The Landlady is bouncing all the way to the bank

At the beginning of this year, I decided that 2012 was going to be a man-free year. Having had men around, more or less without a break since I was 14, I am curious to see if I’ll achieve more without my eye and mind wandering in the male direction. If nothing else, I’ll save on the air fares to Cuba, where my last boyfriend was based.

OK, you finger-pointers, I know I had a bit of a fall from the man-free wagon almost at the first hurdle during January in New York, but that doesn’t count because it was, erm… well, in New York, and what goes on tour stays on tour.

“Will I achieve more without my eye and mind wandering in the male direction?”

It’s not as if I haven’t got enough on which to concentrate, with the clearing-out and sale of my mum’s house in Stoke-On-Trent to contend with. My dear cousin, who is the executor of my mum’s will, is being snail-paced at getting things sorted, in spite of being a man in a high-powered job. But then, you know what they say about men and multi-tasking, which I assume also applies to high-powered men. He blames the slow-grinding probate machine. I’m always amazed that lawyers take so long to get stuff done. I often think it’s a good job that they don’t work in sandwich bars, or we’d all starve.

Last week, my cousin finally sent me a cheque for the funeral expenses, which I paid for in October. I then used the money to pay my overdue tax bill at the end of January, only to find out that, five days later, the cheque had bounced, thus annoying my bank and the Inland Revenue in one fell swoop.

All this has made me think that I’ve been getting a little ahead of myself and I’ve decided to take my one bedroom flat off the market, as it was getting little interest at the price it was on for. Conversely, I had little interest in selling it at the price buyers were offering for it, which makes me suspect that it was over-valued initially. I worked out that once I’d sold it for a lower price and paid the Capital Gains Tax on it, it would barely be worth selling. I am now trying to work out how to raise some money in order to fund the purchase and renovation of another studio flat and have decided that re-mortgaging could be the way forward.

Back in the ’90s, I was re-mortgage Queen, so it will be interesting to see if my old lenders will love me as much in this new, cooler climate.

Illustration: Jake McDonald www.shakeyillustrations.blogspot.com