Episode Transcript
[00:00:03] Speaker A: Let's talk, let's an original podcast from the Lettings Hub.
Hello and welcome to the latest episode of our podcast. Let's talk, let's. I'm Heidi Shackle, the CEO of the Lettings Hub, the tenant referencing business that got good at tech. Let's talk, let's is our regular roundup of news and views on a whole range of subjects spanning the private rental sector. If you have listened all the way to the end of our podcast, you will know that we always ask our guests for a funny story or anecdotal moment from their career. So to celebrate a great season, we've compiled all of the stories from our guests that will hopefully give you a bit of a giggle. Just a little warning for some of those that may have children with you in the car. If you're listening as you're driving along, are some stories that may not be totally child friendly, so you may want to take a minute to listen later.
[00:01:01] Speaker B: I mean, there's probably the anecdote of how my previous agency role came to an end, which was Anne and I were working at an agency.
We worked at an agency which gladly no longer exists. It taught us a few things about what we could do, but a lot of things about what we shouldn't do.
And unfortunately, the boss, who started off being very dynamic, ended up being an outright crook.
And I've never been particularly good at keeping my mouth shut when I feel someone's really in the wrong.
So I'd already made my feelings quite clear with him in the offices in front of quite a few members of staff.
But the final nail in the coffin for my job was that we painted a Christmas party and the owner took us out this big swanky evening to the restaurant that he just opened, which, incidentally, he basically rented and fitted out using landlords rental deposits.
And I proceeded to get very drunk and then throw food at him across the room. Oh, calling him every name under the sun. And yes, I think that's probably no regrets. I don't regret a single thing I said. I think the only thing I regret is that I got so drunk, I don't remember some of the things I said to him. Do you wish reactions?
[00:02:30] Speaker C: Maybe you wish you had exactly the satisfaction of seeing it.
[00:02:33] Speaker B: But I don't regret what I did. I don't regret what I did at all. And Anna and I still laugh about it. Parents, our senior, our head of property management, actually worked with us back at that time as well.
And yeah, we were all at that. So quite often at the base Christmas party. That story will usually come up about me flinging food across the table at the owner and hurling a lot of abuse at him while quite openly talking about the fact that, who cares? Because we're starting our own agency anyway.
So. Yeah, won't be that one.
[00:03:13] Speaker D: This is a really tricky one.
I've been thinking about this and thinking, I can't tell you most of the funny stories that immediately spring to mind because this probably will go out before the watershed. And it's just. I can't do it. So. But I do have a funny one. And it goes right back to my countrywide days.
A guy called Matt Begley, who is. Who was then an extremely talented mortgage advisor and now runs his own financial services business in Cornwall. He's an incredibly successful guy and a really good guy. We've been close friends from almost the day we met. Anyway, I recruited him as a. As a mortgage advisor, and it was his first day at work, and I met him at the office and said, matt, time we picked up your company car. So back in those days in countrywide, if you were a new mortgage advisor, you got a brand spanking new Ford Orion.
[00:04:18] Speaker E: So.
[00:04:19] Speaker D: I know.
[00:04:20] Speaker C: Wow, that was quite a big car, wasn't it?
[00:04:22] Speaker A: A Ford Orion?
[00:04:23] Speaker D: It was, yeah, it was just a little bit bigger than an escort, wasn't it?
[00:04:26] Speaker C: That's it, yeah.
[00:04:28] Speaker D: Anyway, that's what you got back in the day in countrywide, and Matt was clearly excited about going to pick up his new car. So I thought, we're not going to get very much work done until he's picked up his car, because that way he can be happy and we can focus on the rest of the day. So we jumped in my car and went off down to the Ford dealership. Matt jumped out the car and got handed the keys of his bright, shiny new red Orion. Everyone had reduced red. It wasn't a color choice. You had a red Orion. So he picked up his red Orion and I said, right, okay, let's drive back to the office and then we can get some work done. So I pulled out the lot of the car park that we parked in and drove down the road, and someone pulled out in front of me and I had to brake. Sadly, Matt didn't brake.
