There's a housing crisis (read: too many people for not enough houses) across the country, and you might be feeling it, especially if you live in a place where houses and flat are being built, but they're all luxury ones which have maybe a handful of 'affordable' homes, where 'affordable' actually means 'a little bit less expensive than the other places we've built and can you use a separate entrance please and oh yes you're not allowed into the garden'.
Which brings us to the fact that someone has listed a campbed in their kitchen as a legitimate place to live. Yes, for just £400 a month, you can live on a fold-out camp-bed in a flat, right next to the breakfast bar, in a flat that's about 5-10 minutes' bus ride from Kingston, zone six (FYI that's a 40 minute train journey to central London).
The advert came with this blurb: 'PLEASE notice is not a room, Is single bed in shared kitchen'.
The poster of the advert, Joe, added: 'You can use your own entrance from the garden, if you wish.'
Reporters at i100 tried to enquire, but they didn't have the paid-for 'premium' account needed to contact Joe. Besides, the advert has now been taken down by SpareRoom.co.uk.
That isn't a great thing, though, as a spokesperson said: 'This is another sign of how bad the housing crisis has become. This isn’t just one of the most bizarre ads we’ve seen, it’s also a huge invasion of privacy.
'No one should have to sleep in a kitchen, and no one should have to pass through a bedroom to get to a communal area.'
We'd hope bloody not! The new government promised in its manifesto to build 200,00 'starter' homes to help ease the housing crisis. Let's see how they get on.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.