Meeting the neighbours before buying a house?

[Pigtailsandall]

OK, I'm very prepared for people to tell me I'm being weird or to not to do this, but would it be very strange to knock on a potential new neighbour's door before buying a house?

We have moved from London to a nearby market town where everyone so far has been very friendly. We have found a house which is ideal - it is a 1930s semi, and earlier this week, our offer for it was accepted!

Now, our old London neighbours were horrible. They played loud music and had parties almost every weekend in their garden; they also did some structural work in their house without a party wall agreement. They were bullies who complained about everything - and I really mean everything - our tree dropping a few leaves on their side, the fact that we left the house too early (at 8am to go to work) but then let their dogs bark in the garden from 6pm. So, understandibly, I am very cautious about having nightmare neighbours again. And with a semi, you share a wall and see into each other's gardens etc. even though the area otherwise is very quiet.

So I thought, would it be very strange to knock on the neighbours door to say hello and introduce ourselves before the contracts are exchanged? Just to suss them out (and they might be curious about us too!)

Edit to say - if you lived in a semi where the other side was on market, how would you feel about this?

Oh and just quickly - our offer has been accepted and lawyers are working away, so unless anything drastic happens we will buy the house. I wouldn't do it with every house I saw, just this now that the offer has been accepted

No-one wants horrible neighbours but meeting them doesn't mean they aren't loud and inconsiderate. It also doesn't mean they can't move and someone awful move in. Luck of the draw.

I don't think it's that weird to do although I have never done it or had it done to us before purchase.

Just, it's such a tiny snapshot. The last time new neighbours popped round (after moving in) we were still in our PJs so they probably have us pigeonholed as lazy buggers. They'd not be wrong TBF, but on that particular day we'd only got back from holiday at 3am.

I agree with this. If someone knocked and asked about the neighbourhood, I’d be perplexed they were doing this and couldn’t be bothered to scope the neighbourhood themselves. If they asked about the house, I’d suggest they get a survey done. If they purchased I’d avoid them like the plague for fear they would always be at my door wondering about some silly shit they could sort out themselves.

We always get on with (normal) neighbours, but that means having nothing to do with them unless we need to work together on a fence that’s falling down or similar. Neighbours are not friends, you choose friends but not neighbours. We have had two sets of neighbours over the decades that ended up becoming friends, that we still see even though we are no longer neighbours, but that was due to organic interactions having kids the same age who played together and we truly liked and got on with them (not always the case with people with kids the same age). Someone knocking at my door wanting to chat would not induce friendship.

My last neighbour was unhinged. We had a school on our road, she’d come out shouting and raving at people who stopped across her drive; she shouted at my estate agent when they cut across the path and stepped on her drive; and shouted at viewers who were talking at the front door for making too much noise. I sold the house to someone who viewed when she was on holiday-my biggest fear was they would knock on her door and introduce themselves. I’d definitely recommend you do it

I’d think it was weird as though you were interviewing me for the role of neighbour and, if you moved in, I think I’d avoid you!

I think this is an odd thing to do. If you are worried about loud music etc then you aren’t going to be able to establish whether that will be an issue so not sure what you will achieve.

If someone knocked on my door about something like that I would be put off them immediately.

I would do it if you can think of a valid excuse, eg the app who asked about an extension?

if you can invent a reason it will come across better than you just wanting to suss them out!

I think do this. Dress it up as asking about traffic or parking or flood risk, etc.

If prospective neighbours knocked on my door to ask questions, I’d think them weird and I’d slightly worried they were going to be interfering or nosey.

Not weird at all, I did this before buying my house. I wanted to see who I was going g to live in close proximity to.

Definitely a good idea. You can ask questions about the area plus get a feeling as to how friendly or otherwise they appear.
I have a new neighbour and met her a couple of times before she moved in.

I’m not a particularly sociable/friendly person at all, but I wouldn’t think this odd 😂
I’d actually appreciate the opportunity to vet you, too!

