Cebu Estate Agents Demand Character References From Pensioners
Sandals now count as evidence, say Home Counties retirees
CEBU CITY — Geoffrey Pargeter, 71, retired from Reigate to the Philippines in the spring, and this week he was asked to supply two referees, a utility bill and a letter from his vicar before a woman in a lanyard would let him look at a bathroom.
“Two bedrooms, sea view, and apparently I need a testimonial,” Pargeter said, holding a folder of paperwork outside a tower on the Mactan side of the city. “I haven’t been vetted this hard since I joined the golf club, and the golf club had a waiting list.”
The change in manner among local agents followed news that Philippine authorities are investigating Thomas Markle Sr., the estranged father of the Duchess of Sussex, over allegations that he possessed child sexual abuse material at a former home in Cebu. The Justice Department has confirmed its anti-trafficking task force is examining the matter. The Guardian reported further details on Sunday. No charges have been filed, and the allegations are unproven.
Protecting children is not in question. What has Cebu’s property trade rattled is how quickly one man’s name became a guess about every other Englishman holding a Panama hat.
Cebu Estate Agents
- The Philippines has found a brand new way to put off the British retiree: make him prove he’s not the other British retiree. That’s the Home Counties in a nutshell. Everyone’s a suspect and nobody’s allowed to say why.
- Estate agents used to ask about your budget. Now they ask if you’ve got a vicar. If you’ve got a vicar, you’re in. If you’ve got a barrister, you’re also in. If you’ve got a vicar who is also a barrister, they give you the penthouse.
- A man retires to Portugal and he’s sophisticated. Retires to Spain and he’s got a tan. Retires to Cebu and someone wants to inspect his hard drive. It’s all Excel. It’s always Excel.
- Estate agent’s slogan: “Come for the sunshine, stay because the neighbours still haven’t decided what they think of you.” That’s every English village, but with better weather.
- The new listing says: two beds, sea view, balcony and no association with anyone you’ve read about this week. Every property in Britain should be advertised like that. “Quiet cul-de-sac, no association with anyone off the telly.”
British Retirees in Cebu Face a Sudden Trust Problem
Until last week the pitch needed very little. A British pensioner could sell a semi in Surrey, buy a two-bed flat above a palm-lined bay, hire a cleaner for the price of a pub lunch and still have money left over to complain about the breakfast.
That arrangement worked because nobody asked questions. Now they ask nothing else.
“Last month, clients wanted to know about the lift,” said Priscilla Montecillo, an agent at a Cebu firm that serves foreign buyers. “This month, they want to know whether the previous tenant had a Telegraph subscription. I’ve had one man ask if a building can be ‘tainted by association.’ I said the only thing tainted in this building is the lobby carpet.”
Her firm now keeps a laminated sheet on the desk titled Frequently Asked Anxieties. Item one is “Will my neighbours think I’m him?” Item two is “Can I put a plaque on the door saying I’m a retired dentist?”
Retirees Try to Look as Innocent as Possible
Several pensioners have adopted what Montecillo calls “the Surrey posture.” It involves a cardigan, an umbrella in full sunshine and a loud, unprompted conversation about the cricket.
“It’s entirely a visual thing,” said Alan Tuckett, 68, a retired quantity surveyor who now arrives at viewings carrying a Tupperware of sandwiches. “Nobody looks at a man with a sandwich box and thinks, there goes a criminal mastermind. They think, there goes a man who’s going to ask where to find proper tea.”
Why One Case Gets Applied to Every Pensioner
Psychologists have understood the effect for fifty years. In their 1973 paper on the availability heuristic, Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman showed that people estimate how common something is by how easily an example comes to mind. A single dramatic case outweighs the rest of the evidence.
In Cebu the example is lodged firmly. Every pensioner in a short-sleeved shirt is now measured against it, including the ones who moved out to be closer to a good fishing guide.
Philippine Retirement Visa Holders Do Not Recognise the Crisis
The Philippines has courted overseas pensioners for decades through the Philippine Retirement Authority and its Special Resident Retiree’s Visa. The scheme exists to bring retirees in, and it has done so with some success.
The visa office has not reported a change in applications this week. Property statistics have been similarly unhelpful. In July, Colliers described the Visayas and Mindanao as a key property investment hotspot, and developers continue to launch towers.
