To not understand how people can live like this?!

[RevoltingPeasant]

DH and I moved into our first owned home together three weeks ago. The people before us owned it for 24 years and I think they probably cleaned once during that time.

So far, I have found

• a kitchen drawer filled with a couple of years' worth of fingernail clippings
  
• a clump - an actual clump - of black mould hanging off the shower screen
  
• a half eaten butcher's bone from their dog (I hope)
  
• dust in the cupboards that was actually caked on
  

Generally, whole place filthy and covered with dust bunnies. And then today, fleas :( now have to have whole house treated.

DH says i am 'fastidious' but AIBU to really not get how people can live year after year breathing in dust and mould and being bitten by fleas??

BLEURGH. That's all.

[Plomino]

When we moved into ours , it transpired that the owners had pretty much moved out when we made the offer . Except that they decided to leave various items behind , including ;

Their oven , with complimentary 3 month old roast dinner within . ( I opened the door , something waved at me , I slammed it shut saying we are NEVER opening that fucker again) threw it outside and bought a new cooker the next day .

Every room full of dead flies , and filth . Actual filth . My first purchase in our new town was 40 bottles of bleach . Bearing in mind I was 8 months pregnant at the time , and I spent the next month cleaning . As did we all !

Various random items of cookware . The son's cannabis stash under a loose floorboard and finally TWO years worth of dog shit sandwiched between the pine flooring and the underlay . That little present cost us the best part of 3k to sort out , as the stone floor ended up unsalvageable and we had to bury it all under 46 bags of self levelling cement .

The items they did take with them ? All the antenna connectors off the tv aerials , every loo roll holder , and six sockets . And half the keys to the windows . Actually this is the third house where the loo roll holders have been taken . Why ? Are they becoming rarer to find ? Do people get sentimentally attached to them ?

[RevoltingPeasant]

Cory - also what the hell kind of medic keeps their patients' blood samples in their own attic??

I can just see the AIBU - "my GP asked me for an extra vial for his home collection. AIBU to find this odd?"

Attacked mould with HG mould spray which if you don't know is like Magic Juice for bathrooms. Might try it in fleas next!

[RevoltingPeasant]

Plomino

[CrapBag]

Yuck!!!

We are hoping to sell later this year and I will give it all a quick once over before we leave.

When we moved in though it was in a state and nicotine stains everywhere. It had been empty for a while but thank goodness we didn't find things like nail clippings!!! That is gross.

[CreatureRetorts]

There are some disgusting people out there, there truly are!!!!!!!

[HollyBerryBush]

We bought a house once where they actually removed padlocks from shed, including hasps AND took out the little hooks you hung net curtain wires on, and he wires and the curtains - why? you buy curtains to fit a window.

There was also a wall full of mould where they removed their fitted wardrobes.

[pinkballetflats]

Cats that had pissed so much for years on the carpets that it had actually soaked through the carpet, underlay and MDF sub-flooring.

No, I really didn't notice the smell when we viewed the place.

[CombineBananaFister]

Oh my giddy aunt CORY was he a medic or Dexter. Can't think of a good reason to have 'spare' blood samples at home either

Like others have said it IS amazing the level of filth people will live with (I too visit homes when volunteering) and am just glad I have poor eyesight so can't actually see much of where the dubious smells are coming from.

completely understand though when it's someone elderly and vunerable, not so much a choice there.

[marriedinwhiteagain]

When I bought my first flat the owner left one light bulb and removed the nice door handles and replaced them with utility cheap onesm

When I bought my first flat the owner left me a bunch of flowers and bottle of champagne in the kitchen sink. And the biggest skid I have ever seen in the bathroom.

In 25 years of owning catsn we have three at present, I have never actually seen a flea.

[primallass]

I bought a house from a vicar and his family. Found a used condom on top of a cupboard

[marriedinwhiteagain]

2nd para should read first house! Scratches ......

[marriedinwhiteagain]

primallas I now have a vision of the vicar in full surplice using his thurible to flick the condom away. Oh dear - pours more wine !!

