While working on my latest book, The aGent, I’ve been looking back over forty years in estate agency — a career that took me into hundreds of homes and introduced me to more characters than I could ever have imagined when I first walked into the office as a young negotiator.
People often think estate agency is about houses.
In truth, it’s about people.
Every front door opens onto a different world, and sometimes you find yourself standing in the middle of moments you couldn’t possibly make up — even if you tried.
One of the chapters in the book tells the story of a visit to a very respectable couple who lived in a lovely detached house with a beautiful garden. Everything about the place suggested quiet, comfortable retirement.
Tea was poured, polite conversation was exchanged, and I began to make notes for the valuation.
Then I noticed a framed photograph on the windowsill.
It showed the couple in their garden, smiling broadly for the camera, clearly enjoying themselves.
There was only one small detail that made the picture rather memorable.
They were both completely naked.
And one of them was being pushed around the garden in a wheelbarrow.
It was at that moment I realised that in this job you never really knew what you were going to find when you walked through someone’s front door.
Stories like this — funny, surprising, sometimes touching, and occasionally unbelievable — are at the heart of The aGent, a light-hearted look at life as an estate agent during a time when the world, and the housing market, felt very different to today.
If you enjoyed this, there are plenty more stories waiting — some lighter, some darker, all drawn from real moments and observations.
If you’re new here, you can start with a few favourites on the “Start Here” page.
New stories are added regularly — follow along so you don’t miss the next one.
More Memoir Memories: What 40 years as an Estate Agent in Pembrokeshire Really Taught me about people.
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