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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to worry about being judged by a future hypothetical owner of my house

23 replies

BalloonSlayer · 10/08/2010 10:05

if I do not move a large, unwieldy, heavy, screwed to the wall piece of furniture and just paint around it instead?

I have the horrors about moving in a few years' time and overhearing someone say "And you'll never believe what they did in the dining room, the lazy bastards!"

Please cheer me up with your stories of DIY laziness.

OP posts:

lal123 · 10/08/2010 10:19

I wouldn't worry about it - the folk who lived here before us didn't paint behind the wardrobes - but they are huge, so I wouldn't have either. There's no carpet under there either - but means wardrobes sit better.

DIY laziness that did annoy me was in last house where previous owners hadn't laid the kitchen tiles properly, cost us a fortune to put right

sparechange · 10/08/2010 10:21

The previous owners of our house did that with the wardrobe in the bedroom
It all looked so lovely when we viewed it.
When we got the keys and moved in, there is a big white wardrobe-sized patch on one wall (the rest of the wall is very light grey)
"no problem" we thought "we'll redecorate in the next few weeks anyway"

nearly 2 years on, you can probably guess the rest...

I've got used to it now. I like to think of it as modern art

BetterBitOfButter · 10/08/2010 10:23

We moved in to a house when I was a kid where the owners had redecorated every year.

Their DIY laziness however was to put up the paper over last years paper.

By the time all the paper was off, the room was about an inch bigger.

So compared to that I would say don't worry. And surely they'd only be taking the furniture down to redecorate anyway.

Chil1234 · 10/08/2010 10:33

If the furniture is so heavy and unweilding that you'd sell the house complete with it attached then it's not unreasonable. If you'd take it with you and leave a bare patch on the wall behind then you might want to reconsider.....

My current home was a DIY nightmare when I moved in. Live 1950's plug sockets in the bathroom; cables papered over rather than channelled into walls; filthy black rings and little holes everywhere because they'd had plates hanging on every vertical surface. Plus they took everything with them.... it's particularly bad in December to move in and find that not only have all the light-fittings and carpets been removed but that the grate has gone from the fireplace.

EightiesChick · 10/08/2010 11:09

In our house, in the home office there was the smallest possible noticeboard attached to the wall, only about the size of a laptop screen, plus a freestanding cabinet in the corner. The lazy so-and-sos painted round both of these, even though they would only have had to move the cabinet, not even unscrew anything.

firsttimemum77 · 10/08/2010 11:17

We had paper upon paper, border upon border and the painted ontop, in all the bedrooms when we moved in! It took me over a week to strip the 3 rooms! I did swear a lot during the process!

PrettyCandles · 10/08/2010 11:24

Naaa. You live in your house, now, as you want to. It's not as if this is somethng that will change the value of your house, and new occuants always havd to redecorate anyway as the walls always change colour around anything that covers them for a long time.

I lived in a flat where I thought the walls were sound, but because of condensation the paper was peeling and buckling badly at the corners, so I had to strip it all off.

Eight layers of paper later (and each layer had been overpainted as well) I discovered that the walls were severly cracked and in places quite literally held together by the paper.

Which makes the shortcut I took, the second time I redecorated (after fixing the damage from the first time) quite innocent: I, too, redecorated only up to the wall-fixed units, tucking the new paper as far behind them as I could reach.

ChickensHaveNoEyebrows · 10/08/2010 11:26

I worry about the theoretical new owners rotavating the garden and digging up many, many pet corpses. We're on hard clay, so digging down too deep is impossible.

MoominMymbleandMy · 11/08/2010 00:44

I'm sure I've read somewhere that Vanessa Bell painted around the furniture rather than move it at Charleston, so you'd be in very distinguished company.

chandellina · 11/08/2010 08:28

we are renting a house with lots of terrible diy. doors with three inch, lopsided gaps at the bottom, ragged holes around a light switch, crappy skirting in the kitchen that doesn't line up.

I like to shake my head and sigh a lot.

valleyqueen · 11/08/2010 08:34

I am due to move in about 3 weeks I have painted round the wardrobes but they are fitted so lets hope they leave them up. I also laid the lino in the kitchen around all the appliances as I was too lazy to move them.

