We spent the weekend house-hunting. Our present home and office suits us perfectly: town centre location, large garden, just off the sea front and newly modernised. That’s why we bought it, to renovate and make money, but it’s 5-up, 5-down and I go into some rooms once or twice a year. Thank goodness for a robot vacuum cleaner to keep it all clean. We could sell up and buy two or more houses with no mortgage, an attractive proposition. With this in mind a chunk of the week is spent trawling the ‘Net, Google-Earthing potential locations and trying to find the next one.

This weekend it was Eastbourne, home of the blue-rinse brigade and a university full of potential tenants. The only problem being we couldn’t find any part of the town we liked for us. We ask ourselves: “Would you live in this house If I paid off your mortgage and gave you £200,000?”. The answer was always a definite “No” apart from a house in Saffrons priced the same as the one we have to sell. After a lifetime with the sea at the end of the road we would miss seagulls: friendly, intelligent blighters who are useful as food scrap recyclers. Our present feathered dustbin, Steve (Segal, Beko, whoever) came with our house, has reared two offspring to whom he was a caring parent. He’s easy to live with apart from his penchant for red Rawlplugs. Closeness to the sea is our number one priority.

Willis or Clarkson
There was a cycle race on as we drifted along the sea front, we noticed all the male riders had one thing in common. Without exception they were shaven-headed. Apparently not because of wind resistance or safety helmet constraints but because they had the Bruce Willis pattern of baldness. Presumably their choice is either slaphead, toupee, fly-over or a reverse Mohican with a gap where there ought to be hair. As an old geezer twice the age of the cyclists, my hair follows the Jeremy Clarkson style. Full-face reflection shows a complete head of hair above a high forehead. Experience teaches not to use the mirrors in Marks and Sparks with one in front and another behind, to see oneself from the back. Also to never ever let the hairdresser show you your head from the back. I know hair is there because it was when I wore it shoulder-length so there is no need to see it now.

With all the mileage we do, a diesel car will prove far cheaper to run so every competition is entered to win the new Civic CTDi, a car that any self-respecting alien invader would feel at home in with it’s sci-fi dashboard and pocket rocket pretensions. We would be even better off not having to drive to view potential houses at all. Google Earth’s satellite’s viewpoint now shows most of the south coast in high resolution but cannot display what the area is really like. Estate agents talk up the good points forgetting the sewage farm next door or the 1 in 10 hill outside. What is really needed are short videos introducing the area.

Betjamen bombshell
The words friendly bombs and Slough come to mind but Betjamen did its residents a great disservice and for anyone who had never visited the town. With all the media studies degrees universities churn out, the skills base already exists to make videos. A quick tour around the town, focusing on its various areas, pointing out the local shops, schools and amenities. Then a drive down the road a house is for sale in, perhaps taken by the estate agent with their digital cameras used to make the brochure images.

Estate agents and firms like rightmove.co.uk are missing a trick here. We would like to see what other sea side towns are like but don’t want to spend all our free time driving, only to find we don’t like them. Towns of the Kent coast or Thames estuary have potential, Dover, Margate, Deal, Southend might all suit us if we could get a flavour of the towns without needing to visit them all. Streaming videos on estate agent sites would be a perfect substitute.