Every househunter needs a Kirstie or Phil of their own

Buying a home is one of life’s most stressful experiences and most of us are out there flying blind. Helen Coffey asks why we can’t all have a crack team to help us make decisions

- Helen Coffey

“We don’t know anything about buying property. We’ve seen a lot of flats that, before we’ve even had a chance to discuss, we got a phone call to say that it’s been sold already.”

Hearing this on the first episode of the new series of Location, Location, Location, I could have been listening to myself three years ago. Like Danit and Rafi, a young couple attempting to buy their first home, in 2021 I was blundering my way through the stressful and opaque underworld of house-hunting with a naivety that, looking back, bordered on stupidity.

“It’s just hard to find something that we like and then move quickly enough and confidently enough,” says Rafi. “We lack in confidence, for sure,” Danit agrees.

Their experience is so similar to mine, in fact, that it’s almost spooky. I too was a first-time buyer, house-hunting in a popular southern seaside town, battling with a frenzied market that moved so swiftly I practically developed whiplash. Unless you were refreshing Rightmove on an hourly basis and booking a viewing within minutes of a property going online, you hadn’t a hope in hell of ever seeing it in the flesh. But that’s where the similarities abruptly ended, because I, of course, didn’t have a Phil Spencer or a Kirstie Allsopp by my side. I just had – shudder – estate agents.

“It’s a big, scary decision, and you’ve not done it before,” Phil, co-presenter of the popular Channel 4 show, reassures the doeeyed young couple keen to purchase a one-bed flat in Brighton or Hove. “I’ve got some good things lined up, but they do sell. But I’m not going to put any pressure on you.”