[HPforGrownups] Lynn's questions

[manawydan]

No: HPFGUIDX 57028

Lynn wrote:

>1.  Now that Percy is working, is he paying his
>parents room and board?  Is that why he thinks
>everyone in the house has to be very quiet and
>why he doesn't have to share his room in GoF?

Given the Weasleys' tight financial situation, it would seem likely that
Molly and Arthur would want some sort of contribution out of his salary. Not
that the MoM pays very much. Arthur himself is pretty senior but the family
isn't well off. Bagman (who is even more senior) is chronically unable to
pay his debts. And I think there's a reference in Fantastic Beasts that the
author wrote the book to supplement his salary in the Ministry (someone will
doubtless correct me if I'm wrong on that...)

>2.  At what age do wizards move out from mummy
>and daddy's and get their own place?

I think that depends on what you believe about the "Hogwarts numbers
question". If you take one end of the discussion and consider that _all_ WW
children go there, then, given the lack of further or higher education, they
probably move out when they get a job at age 18 (or hang around if they
can't find anywhere suitable to live, can't be arsed to do their own
laundry, or any of the other reasons teenagers don't move out!) But
alternatively, if you accept the other end of the discussion, that only some
WW children go to Hogwarts and the others go into things like
apprenticeships, then the traditional age for children to do this in England
was in early teenage. The child would be bound apprentice and would go to
live in the master's house where they would stay during the traditional 7
years' apprenticeship. It's my favourite for the WW (given my stance on the
numbers question).

>3.  Are there special wizard realtors or do
>wizards have to deal with Muggle realtors when
>they want to buy a house?

I don't think they would deal with Muggles unless they wanted to take a
house out of the Muggle world. If they did, there would certainly have to be
a lot of magical confusion scattered, to make sure that the house
disappeared totally from the various Muggle records like the Land Registry,
the Council Tax register, the voting list register, etc, etc. But I suspect
that wizards pay cash.

Alternatively, perhaps wizards build their own homes, or have them built for
them (my wholly non-canonical suggestion is that you would buy in the
goblins to do your building for you). The big problem with a Muggle home
would be that it's built with technology rather than magic, there's
eckeltricity in all the rooms, the stairs go straight up and down, the rooms
are the same size inside as out, something to tax even a wizardly Lawrence
Llewellyn Bowen in converting it :-)

I'll leave your other questions for others...

Cheers

Ffred

O Benryn wleth hyd Luch Reon
Cymru yn unfryd gerhyd Wrion
Gwret dy Cymry yghymeiri