[00:05:22] Speaker A: Oh, no.
[00:05:23] Speaker D: And plowed straight into the back of me. And it's.
Poor lad was absolutely beside himself. He thought a. That was the end of his career before it even started. Cause I'm gonna fire him instantly.
Of course I didn't fire him. It was an accident. No one got hurt. It's one of those things. And like I say, he turned out to be an incredibly successful mortgage advisor for me in my team. I love working with him and he is now my financial advisor in a different life. And I went down to Cornwall because my mum still lives in Cornwall. I went down to Cornwall a week or so ago over Easter and met up with Matt and had a couple of beers with him.
He's a really good guy, but we never meet up without him bringing up that again.
[00:06:20] Speaker C: Well, you can just imagine, can't you?
[00:06:22] Speaker A: New job, brand new car, instantly happening. God, the poor guy. Feel mortified for him.
[00:06:29] Speaker D: But, hey, nervous, excited, everything there, all of a sudden it all flashed.
He thought he'd lost the lot lesson.
[00:06:37] Speaker C: And that's the thing, that's one of those, isn't it? Like, you know, I bet he wish.
[00:06:40] Speaker A: He knew then what he knew now in the fact that everything would be all right. Everything would be all right in the end.
[00:06:49] Speaker F: Right? Yes. Well, you warned me about this, so I've been trying to think.
So funny.
I'm not sure this is funny or not. I find it quite amusing, which is when I worked at Zoopla and I joined them because they bought promocation and what have you. And so I sort of. I got sucked into Zoopla and I was very, you know, I was very happy that they had decided not to make me sag me from publication and that they had decided instead to keep me and make me head of content at Zoopla. And every, every day, almost including at some of the meetings with Alex Chesterman, he always kept saying, nigel, we must have lunch and have a chat.
And occasionally I'd see him outside smoking lunch. Tomorrow he'd go, yeah, yeah, let's do lunch. Anyway, on the day he phoned me up and said, do you want to do lunch? I resigned.
We never ever had that lunche because my wife and I took a two year career break and ran chalets in the alps for two years.
[00:07:59] Speaker A: Oh, lovely.
[00:08:01] Speaker F: And I don't. I have a horrible feeling. You probably never thank me for that. Anyway. The lunch I never had with Alex Chesterman.
[00:08:10] Speaker A: Oh, that's a good story.
[00:08:15] Speaker E: Oh, gosh. Well, there's going to be certain ones that I won't be able to say on her, naturally, which I'll take a fair bit.
I would probably suggest taking a possession of a property in a suburb called Handsworth that time, meeting her bailiff.
And there was a family that was quite notorious at that time, that was in the neighbourhood.
Little did I know that we were actually coming at the bailiff orders on that particular property. So I remember turning up with the bailiff about 11, 11 30 in the morning, it was. And knocked on the door, and I was presented with an individual that had a shotgun.
[00:09:12] Speaker C: Oh, lord.
[00:09:13] Speaker E: And the individual was frothing at the mouth, and all that came out of my mouth was, I'm just the agent, he's. The bailiff pointed at them. So, yeah, yeah, plenty of those sort of things. But that was.
That was wit and, oh, wow.
[00:09:34] Speaker D: Save yourself at one moment in time.
[00:09:37] Speaker E: Which the bailiff didn't thank me for afterwards. But, yeah, that was my. That was one I could share with everybody.
[00:09:46] Speaker C: I think that's the thing is, in the lettings industry, we get so used to so many things happening that we then don't actually know what is not normal life anymore. But that will definitely be character building. And for all of our listeners, to ensure you never miss an episode of let's talk, let's please follow us on Spotify or wherever you listen to your pods.
[00:10:06] Speaker A: And please leave us a review.
[00:10:09] Speaker C: Thank you all so much for listening.
[00:10:13] Speaker A: Let's talk.
[00:10:13] Speaker C: Let's.
[00:10:14] Speaker A: An original podcast from the lettings hub.