Agents say this proves nothing.
“The figures say we’re fine,” Montecillo said. “The atmosphere says otherwise, and the atmosphere is what buys the flat.”
Foreign Buyers Already Cannot Own the Land
Retirees have a separate difficulty. Under Republic Act 4726, the Condominium Act, foreigners may own units but not the land beneath them, and their share of any project is capped at 40 percent. It is, by most accounts, a lot of paperwork for a man who wanted to sit by the sea.
“I came here to get away from forms,” Pargeter said. “I spent forty years at a building society. I know what a form looks like. And now there’s a second form, to prove I’m not somebody I’ve never met.”
Filipino Neighbours Remain Unmoved
Local residents, it should be said, are the calmest people in the whole story. Cebu is a city of nearly a million, with its own economy, its own housing demand and its own priorities, none of which involve the British royal family.
“One foreigner is in the news and suddenly the whole island has a reputation?” said Ligaya Dumdum, who runs a sari-sari store near the tower. “We have millions of people. Most of us are at work.”
She added that foreign pensioners had their own way of upsetting her.
“They all ask for a proper cup of tea. I sell Milo.”
On the central question she was clear. “Investigate anyone who hurts children. Protect the children. But the beach didn’t do anything.”
One Viewing Ends Without a Reference
On Sunday afternoon Montecillo showed a flat to a 66-year-old retired solicitor from Harrogate. She had her referee folder ready. He had brought none.
“Aren’t you going to ask for references?” she said.
“I’m a solicitor,” he said. “I don’t trust anyone’s.”
He made an offer on the spot, 8 percent under asking.
10 Humorous Observations on the Cebu Pensioner Panic
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Cebu Condo Sales Amid Media Drama Sandals with socks have officially become circumstantial evidence. It’s the first time in British history the sandals-and-socks look has come under investigation by anyone other than my wife.
- The Daily Mail discovers a pensioner owns a laptop and the entire Philippine property market gets the vapours. It’s the only industry that’s weaker than the English cricket middle order.
- A condominium can survive a typhoon, an earthquake and a banking crisis. It can’t survive one front page. Concrete takes a bad review harder than a restaurant.
- Retired quantity surveyors are the worst off. They turn up with a tape measure, a clipboard and a mild sense of grievance. That’s not a criminal profile, that’s a Wednesday.
- “Golden Years Beach Resort” has changed its name to “We Have No Reason To Believe Anyone Here Did Anything Court.” It’s not a great brand, but it’s the only honest one on the island.
- You spend forty years in a building society, you move to paradise, and your biggest liability is your demographic. And I thought my pension was the problem.
- One man makes the news and now a hundred and ten million people have to prove they’re not him. That’s not a conclusion, that’s a WhatsApp group.
- The locals are calm because they’ve got real worries, like a British man watering his lawn during a typhoon. Nobody tells him. He thinks he’s helping.
- The only person who comes out of this well is the Harrogate solicitor, who trusts nobody, took 8 percent off and slept like a baby.
- The beach has been there for millions of years. It has never once been accused of anything. It’s the most trustworthy party in the whole transaction and it still won’t get a mortgage.
This article is satire. The Philippine Justice Department has confirmed an investigation into allegations concerning Thomas Markle Sr.; no charges have been filed and the allegations are unproven. The agents, retirees, residents and all quotations in this piece are fictional, and there is no verified collapse of the Philippine property market. Nothing here is meant to accuse British or other foreign retirees as a group. Child protection and fair investigation are serious matters.
Alan Nafzger was born in Lubbock, Texas, the son Swiss immigrants. He grew up on a dairy in Windthorst, north central Texas. He earned degrees from Midwestern State University (B.A. 1985) and Texas State University (M.A. 1987). University College Dublin (Ph.D. 1991). Dr. Nafzger has entertained and educated young people in Texas colleges for 37 years. Nafzger is best known for his dark novels and experimental screenwriting. His best know scripts to date are Lenin’s Body, produced in Russia by A-Media and Sea and Sky produced in The Philippines in the Tagalog language. In 1986, Nafzger wrote the iconic feminist western novel, Gina of Quitaque. He currently lives in Holloway, North London. Contact: [email protected]
