Kitchen crisis

I have been forced to think quite a lot about kitchens this week. This has led me to a growing realisation that either:

a) I am deluded

b) I have been hoodwinked

c) My idea of entertaining is at odds with that of the majority.

Let me explain.

As the possibility of a house move looms ever larger, I have been forced to invite into our Nowhere on Thames abode that most reviled of creatures, the Estate Agent. Personally, I have nothing against them. I can even say that at least one of my good friends is one. However, the UK ones have something of an image problem, and the ones I’ve seen so far have tended to conform to the main stereotypes one always imagines when the words “Estate Agent” are mentioned.

On Monday, agent 1 came round. Wearing an Arthur Daley coat and a pleasant smile, he looked around our home, muttering “Lovely” “Great” and “Very nice” as I flung open the doors to the various inner sanctums of the On Thames household.

I had prepared for his visit by Googling myself into a stupor. If I should feel called to apply for the next series of “Mastermind” I am certainly equipped to choose “Property Prices and sales values achieved in Nowhere-on-Thames from 1991-2013” as my specialist subject.

He told me my house was worth far more than I know it really is, offered me numerous reductions and discounts to his fees and charges without me even having to give him a flash of my “I don’t think so” raised eyebrow, and attempted to flatter me and my home to within an inch of our respective lives. I was immune to his charms.

Once he’d exhausted his sales pitch and paused for questions, I ventured one..

“So what’s wrong with this house?” I asked “Really, be honest, I have the skin of a rhino and it would be useful to know what lets the place down”

“Well…the kitchen” He ventured, his neck retreating into his Arthur Daley coat like a tortoise retreating into its shell.

“I know” I said, and he visibly relaxed.

I should explain. Our Victorian house retains its original footprint, and the kitchen is, indeed, small compared to all the other rooms in the house. We have never felt the need to enlarge it, as it provides adequate space to carry out any kitchen-related activity, and I like my privacy whilst I'm working myself into a culinary lather and clattering pans around.

And so to this morning. Agent 2 arrived. Late. His name really was Sebastian and his surname double barrelled, and he wore a pink cashmere scarf around his neck. Which is a sure sign of extortionate fees. The visit proceeded as previously, only there were many, many more “Greats”. The wardrobes, the windows, the glory hole under the stairs, the downstairs loo, the log burner, the stair rods and runners…all “Great”. By bedroom 4, a voice in my head was screaming “No, they’re NOT!” but I held back.

His final pitch involved a ten-minute recital of their annual sales figures by quarter, a brief history of the property market since (I don’t know since when, I wasn’t paying attention by this point), a polite but pointed insight into the shifty practices of “other agents” and veiled suggestions of what “they” might do to reel us in, before letting us down badly by Not Selling Our House, and, of course, a hasty sprint through their fees and charges which included the somewhat startling revelation that, on top of the not insignificant sum they would receive in the event of a sale, they would only charge us £200 to take photographs of our property. (Only…yeah…a snip…isn’t that part of the deal? If we don’t agree to pay for photos, do they draw a likeness on an available scrap of paper???)

He did, however, finally get round to his suggestion for a selling price, but just before he did, I asked my killer question about what was wrong with our house. “The kitchen” he said.

He then proceeded to give us a valuation figure. The amusing thing (as I am rhino-skinned, it was amusing, rather than making me want to cry or wear sackcloth and ashes) was that this agent is selling the house next door-but-one. It’s the same size and style of house, but their kitchen is (wait for it) about 1.5 square metres larger than ours (if that).  There are other differences of decoration or configuration between our two houses, but objectively, they’re the same. However, for the sin of having a smaller kitchen, Sebastian Pink-Scarf wants me to sell my house for somewhere between 15 and 20 THOUSAND POUNDS less than my neighbours!!!

And so to kitchens.

My kitchen IS too small. Not for me, I should add, but for potential buyers. They will, I am sure, all want “lifestyle” kitchens, because “I like to be able to talk to my guests when I’m cooking when we entertain” or “I really believe the kitchen is the heart of the home” and “It means I can keep an eye on the children as I’m preparing their supper”

OK, so why buy a house with 3 other reception rooms if all you want to do is spend your every waking moment in the bloody kitchen??? Why not buy a house with just a kitchen??? If you do want a kitchen where you can spend your every waking moment, then the rest of the house will be a waste of space, surely?

No one ever says “I like to keep an eye on the kids while I microwave their spaghetti hoops” or “I like to be able to talk to my guests whilst I remove the packaging from the Marks and Spencer  lemon torte I bought for dessert”, or even “I really love the fact that when we retire to the open-plan sitting room after dinner, the smell of the chicken vindaloo we shared earlier can permeate the entire open-plan kitchen-diner-living area”. Oh, no, when it comes to buying a home, everyone’s suddenly Nigella Lawson or Martha Stewart, and needs a kitchen the size of a tennis court even though it’s unlikely to make them cook any more (or any better) than a smaller one.

And, lest anyone think that I have a chip on my shoulder about having a small kitchen, the Nowhere-in-France house has a large kitchen, but I still like my guests to sit in the sitting room or the dining room rather than the kitchen, and if anywhere is the “heart” of that home, then it’s the chair nearest the log burner in winter, and a hammock in the garden in summer. The kitchen may be the engine room, but who wants to spend their every waking moment stoking the boiler??? 

The generation before mine put considerable time and effort into ensuring that women would be free, equal and no longer chained to the sink. Suddenly, it seems that "chained to the sink" is the new black.

There are four houses like ours in our road. The first sold about a year ago, and the new owners ripped out most of the interior and converted the largest reception room into a mega-kitchen. The second is the one with a kitchen a couple of feet larger than ours. The third had already been largely converted into one gigantic kitchen when it sold a couple of years ago, and yet the new owners still gutted it and started again. I am quite sure that, whoever takes on our house-with-the-tiny kitchen, they will rip out and rebuild whatever they wish, and to their heart's content. Should we gift them £20K to help them on their way, though? I'm not convinced.