A Glimmer of hope for all renters...

[bonniethomas06]

I am sure I am not the only isher who is not yet in a position to buy a house/garden of my own. It is relly frustrating sometimes when your land is not your own, and you feel asthough things have to be put on hold until you can buy your own patch.

My BF and I were about to consign ourselves to having to give up our flock of chooks (currently residing in my parents back garden) when we moved into a place of our own, as no landlord was happy to allow even 3 - even in gardens which were purely put to lawn (and not even nice manicured lawn).

It seems chooks' reputations go before them.

But then we happened to drive past a gorgeous old house in a little village, about three miles out of town, with a to let sign. We have now paid the deposit and will be moving in on oct 1st

The best is that the landlady (a very nice woman with horsey business in her early 40's) is more than happy for us to have hens, and to do what we like to the garden (provided it goes back to something sensible when we leave). I guess for her, the happier and more settled we are, the longer we will stay.

Does anyone else have experiences of nice easygoing landlords like this? Or the opposite?

[Cassiepod]

I've got a good one up here. The cottage we rent is part of a family owned estate. Before we moved in they re-did the old bathroom, put in an en-suite, laid new carpet throughout and redecorated throughout. It was pretty grotty before hand and we were resigned to deep cleaning and stuff so ti was fabulous. the garden in not defined so we can look after as much or as little as we like and we have a run of ould stables/outbuiidligns to keep old vehicles and stuff in it's fabulous, we're very very lucky. The only problem is I don't want to leave.... but it doesn't make sense financlially to be renting forever...

[StripyPixieSocks]

Seems like the morning (well... afternoon now) for good news, that's great and good news for your Chickies too!

Good luck with the move :D

We're about to move go and view a house on the 1st October in Cornwall and we will get to meet our new landlord then so we can't say either way yet but we're hoping he's going to be nice.

Sadly the cottage we want doesn't have a back garden and infact has no back door but it does have a rather large front garden and we're looking at it as a long term stop gap until we find somewhere with a garden more locally.

There's always allotments and a nearby town put about £60,000 into new allotments a couple of years ago so we know there are some around!

[Millymollymandy]

Really pleased for you Bonnie and good luck as well SPS!

[Gem]

Its nice to know that there is some hope out there for us renters. I am hoping to move out westcountry way sometime in the future where everything sees a bit more manageable than here in ol' Reading. At the moment I pay a fortune for rent, have 'orrible neighbours and cant touch the lawn even if i offer to resurface it..

Bum..

So happy I managed to get the allotment!!!!

[bodrighy]

We have a place in Cornwall with 1/4 acre of garden (albeit untended for 8 years) a pond, and a hedge of plum trees and out nearest neighbours are 1/4 mile away. Our landlady is a darling. When we asked about keeping chickens her only comment was "Of course you can" she then pointed to the pond and said with a sly grin, " ducks would do well as well". She then introduced us to her friend three fields away (who keeps free range hens comercially) who supplied us with free chickens a year old to get us started....an ongoing thing as when we recently asked if she had any POL we were told that if we were ready for more we could have them, again free. so we have another 4 coming in. OK they don't lay as often as POL but they are free, fun and supply us with all the eggs we need. We are seriously thnking of the ducks now as we have a serious slug problem, most or veg planted ths year went to them.

All for £600 a month which by todays standards is a bargain. Places are there you just need to keep looking and strike when you fnd it.

Pete

[bonniethomas06]

Bum indeed Gem, get yourself down this neck of the woods (Wiltshire etc)- I rented in Reading for a while once and found that most landlords are professionals - i.e buy to let and don't get involved with meeting tenents etc...and just impose a straightforward ban accross all of their properties.

Agents aren't interested in negotiating on your behalf either. I guess there is less of a buy to let market in rural areas 'cos the price of houses don't make it viable...and therefore landlords are more likely to be individuals renting a second house (or in this case, a spare house on their huge estate).

Good luck though. Ducks! I would LOVE ducks but I heard that althgough they eat slugs, they also destroy plants with their flat little feet? Aww.

[Millymollymandy]

I'd never let my ducks near my veg patch anymore than I'd let my hens in there! The hens would dig it all for me, seedlings and all whilst eating half the greens, and the ducks would squash the rest whilst eating all the greens.