.

Unlike my friend.

I'm sure there was some joke in there about not being let back in until I'd made an offer, as the agent frantically tried every James Bond credit card myth for opening a locked door...

To no avail.

So, what have we learnt from all of this?

Always have your colleague on speed dial.

And maybe check there is a handle on both sides of a door before you shut it...

But probably the most important lesson?

Always expect the unexpected.

Nothing really prepares you for the unexpected quite like working as a mortgage adviser!

This month's examples: a £150,000 down-valuation, a sale where the solicitors essentially forgot they were working on the case and an undisclosed County Court Judgement...

The list goes on!

And I think that's probably why getting locked in a garden didn't particularly faze me.

In mortgages, there is nearly always something.

A not my fault issue. A delay. A lender decision you weren't expecting. A solicitor suddenly discovering something the day before completion (it never is the day before but buyers would have you believe anything) that apparently nobody noticed during the previous three months.

And somehow, we always seem to end up trapped in the middle trying to reassure everybody, afterall, these problems don't mean anything to real people! They are legislation and rules in the main which have been created to safeguard buyer and seller alike to ensure that their dream home doesn't turn into a nightmare. 

My approach is normally: take a breath, work out what can actually be fixed and decide what needs doing next. Some people may say I can be direct in my articulation of this, but what we do know is that we are moving forward not backward.

In my case with the garden, worst case scenario: jump the wall and open the front door.

My dear friend, on the other hand...

Panic. Shout. Call the emergency services.

Which, for clarity, I completely agree with. If I was trapped in a public toilet with no door handle, a closing time on the park, my mode of transport being left for a tyre change and being in such a confined space - seems a rational response in the first instance. I mean even if I managed to get out before they arrive at least they could have a laugh on the way.

In the world of mortgages, we're not emergency services, we deal with disappointment and stress but never really life or death.

My friend needed rescuing from a confined space for probably the first time in their life.

The fire brigade, I'd imagine, have dealt with considerably worse.

Not necessarily somebody trapped in the local park bog, but you get the gist.

And I think that's the bit we can sometimes underestimate.

I've been working around property for more than 15 years now, and a lot of the useful stuff you learn isn't necessarily about mortgages at all.

It's knowing when non-standard construction is going to cause a problem and when it probably isn't.

It's understanding why an increasing ground rent can suddenly make a perfectly nice flat far less straightforward.

It's knowing that some lenders care about the height of an apartment block and others don't.

It's knowing when expanding foam loft insulation could make a mortgage application feel like a nightmare and understanding how to structure the conversation towards the diligent energy conscious sellers.

Or when solar panel leases first appeared and lenders treated them like somebody was literally going to run away with the roof, which for clarity... Was attached to the building.

And then, over time, things change.

Lenders change.

Criteria change.

What was almost un-mortgageable ten years ago might be perfectly manageable now.

Some things that look terrifying to a buyer are actually quite ordinary.

And some things that look completely harmless can cause an absolute nightmare three weeks later.

That knowledge doesn't normally come from reading a product guide.

It comes from seeing things go wrong. Then seeing them go wrong again.

Then eventually seeing enough weird and wonderful versions of the same problem that, when somebody calls you in a panic, you can usually say:

“Right. I've seen something like this before.”

That's probably where experience becomes useful.

Not because it means nothing unexpected will happen.

It absolutely will.

But because there is a fair chance the unexpected thing ruining your Tuesday isn't the first time we've seen it.

And after 15-odd years around property, I still keep finding new ones.

Although there is one thing above all of this that has genuinely got me thinking...

Where are the rest of these door handles?