When we moved into our house, we did regular recces. (I’d recommend this). It’s a cul-de-sac and we now realise that everyone was probably watching us do this 😂 Once we’d moved in, two sets of neighbours knocked to say hello and bought us a bottle of prosecco and a card, which I thought was lovely (and had never happened to me before). Another set offered to make us tea and sandwiches on moving day.

Everyone is friendly as in we say hello, tell each other when we’re going away, but we still keep ourselves to ourselves. I know I could knock and ask a favour, but we avoid the street parties they’ve had to celebrate the King’s Coronation etc!

Hmmm I think it's a very bad idea. As the neighbour, I would totally feel like you're here to judge me. Who are you to decide whether or not I'm suitable for you to live next to? I mean you can dress it up all you like, but that's what you're doing. Plus trying to get the lo-down on the neighbourhood and asking what everyone is like. What if I don't want to gossip about my neighbours?

I'm polite and friendly but keep myself to myself and wouldn't particularly enjoy being judged by you, and being grilled on my neighbours.

Clearly questions about the house and hood are just the subtext to suss someone out. No one is going to rely on Jim next door instead of a survey!

I bumped into my future next door neighbour when viewing my house, I was relieved to be able to scope him out as the gardens run into each other. We had a good chat and by the end I knew my DH would love him. And so it has come to pass and the two of them spend weekends mulching stuff and knocking nails into things.

I am loving the claims that it's weird etc to do due diligence when not only spending hundreds pf thousands of pounds but also locking myself to live next to someone for forseable.

I will be honest, if the neighbour was pulling face about me knocking, I would be thinking about the house twoce. But that's also because I am a "everything takes a village" weirdo. No best friends, but I need to know name and discuss local stuff.

We are allowed more info, time etc about cars we are buying than houses someties😂 I can't just find reviews for the houses.

We did this OP! We had difficult neighbours in London so wanted to get the vibes. Why wouldn’t you?

Got to laugh at the PPs gasping at the idea of anyone daring to knock on a person’s door - I’m surprised anyone like that on MN would answer, I thought they all hid behind the sofa 🤣

I maybe a tad of a paranoid take? No one is judging - I'm only looking for immediate red flags like I said. Obviously, very obviously, I'm not asking for some odd neighbourhood gossip aboutpeople per se. But we'd be quite genuinely interested in the traffic level (it's close to a school) and how hard is it to get our with a car at 8.30am when drop-offs are taking place.

What a lovely story! I did this with our neighbours on the other side. I think it's sweet.

Great idea,I have lived next door to neighbours from hell,and wouldn’t wish to ever again.you could make a point of is it quiet around here,much to do etc.All the best xx

We were going to knock on the immediate neighbours door when we moved to our current house, it's good to get a feel for the area from someone not trying to sell as long as you do it politely! As it happens several of the neighbours were having a chat out the front as we were leaving so we wondered over. It was helpful to be reassured that the road was as quiet as we thought, they'd all been there years. The only thing they all warned us about was the geese on the pond behind the houses, they can be noisy and you have to keep an eye when you're walking round but I'll take that over loud music any day!

This! 😂

I’ve certainly done it, though I wasn’t auditioning the neighbours, I was asking about the area, parking (one Regency terrace had a communal parking area off the road at the front), and some other logistical stuff. The fact that it gave me a sense of who would be next door was incidental.

If im dropping £1m i want to know the neighbours arent weirdos.

You think awful neighbours are going to literally say "hiya, just to let you know, we enjoy a bit of loud techno music every single night from 11pm until 4am. We argue constantly and smoke weed in the garden every day. We are also quite racist and might make comments about your husband if we feel like it. Oh, and we like cursing and swearing, a LOT- nice to meet you!"

Thats what my old neighbours were like but if you had asked them, they thought they were amazing and considerate. Thats the problem with unreasonable neighbours, they often think they are perfectly lovely

Hmmm - i think the amount of useful insight you get with a 3 min chat on a doorstep (state of the hall/state of the person/out of control dogs/kids) could be found by looking carefully at their property.

Neat lawn or flower bed? Nice car? Clean windows? No weeds? No dog shit or overflowing bins?! No fridge chucked in the middle?! 😆