Now where were we ... ?

O yes.

Well, the Chuppies eventually agreed to a very very low offer on his flat.  Cos, you know, we were desperate to move on after having the gaff on the market for a coupla years.  And cos no-one seemed to want the place EVEN THOUGH anytime someone walked in it was all "Oo this is nice and big" and "Oo this is light and airy".  Even my hairdresser (who turns up at the Chuppies' flat to do my bonce every three months or so) was giving it all "Oo, I'd have snapped this up in an instant, o yes.  In fact I was actually talking about this flat with my husband the other day, saying that there's this lovely place in Chelmsford which we could buy to rent out ... "

But, obviously, she never did since, as mentioned earlier, the lowly offer (being the only one on the table after two years of marketing) was eventually accepted.

Anyway, that was all back last October.

And where are we now?  O yes, February.  The Chuppies had a removals guy round on Saturday who left a mound of flat pack boxes in his flat, copious amounts of bubble wrap and spools of brown sticky tape.  The Chuppies emptied out a sideboard that sits in his living room whilst I was there (which took an absolute age - so packed to the gills was it with odd bits of wire, headphones and unused batteries rolling around - never mind the odd important document that should have been filed away ages ago) and will be slowly getting on with the rest of the flat this week.  The buyer (a schoolteacher) was keen to move in during the half-term holidays but this has now been changed to the first week of the Easter break.

Which is fine by us.  As we have been extremely unsuccessful in acquiring a house since Chuppies accepted the offer on his flat.  And a few extra bonus weeks before the Chuppies is officially homeless (a.k.a. back home with his mother) is not to be sniffed at.

Despite recent news headlines, the area we are looking in, whilst rather quiet towards the end of last year, is now - I think you can safely call it - pretty ill, or `on death's door'.  We have exhausted every available opportunity to us in our price bracket (which, believe me, wasn't much) and, after desperately considering other stations along the rail line that might lift us out of the slump that our chosen area has been afflicted with, have realised that, whilst we are (more than) ready to move, and we are (more than) good for the money, with a good budget, that should get us something nice, there is nothing out there in our ideal spot and, short of murdering some innocent home-owner, have just got to sit tight and try not to get too stressed out.  We have registered with eight estate agents (to date) but it is a time (and town) of slim pickings.  We know the gaffs are out there (one need only check Land Registry sold prices to see the places we just missed out on last spring/summer) so it's just a case of wait, wait, wait.