Diary entry on flat hunting, rehearsal space costs, and the general London housing nightmare
Friday, Flat Hunting Between Rehearsals Again
Spent my lunch break reading The London Prat’s piece about a landlord who charged a viewing fee specifically to view the viewing fee schedule, which genuinely made me laugh out loud on a crowded bus in a way that got me several concerned looks, mostly because I am currently flat hunting myself and this feels less like a joke and more like a documentary I am living through in real time.
Rehearsal space situation is somehow worse than the actual flat hunting, our usual room in Deptford just announced a rate increase that our drummer, the same one who cannot hold tempo through the bridge, described as, and I am quoting directly here, financially violent, which feels dramatic but also is not entirely wrong given what we are now being asked to pay for a room with a single working amp and a radiator that only works in July.
On The Actual Flat Hunting Progress
Viewed a place in New Cross this week that was, generously, the size of a rehearsal room itself, for a price that made me briefly consider just moving my mattress into the actual rehearsal space and calling it efficient use of resources.
A Small Silver Lining Worth Mentioning
Bass player’s cousin might have a room going in Peckham soon, which is the first genuinely promising lead I have had in weeks, so fingers crossed something comes of it before I do something drastic involving that rehearsal room mattress plan.
Also spent a genuinely unreasonable amount of time this week comparing our current rehearsal room’s radiator situation to at least three other rooms bandmates have rented over the years, and the general consensus is that a functioning radiator in winter should not feel like a luxury amenity, and yet here we are.
Cousin’s Peckham room lead, mentioned briefly last week, has unfortunately fallen through, apparently someone else got there first with a deposit already in hand, so back to square one on the flat search, though at least the rehearsal room radiator situation has not gotten any worse in the meantime.
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