I am only moving 2 mins up the road so I will have to see these people!

overmydeadbody · 11/08/2010 08:34

Of Course YABU.

Why worry about wehat hypothetical people in the future might think?! Who cares what they think.

If you sell your house in the future the ne buyers will want to repaint anyway.

BaggedandTagged · 11/08/2010 08:41

The people I bought my flat from painted around the TV- not a TV screwed to the wall (this is before flatscreens), but a TV which just sat on top of a fitted cupboard.They painted the fitted cupboard but just round the edges of the TV.

That is lazy. What you are intending is pretty understandable.

TrillianAstra · 11/08/2010 08:47

They will most likely hate your colour scheme anyway.

Original poster

BalloonSlayer · 11/08/2010 08:48

Oh I have got lazier. I am getting someone to come in and paint it for me. Now he'll move the cupboard .

Actually I remembered that I'd have to move it at some point because I am getting a new carpet.

At my first house we changed our bedroom round and had to move our bedside cupboards which were screwed to the wall. In case we decided to change the room back again, my ex covered the old screw holes with stickers and painted them over so we could use them again, rather than filling them. I used this technique quite a lot after that, thought it was clever. Then I met the new owners a few years later and laughed about a few odd things about the house - radiators were under the windows but not symmetrically etc. Then realised I had better shut up pronto in case they started saying "Oh yeah, and what about all those screw holes covered in stickers? And the terrible tiling in the bathroom! (culprit: me)"

OP posts:

2rebecca · 11/08/2010 08:52

I'd move any furniture I intended to take with me and paint behind it. We have a large wardrobe (4 door), but when decorating the clothes come out and it gets pulled forward as it isn't a fitted wardrobe and will be coming with us, often if we're redecorating we're getting new carpets anyway as we're not fans of decorating for the sake of it.
I agree that numerous holes in the walls can be just as annoying when you move in and alot of people redecorate. Painting behind furniture just seems sloppy though, like painting round sockets rather than partly unscrewing them and painting behind them.

Original poster

BalloonSlayer · 11/08/2010 08:54

"like painting round sockets rather than partly unscrewing them and painting behind them. "

ahem . . . . . . < clears throat >

Don't tell me you unscrew door handles as well?

OP posts:

carebear321 · 11/08/2010 09:04

does it matter? dont people normally redecorate when they move into a new place, to suit their own taste?

plantsitter · 11/08/2010 09:08

When my sil moved into her house there was a perfect grandfather clock shape left on the wall where someone had painted round it. They'd obviously been really careful about it as well as it was so even and clear.

It made me feel a sneaking fondness for the old owners actually as it gave everyone a right laugh every time they looked at it.

I didn't have to do the painting over, though...

OhYouBadBadKitten · 11/08/2010 09:12

we may be moving in the soonish future. What if dd suggests that we dig up her dead guinea pigs to take with us (wouldnt put it past her) obv the answer would be no - but the thought of it!

I did paint around our aquarium no way I was going to try and move that.

new owners would hate us. I'm sure they would love our pantry though

2rebecca · 11/08/2010 09:17

Yes if painting door the door handles come off and get cleaned/ new ones if too grubby.
We're not fans of decorating but if we do it then we strip down walls, sand wood down etc.
Painting doors takes ages, removing the door handle usually just takes a couple of minutes and makes sanding and painting the door faster, not slower.

2rebecca · 11/08/2010 09:19

I'm not convinced by all these reports of people decorating as soon as they move. We've been here nearly 10 years and are just getting round to redecorating some areas. If you both work and have kids then there isn't time and money to redecorate a house the moment you buy it.

PrettyCandles · 11/08/2010 11:36

But you do it a bit at a time, and in thr meantime you live with the marks the previous owners left behind. We've been here 4y and have only got the dcs' bedrooms done so far. Elsewhere we have got used to a picture that hangs inside the gap left by a previous picture where they had painted behind the picture but the walls had discoloured with time, and an unpainted strip on a wall where we removed a piece of furniture which they had not painted behind. Same difference, really.

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