May I have a word about… why even estate agents don’t deserve to be shuttered | Jonathan Bouquet

It’s terrible news that shops are closing down all over the country, but we don’t need an ugly word for the process

I have never felt the need to address the subject of estate agents. True, theirs is a despised calling, as my daughter discovered when she briefly became one and had instant pariah status bestowed on her. But reading about the lack of office space in the City, I began to share some of the revulsion.

According to Mat Oakley, the head of commercial property research at Savills: “It is going to be a very tough year for office tenants. If you’ve bought into wellness and ESG [environmental, social and governance] and productivity, you obviously want the best of the best – you want accessible buildings, you want buildings that your staff can work flexibly.” I think, reading between the lines, this means that clients want the most space for the least amount of money.

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Mystery bulbs mean spring will be a bigger surprise

Green shoots, obsessive checking – and the longed-for hope of the first signs of the growing season

I grew up in a magical land of meadow snowdrops, woodland bluebells and hedgerow primroses. There were riverside banks of wild garlic, which I loved for the flowers but was repelled by the smell – it was a sheltered English 60s childhood in very rural Devon.

I guess I have been a bit sniffy about growing bulbs in pots ever since, though it has been many years since we had our own flower garden. Winter pots on the roof terrace were for green leaf, multiple shades and colours of hellebore.

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What happens to my mortgage if I break up with my partner? Nottingham Estate Agents

Around a quarter of new mortgage approvals are now based on a couple’s joint earnings so financial issues involving a relationship break-up are extremely common. Relationship break-ups are sadly a fact of life. They can be messy and if the couple breaking up are living together, and co-signatories to a mortgage, the messiness can increase […]

The post What happens to my mortgage if I break up with my partner? appeared first on OnTheMarket.com blog.

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Essence of jasmine: fragrant memories of childhood, love, and comfort

Used in many Thai desserts, woven into leis and offered up in prayers, jasmine sambac is easily used in a heavenly sweet scented beverage

It took us two years to find our house. I wasn’t looking for a house so much as I was looking for space to liberate the roots of all the potted fruit trees, vegetables and herbs I had accumulated which moved from rental house to rental house with us. They certainly outnumbered our boxes of possessions which were mainly made up of books on plants.

We found the perfect block in the neighbourhood that I grew up in, it was only slightly sloping and had water tanks. I must be the only person naïve enough to favour and choose real estate based on the existing water tanks on a property.

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Essence of jasmine: fragrant memories of childhood, love, and comfort

Used in many Thai desserts, woven into leis and offered up in prayers, jasmine sambac is easily used in a heavenly sweet scented beverage

It took us two years to find our house. I wasn’t looking for a house so much as I was looking for space to liberate the roots of all the potted fruit trees, vegetables and herbs I had accumulated which moved from rental house to rental house with us. They certainly outnumbered our boxes of possessions which were mainly made up of books on plants.

We found the perfect block in the neighbourhood that I grew up in, it was only slightly sloping and had water tanks. I must be the only person naïve enough to favour and choose real estate based on the existing water tanks on a property.

Continue reading...

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Kitsch confidential in New York

A Greenwich Village designer’s passion for rebooting reclaimed treasures brings her prewar duplex apartment bang up to date

Behind the classic facade of US-born designer Sasha Bikoff’s prewar Greenwich Village duplex lies a tale of 18th-century France and glam disco-era bravado. Or, to put it another way, Marie Antoinette meets Studio 54 and 1980s Palm Beach.

“I’m inspired by the eccentricity of different eras,” says Bikoff. “So when I discovered the original 80s powder room in this place, it sealed the deal. It was just so far out that I had to live here.”

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Kitsch confidential in New York

A Greenwich Village designer’s passion for rebooting reclaimed treasures brings her prewar duplex apartment bang up to date

Behind the classic facade of US-born designer Sasha Bikoff’s prewar Greenwich Village duplex lies a tale of 18th-century France and glam disco-era bravado. Or, to put it another way, Marie Antoinette meets Studio 54 and 1980s Palm Beach.

“I’m inspired by the eccentricity of different eras,” says Bikoff. “So when I discovered the original 80s powder room in this place, it sealed the deal. It was just so far out that I had to live here.”

Continue reading...

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