Danny the Estate Agent.
......"got a place which he himself had chosen" ......(I said). The RAF did not go out to do any house-hunting on its own account. You had to find a place for yourself, find out if the landlord was willing to enter into the Hiring scheme and what the rent and conditions were, then put the proposition up to the Station Housing Officer. He would then inspect the property and its furnishings, to ensure that they were of a reasonable size and standard in relation to the rent asked.
At this time a decent small place would be on the market for 3 - 5 guineas per week (say £400 - £600 p.m. today), which is pretty well in line with what is asked round here now. (I think 5 guineas was the most the RAF would pay). Only then, and given that the station had still got scope for more hirings, would the Station Housing Officer sanction the arrangement. This would involve an already harassed individual in even more time-consumimg work. But why have a dog and bark yourself ? Step forward, Danny.
I did quite a number of these inspections in the next three months I spent at Weston. As to suitability, my criterion was simply: "would I be content to live in this place myself ?" If not, it was out of Court straight away, no matter how low the rent. For I had to consider not only the chap in front of me, but the next man to whom the hiring might be offered. If the rental asked was excessive, I would say so, but remand the case to the Housing Officer to decide.
The curious thing was that at first there was no correlation between the desirability of the place and the rent asked for it. One day I would be offered some wretched hovel for which the owner brazenly expected to get the full five guineas. The next, I would see a perfectly nice, well kept house; the (usually elderly) householder would timidly ask "would three guineas be too much ?" Of course, this happy state of affairs did not last for very long, and soon £5/5 became the standard price asked for everything (whether they got it or not was another matter).
The ones to whom I gave the green light were never grateful for very long. But there were other cases where I'd had to harden my heart and say "No" (with the next man in mind). These unlucky ones could still take the place themseves, of course, and pay the landlord the rent demanded, but that might be twice the rent of a MQ and put it out of their reach.
In this way I had to disappoint a number of people, these did not suffer in silence, I was not the most popular kid on the block. However, the experience gained was valuable and would come in extremely useful to me later.
That's the lot about Hirings, you'll be pleased to know.
Goodnight, chaps,
Danny42C
"We must all of us be somewhere, and I might as well be here" (Well known obiter dicta of an old High Court Judge)
Last edited by Danny42C; 18th Jun 2013 at 17:13.
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