Weirdest thing a house seller has got upset about you changing?

[CruCru]

I’ve just been doing some gardening and was thinking about a woman who dropped by our house a few years ago. We were on our way out so didn’t ask her in. She told us some of the history of the house (interesting) but got quite upset when she mentioned some tiles she’d put in and we had no idea what she was talking about. Presumably the people before us had ripped them out.

We didn’t like to mention all the stuff we did to fix the dodgy electrics.

Another friend had some people get very cross when she changed some things in the garden (not concreting it or putting in that plastic grass). Just putting in some different plants.

What about you?

One of our old houses had a small, compact tree in the front garden. No overhang over the neighbour's garden and rather overshadowed by some trees in the neighbour's garden which overhung a public path and were generally a mess. As we drove away we saw the neighbour in the garden chopping down our tree. No idea why and nothing came of it.

I'm in the odd situation where my DS bought our old house from us and lives there. It was the house DH and I bought when we married and the house he was raised in.

Must admit it's a strange feeling when you visit, it still looks like our house but it's his and his partners furniture etc.
He did want to chop a beautiful lilac tree in the garden and I told him I'd chop his fingers off if he did 😂 but other than that it's their home and their taste.

You may have sold to my mum! 20 years later she bitterly regrets it and has bought a new one which is in its third year and she has high hopes for!

I think some people see changes to their old home as a criticism of them, their taste, their choices. DM was very offended that the new owner of her old house had changed the front garden.

Also I think there is a lot of rose tinted hindsight. That lovely garden, wallpaper, carpet may have looked very different once memories and furniture were removed and the weeds, scuffs, holes are visible especially to a less sentimental eye.

The family house dd and SiL bought had a mature 90 foot garden with lots of beautiful plants and shrubs - but no lawn at all, just gravel and several rathet itsy bitsy brick or stone ‘features’.
Since they had two very tiny dcs the garden had to be made child friendly, which meant removing most of the ‘features’ plus one tree, and laying turf.
Unfortunately the former owner, a widower, who’d moved 200 miles away, chose to come back for a visit just when that tree was being cut down. He was evidently upset since the garden had been a great live of his wife 😢but the tree would have been in the middle of the new lawn.
Dd and Sil did retain virtually all her planting though.
On the plus side, I’m sure the lack of a child friendly garden in what is a 1920s family house (plus the fact that it was a doer-upper) meant that other buyers were put off, so it was up for sale for many months and eventually reduced to a price that dd and Sil could afford.

Not all that strange - we're currently selling a flat we're not living in at the moment, and I've gathered the keys from DS, DD and my sister and thought I had them all. I just found another set of keys in a bag I haven't used for months. If I hadn't happened to use it, it could easily not have been found before the flat was sold.

I didn't so much mean the finding of another set of keys so much as the 'idea' to come back and let yourself in once it belongs to somebody else, which is rather 'convenient' having 'mislaid' the keys earlier! That really does sound to me like it was planned all along - completely different from coming across an old set that you wouldn't dream of using again, now that it isn't your house any more.

I'm so confused, your daughter and sister in law?!

My cousin lives in my grandparents house and her parents lived there before she did. I find it hard to visit as it's not my grandparents house anymore but clearly that was years ago so I'd never say anything. Tbh they've definitely improved the old pile but even the layout is different, feels so weird even after all this time! (Over 20 years lol)

@1moreyear I presume she means Son in Law

I still park outside my old house to walk the rest of the way to school. I can't believe the fence is still standing tbh lol. The buyers also made a fuss about a crack in the brickwork (it's only brick facing on a timber frame house so not structural) I notice it's still there 3 years after we moved.

The garden was honestly crap as I hate gardening but they've done even less than me, the Ivy has taken over the shed and threatening to work it's way into the house.

I'm glad I don't live there anymore tbh, cheap old 1970s ex council houses are hard work!

My Mum’s old next door neighbours sold their house to another family and then were shocked when the new owners changed the locks right away. I think they thought they would be able to pop in every now and then (God knows why).

