To be a bit fuming at Escape To The Country

[jamoncrumpets]

Yes, yes, I know I am watching tv in the day and should be out working or volunteering or something, but both kids are ill so we're all having a down day today.

Anyway, I'm fuming because the couple (male, female) are viewing houses and every single time they walk into a kitchen the presenter says 'Well, will this do for you Sharon?' and then when they get to the outside space, garage etc, he turns to the man and says 'What do you think then, Nigel?'

The woman has already said that she isn't much of a cook. He's not letting her off the hook, he is absolutely DESPERATE to sell her a big old kitchen so she fit more neatly into her gender role.

I've never seen this show before, is it always like this? AIBU to want to take the presenter to a female boxing club and have him pummelled for a few bouts?

Middle class alternative to Jeremy Kyle

I don't think that's necessarily very fair Takeme and you could use the same argument for just about everything on TV. Why make a programme called America's Next Top Model when there are people with disfigurements and missing limbs? Why watch the Kardashians when they spend more on their baby's first birthday party than most families earn in a year? Why make Top Gear when most people have to take the bus?

In fact why watch the Kardashians for any reason whatsoever?

People are entitled to be picky about how they spend their money and buying a house is the biggest financial commitment you'll ever make, so it needs to feel right. And you don't know they've got more money than sense. Apart from people who inherit loads or win the lottery most people have come by their money precisely because they do have quite a bit of sense.

I really don't see why if you've got the money you should be berated for wanting a house with spare bedroom or two for occasional guests, nor why anyone over 65 is deemed to be mad to move to the country. How about quality of life? I've never seen anyone on the programme who didn't look like they could cope.

I hate it as its jusy old couples buying houses that are too big for them. Why people in their 60s with no children living at him need more than 2 bedrooms I'll never know.

😴. Oh here we go, yet again. The hard of thinking telling us how we should live our lives. Here’s a clue. Maybe we actually want more than two bedrooms. HTH.

tbd most of the time when they are talking about requirements of new house it is the woman who want big kitchen and he wants a garage and garden .Most of the people are retiring age where there is still very much pink and blue jobs in there relationship

Not only do some of us want (and can afford) more than two bedrooms but some of need them - our family of four plus partners couldn’t all stay with us together if we only had two bedrooms.

I want a woman cave.

It's called a she shed.

Today's ETTC episode features a couple in their 30s, former teachers with a budget of 850k but over a million "if it's right".

HOW?!

Exactly jelly Belly! Gits.

Lottery win? Inheritance?

Printing press in the She Shed?

Needless to say, the two male friends who bought a flat together in the same episode weren't given the same treatment!

I watched an old LLL the other day with a male couple on and there was much chat about extra room for a baby.

My parents are now heading towards 70 and thinking of moving from a small village into a town. I don’t understand why people retire to the country.

l've just watched an episode of EETC this afternoon (l think it was from yesterday, l recorded it) and the buyers were a young couple (in their late twenties-early 30s, l'd say) who had just got married and had "£700k to spend, but for the perfect property, we can go up to a million."
Where on earth do these people get that kind of money from?!

l think the episode l've just posted about may be the one JellyBellyyyyyyyyy just mentioned!

Live rural when young if that’s your dream. Near or preferably in a town or city when old. We need facilities that don’t require a car!

I just love the episodes in which the couple need an annexe for the elderly parent who’s going to be living with them. You can always tell that one half of the couple is less than thrilled to be bringing the MIL to live in their dream home.

then when they see the awful garage or tiny shed the mil or dil is expected to live in ! The comments between the child and s or dil are sometimes priceless.
Every now and then they find an annex that I’d be bloody delighted to live in myself.

It's usually the house-hunters that annoy me. They say they want a characterful, period, country cottage then moan about beams and small rooms.

And low ceilings and doorways, and the husband is always 6'7" or something!

My sister went on one of these programs not this one but a daytime one. Very funny as she has an expressive face on being shown one crap house bil politely gushing about it camera pans to my sister her face

Quite like Escape to the Country. Mostly because I'm nosey about other people's houses and I can take the couples with a pinch of salt. But one couple stood out for me.

He liked gardening and she felt it important to have room for visiting family. Not sure of their age, I'd have guessed over 70 as they were mobile but weren't agile. The houses they viewed were insane. One had about 1000 acres of garden, all slopes and different levels, and the (ginormous 500 bedroomed) house was also on multiple levels, steps and stairs everywhere. Multiple outbuildings too.

They loved it (was nice) I felt quite concerned for them envisioned a future of him collapsed in the garden too far from the house to call for help and her ending up confined to one room whilst the house fell apart around them and the mafia started a drug cartel in the outhouse. (Possibly over thought it.)

Worse property programme for irritating people and budget stupidity is Grand Designs. Here's Fluff and Tibbles, they have a budget of £53,699,876 they plan to level this perfectly nice house and built an "authentic" utter monstrosity out of a tyres covered with wattle and daub with giant doors and windows. They will project manage it themselves whilst living in a caravan for 7 years. On the return visit to the expensively decorated house we discover they laughingly overspend the budget by £1,579,899 which they magiced from nowhere

(Speaking of giant windows, saw one - some tower in central London - where the window was the size of the side of the house, so if you where in the kitchen and opened the window because you burnt the toast then it opened for anyone upstairs too.)

you forgot the bit about the couple inexplicably having another kid during the process when they are living in an old shed while the monstrosity is built

Oh yes I did forget the children!! No chickens though, don't think there's ever been chickens on Grand Designs.

@RedForShort "Ugly House to Lovely House" is becoming a contender for worst property show too.

A couple of weeks ago it had a couple on who had inherited their A-frame house bit kept going on about how embarrassing it looked and now much they hated it, (cue tiny violin).

They had a budget if 150k which they promptly overspent by another 150k, taking their total to 300k.

For all the sentimental value the house apparently had from childhood, they basically stripped it down and had something new built in its place.

Not even heard of Ugly House to Lovely House.

I shall seek it out!