[HeffalumpTheFlump]

We didnt buy the flat we live in now, as it is a ha property but it was rather shocking to move into.

The lady who lived here before us passed away and wasn't found for weeks as she had no family or friends. She had chain smoked in the property since the 70's so we had extreme nicotine staining to deal with.

There was also something rotting in the utility room that the housing association had put newspaper on top of so we wouldn't notice until we had the keys. We still don't know what it was, but it had bones in it and took 2 whole bottles of bleach to sort the smell. The woman apparently had a dog, and none of the neighbours know what happened to it... I try to tell myself it can't have been that though.

One of the drawers in the kitchen was full of hair, nothing else, just hair. Every plug socket and light switch had a thick layer of brown grime on it and there were brown splatter stains up all the walls.

The ha offered us £150 decorating vouchers to sort the place, but we ended up spending closer to £600 because of the amount of cleaning products and the number of layers of paint needed.

[HeffalumpTheFlump]

I should say that we didn't move in until 5 months after the lady died, so all that had been sitting in a closed up flat for all that time...

[froggies]

We moved into a renovation project that had been empty for 8 years. No electricity, 1 working fireplace, cold running water, bouncy floors, woodworm and desiccated rats included.

The snow used to blow through the cracks in the windows and the walls were finished in gloss paint (orange and mottled white mould in our room). When we moved the furniture out, the mice in the mattress squeaked. I remember scraping the mouldy Lino off the bathroom floor with a paint scraper. Lovely.

[Madamecastafiore]

We moved into a lovely house full of dog hair, it was even in the fridge and freezer!

My first lovely job was to clear the lawn of dog shit!

People are revolting!

[MichaelaS]

Sounds like our house. We have been here a year and bought having viewed the whole house except the living room. We had viewed another house on the street and knew what to expect, we thought. Well, the reason we couldn't see the living room was it had been turned into lodging rooms and that was the only room still tenanted, but a barrister, lovely guy who was a bit too clever for his own good I think. The kitchen table and sitting area (now dining room) were stacked floor to ceiling with papers.

When we moved in we got a professional cleaning firm to do the whole house. That living room was so bad they had to come back a second day. He had NEVER hoovered and it was literally an inch thick in dust. The first person to set foot in the room was sent to hospital with breathing difficulties. The steam carpet cleaner only made the dust into a thick mud. We had to chisel the windows open to air it.

Unfortunately we were moving in with a 3 year old who has chronic lung problems and an 8 week old baby.

Later we found the mice and the woodworm.

At least we knew it was a renovation project, the roof leaks and its wall to wall wood chip and brown shagpile carpets so we were not expecting a clean safe house. Planning permission and listed buildings consent expected on 15th July, wish us luck!!

[RevoltingPeasant]

Tunnock - yes, our previous owners had a dog and a cat!! One of them is responsible for the fleas, and the dog presumably for the lovely tide,ark of mud on all the paintwork. I've got it off the gloss paint but it's really stubborn on the matte paint!

[bedmonster]

Nail clippings in a drawer? Holy Fuck.

Did you go and view this house prior to buying it? And not notice this house was a bit on the scummy side? That sounds rank!

[RevoltingPeasant]

Married - eeeeeeeew.

You know, this thread is making me feel SO much better.

Although I just went to check on the bathroom mould cluster, and the spray has turned it neon green. I am not sure if this is an improvement!

[RevoltingPeasant]

Bedmonster, yes, but you don't check all the drawers! Anyhow it really is a nice house and may be out forever home, so a bit of dust and bloodsucking insects won't put us off!

[cheerfulweather]

We found live maggots in a kitchen drawer on moving into a new house, doesn't sound so bad now compared to some of these posts!

[Thesebootsweremadeforwalking]

Ick.

We moved into our current house last year, and all the bathroom fittings were so disgusting that after spending a whole day trying to clean them, we put them in a skip and went off to find a cheap replacement suite and a plumber, fast.

My top tip is to get some mouse traps down now....

[WhereDoAllTheCalculatorsGo]

Calculators wanders off to clean something (anything) at 9:30 on a Saturday night...