Flying the Nest

Celebrations in the Chairman's household - No.1 Son successfully made a bid to rent a beautiful, 18th century, 2 bedroom cottage in the centre of Chipping Sodbury on Saturday. 

There were 3 people viewing, but we came up with a winning strategy to negate any potential risks to the landlord, such as the fact No.1 Son is only 22, has been in his current job for only 4 months and that someone may offer a higher monthly rent.

The strategy comprised 

1. Reiterating he's in IT and has been working from home, is therefore completely unaffected by lockdowns and hence there's little risk of redundancy or furlough and, consequently, missed rent payments, and
2. Offering 6 months rent up-front (borrowed from the Bank of Dad and paid back to me over 6 months, interest-free). A wedge of money has the power to persuade.

It's right in the middle of this aerial photo.

Now it's a case of seeking furnishings and ensuring the broadband is operational on the day he moves in. All a steep learning curve for No.1 Son, but old hat to me. Given the horror stories I've read about IKEA click and collect, as well as my own experience of collecting our Christmas candle order, I think he'd be better using Argos for a new bed and mattress. 

The rest can be garnered at low cost from Facebook Market or WotNot - a local emporium where people bring household goods they want to sell. We've bought a good number of items from WotNot and very reasonable prices. WotNot is more expensive than Facebook Market, but everything is under one roof and you don't have to travel all over the place for collections. They deliver locally too.

That leaves just one out of four kids left to fly the nest, and he's off to Uni in September anyway. However, he's now solely responsible for cleaning the bathroom and is also solely to blame for cutlery and crockery that goes walkabout.