The Great British Fake Housing Crisis, Part 1. Mickey from Manchester Series, #19

England is a country obsessed by housing. Some people want to buy houses, some want to sell them. Everyone wants to make a profit, build up capital and, probably, create a pile of money they can retire on. Hopefully, too, leave to their offspring. In other words, nobody has any idea what they are doing and, as any business person will tell you, are therefore highly unlikely to succeed in their aims.
Mickey, trying to enjoy the quiet life in North Salford, keeps coming across these failures. Some of them are his oldest - and bestest - friends. Mostly, he doesn't mind, but his best friend Don is a policeman and he's been dragged into a feud between building firms. Then Mickey meets his really best friend, a man he hasn't seen for years. In that interim, the man has turned into a property mogul too.
Then Mickey is asked to work with and mentor a jailbird, a young man with a bright future and a disastrous past. The kid wants to build a house - on television. It's a grand idea, but his helpers seem far too committed to the vision. Are they being taken in? If only people weren't getting hurt - literally - Mickey might be able to walk away. But cuts, bruises, and then a real dead body, stand in his way.
Concerned, overwhelmed, he does what he does best - try to help. Unfortunately, it's just not good enough, this time.