They we’re also quite upset because the new owners hadn’t wanted any of their furniture.

Of course 🤦🏽‍♀️ sorry having a very dim moment!

I think they thought they would be able to pop in every now and then (God knows why).

The previous owners here - who may have tried to enter post sale - didn't do any postal re-direct - not letting companies know or do a royal mail re-direct and months after sale we still got most of their post.

They left no forwarding address so we did return to sender - which is usually best way of getting companies to use new address if they have it and aren't using which has happened to us.

18 months after sale DVLA wrote - we sent it back - neighbour came round on behalf on previous owners could we look our for a DVLA letter and pass it to them err no already sent back - horrified outrage - in future we should give all post to next door. That events id stop the important looking post being sent here.

I do wonder if they thought they could pop back let themselves in and still use our address for post. Though why they didn't twig there weren't getting their post post move is beyond me.

I sometimes look at houses I've owned in the past on Rightmove. I sold a Victorian semi, with a classic garden, apple tree, beautiful mature shrubs, and careful planting to encourage and support wildlife, pollinators, birds etc.

Now, everything has gone (including the apple tree) and its straight up and down lawn, with zero foliage, looks bleak and supports no wildlife at all. Dissapointing.

I'm not a nutter that would actually go round and comment though.

I'm not a nutter that would actually go round and comment though. 😂

I used to live in a Victorian cottage. I put in a bespoke iroko hard wood front door with brass fittings. I lovingly oiled the wood and polished the brass regularly and it was beautiful. The buyers glossed it grey and replaced the brass with black metal fittings. Entirely their prerogative and to their taste but i could have cried. They were very young FTB so I sometimes wonder if they didn’t quite realise what they had. I suspect that in years to come a future buyer will strip it back and be delighted with what they find.

It’s odd but it’s clear in these posts that even though people sell and move on they still feel a sense of ownership to their previous home. However not one has said “because I feel like this I’ve not changed a thing in my new house so the old owners don’t get upset”.

it’s like folks feel they can change what they want in their own home, but no one else really should be doing the same thing.

every single person who changes something, does so as they feel they are changing it for the better. No one does it becayse they prefer it to look like a bag of shite.😂

im fairly sure the people complaining have changed things in their current homes where the previous owners would be aghast.

We had a beautiful heavy wood front door with brass fittings in our house when I was younger.

I've since seen pictures of the house online and they've gutted the life out of it, but the thing that made me sad was that they replaced that lovely front door with a shiny white PVC monstrosity 😢

Some friends bought their house off an older man. When they arrived on completion day, he was still there with all his stuff. He was quite upset that they wouldn’t let him store all his old furniture in their house (he was downsizing). However, perhaps that’s for a separate thread.

I detest wisteria. I would have done the same

I did the opposite. I ripped out an old rambling rose climber and planted wisteria instead, 😃

Oh god! Did he take it with him in the end?

I remember this thread. I believe it was removed after the nosey neighbour got violent or damaged their new fence at the front of their house. I also remember issues with parking and general stalking. The OP was an American living in a village and I don’t think the neighbours wanted her and her husband to change anything about the house they moved into.

I wonder if she'd previously lived in our house. We arrived to discover a new cheap loo seat had been fitted - they'd left all the wrappings and instructions. Noetuer dh not I had noticed anything special about the one that had been there when we viewed. However going by the general lack of cleanliness when we moved in, we were happy to have a new one!!

My neighbours are like this a little, not to this extreme, but they do like to see what we are up to and cast judgment, which often goes along the lines of much teeth sucking, shaking of heads and “well I can see why you did it, it looks better but I’d not have done that,”. Um we didn’t ask or invite you over so fuck off.

I can’t quite grasp it. Do t get me wrong we can all be a bit nosey about what the joneses at number nine are doing, maybe even talk about it between ourselves, but it takes a special type of —nutter— entitlement to go and ask to have a look then declare your opinion. 😂