True confessions of an estate agent – you couldn't make it up

Desperate housewives, bitter divorcees and rampant rodents may sound like the cast of a saucy Channel 4 drama series, but they're all characters in the real life soap opera of estate agency.

"There have been times when I've thought, 'This is like an episode of Dynasty'," says Andrew Beadnall, co-founder of Beadnall Copley estate agency, who after 36 years in the business could write a book on the funny side of the job.

"A sense of humour is absolutely essential in this line of work," he adds.

The bored housewife is a particular problem for one member of his staff who has the good fortune to resemble rugby heartthrob Danny Cipriani.

Eager to please, the Danny look-a-like arrived on time to measure up a property and take photographs when the lady of the house opened the door wearing nothing but suspenders, panties and bra.

"He made his excuses and left," says Andrew, who adds that this scenario is a common occupational hazard for younger members of the profession.

"The same young valuer was also enticed into a divorcee's home on the pretext of her showing him how to work the alarm system so he could conduct viewings.

"As you will appreciate, we have become experts at dealing with all sorts of alarms and all the divorcee had to do was show us where the box was and give us the code.

"But no, she insisted that the only way she could show this young valuer how to work the system was for her to get into the understairs storage cupboard where the alarm was housed and get him to join her. He did as instructed and then yet again had to make his excuses and leave."

Alarms can be tricky, says Andrew.

"On another occasion, one of my colleagues got locked in a house where we were doing a viewing. Our vendor had constructed his own very complicated alarm system. As such the house had in effect locked itself and our colleague had to ring the office for someone to go and let her and the viewer out. Needless to say, we didn't sell the house to that prospective buyer."

Alarm bells should've sounded when another Beadnall agent was told, "Quick you must hide" when he was valuing a property.

"She led him straight in to the master bedroom and, naturally, he really didn't know what to think,"says Andrew.

"She said that her husband mustn't know that we were at the house as he wasn't keen to sell. He would be angry if he found out that his wife had gone behind his back and had an estate agent in the house. We had to hide in the bedroom until he had gone off to golf."

Negotiating stormy water between couples is another skill agents must acquire.

"We are piggy in the middle and often have one partner who wants to sell the house and one who really doesn't, so that can be very tricky," says Andrew.

"I remember dealing with one very bitter divorcee. I was measuring up the house and noticed there were lots of lovely family photos. Then I realised she had cut her husband's face out of them all and stuck photographs of elephants, hippos and chimps in his place.

"I then had to delicately tell the husband, who had moved out of the house, that he really would have to ensure that these were all removed before we started marketing.

"It's not a good idea to advertise a split to potential buyers, who then might sense that a quick sale is needed and offer a low price. It can also be off-putting."

Even more of a turn off are vermin, but there were scores of them living alongside a Premiership footballler whose house Andrew had been instructed to sell.

"It was a million pound-plus home of a well-known footballer who had just been transferred to another club. In usual Premiership footballer mode, it all had to happen immediately and following his departure with his suitcase we met the relocation agent who delicately asked if we minded mice?

"I do and the house was infested. They were so hungry they were even eating the chalk on the snooker cues and in a desperate search for water we found a few of them floating on the top of toilet bowls.

"We had to instruct Rentokil for a continual period of five weeks before we were able to start marketing."

He'd like to say who the soccer star is, but estate agency code of honour forbids it.

"It's amazing what clients tell you, partly because you do have to build a rapport with them very quickly. Some of the stories I've heard would easily do justice to Dallas or Desperate Housewives, but it's all in the strictest confidence.

"What you hear and see stays private. You don't name names or locations."

"I was told that in my training days and I have never forgotten it," he says.

Another thing he has never forgotten is the day his old boss took him to measure up at a mortuary. "I was 18 and went with a senior

partner to measure up a mortuary for the old rating assessment forms.

"They were doing an embalming at the time and the undertaker explained we'd probably like to wait. But my boss made me do it and I had to take the tape measure right over the body, which was pretty awful."

But at least that wasn't as bad as a colleague, who back in the days of dictaphones inadvertently described exactly what he saw in a bedroom, which was a wardrobe full of pornographic magazines.

"The secretary was on auto-pilot when she typed it up and printed off the particulars," says Andrew.

"The owner came in to check them over and read: Bedroom three 10ft 6in by 11ft 2in fitted wardrobes with a supply of porn.How my former colleague managed to keep that instruction I'll never know."