To think that there's a house selling etiquette?

[1onelyranger]

DP has just bought a house. It's filthy - crumbs in the cupboards, grafted woodwork, claggy oven and hob, the sink , marbles all over the garden path... Oddly the bathroom isn't too bad.

When I sold my previous house DM, nowEx and me cleaned it spotless. We left a bottle of wine and a toilet roll. I think that's just normal.

What have been your house-moving acts of kindness and horror discoveries?

My first house was filthy. I didnt expect it to be clean as it was a wreck when I viewed it and we got it as a good price as a result then spent a fortune doing it up.

What I didn't expect was that they'd leave lots of the old furniture - damp sofas and chairs, broken fridge and dishwasher.. it was vile. We just had to get a skip in the end as the vendor completely disappeared. We later discovered he was bankrupt and he'd not exactly sold the house willingly. On the other hand we've still got 2 book cases and a kitchen table which all cleaned up beautifully.

When we sold I paid a cleaner to come in and do a through clean on moving out day. She was still finishing off when the new owners arrived but I'd discussed it with them first in case that happened and she just finished the kitchen while they moved all the bedroom and living room stuff in.

Our current home was very clean but there's still a lot of rubbish in the loft that we need to sort out - not a priority

My previous house was filthy when I moved in, but the worst of it was the attic. Oh my god, the attic. The only hole to get up there was absolutely tiny - even at a relatively petite 5’1, I was too big for it.

Anyway, we had to make a new hole, and it became clear no one had been up there since the 70s. The house had passed through at least three hands in the subsequent decades and none of them had gone up there. It was FULL - literally piled high - with the belongings of a very odd man who had lived there between c.1945-1975. He was fervently religious (ran some kind of weird Christian sect from the property) and clearly mentally & morally questionable. There were piles and piles of letters - a lot of them sexual in nature, but from very naive, inexperienced women who were under his spell. They were clearly being told by him they were worthless specimens and should repent/serve him to save their souls.

Anyway, it was all pretty messed up. Also found loads of his clothes, his filthy string pants, his very thick glasses, and his teeth. All-in-all it was a skip full, but I did keep a small bag of the more interesting stuff. Kept finding notes under the floorboards everywhere too - see below..

This house was pretty grim when we moved in, but the worst of it was that they'd left the garden absolutely full of dog poo. They had two small dogs and there must have been weeks' worth of crap out there. We have dogs ourselves and would never dream of leaving a garden in that state for a buyer - it was vile.

Mine was spotless when we moved in but we had added a caveat that all walls had to be repaired ready for painting so they just put up a load of shitty pictures instead and kindly left them for us 😂 no prosecco waiting either lol.
When we moved out of our home it was gleaming and I left a card, flowers, a flower decoration the viewer had admired when viewing, bread, milk, toilet rolls, wine and beer and menus for local takeaways.

If you want a clean house then stipulate it in the contract. We did and the house was spotlessz

We are in a rented so a little different, tenant left it dirty so the agent had professional cleaners in and it was still disgusting. Photo of toilet attached for example!!!!!
We are moving out and they’ve asked me to clean obviously and I will (its respect) but if they pick anything up I will LAUGH!

P.s. I can’t believe people can live with such filth!!!

One owner left me a dead rat in a trap in a kitchen cupboard. Oh and the bath overflow was stuffed with loo paper...

both the houses we've bought had been empty for over a year when we moved in so you'd think they'd be clean. The second was quite clean, but someone had left the gas fire on a really low light presumably since they'd moved out and we never realised on the viewings but their gas bill must have been enormous. Bit dusty but that's to be expected.

The first house was filthy. Absolutely revolting.

Moved into a house that was averagely clean but not spotless.
The owner left some tan velvet curtains in main bedroom, not particularly nice but I they would do until we got something better.
The bedroom was the only room in the house he smoked in - I picked up several hundred fag ends from the flat roof under the window.

Chucked tan curtains in bug machine at laundrette - didn't care if they shrank just wanted to defug them.
They weren't tan.
They were peach coloured!

We moved into one house and arrived at 3pm. The couple had split and he’d moved out weeks before, taking quite random things. She hadn’t moved a thing. Fortunately it was a fine day and we had to move it into the garden as she should have been out three hours earlier.

We threw out the grill pan immediately. She left a built in fridge with food in. That went too. When we did some renovation work later, under the floorboards was crammed with empty gin and whisky bottles.

We were left with lots of crappy furniture that the vendor couldn’t move, plus plastic flowers and shit!
Very annoying.
When we found wads of old money under the carpet ( hidden by her FIL we guess) we kept it.

My first house was reasonably clean when I moved in.

My second house was absolutely filthy. It was really grotty when I looked round but I loved the house. It was being lived in by a guy and 3 teenage sons, There was a radiator next to a loo; all the paint on the front was blistered off. The kitchen had a black carpet - except it had a green pattern around the edge and beyond the breakfast bar. The kitchen ceiling was gloss paint on a pointy stippled artex. The bathroom was carpeted and in front of the loo the carpet was stained and rotting - and smelled disgusting - just a few of the worst examples.

I got 5k off just for the state of the house - they had had loads of viewing but no offers because of the state of it. This was 25 years ago and 5k was about 8% of the cost of the house.

My next house was in a state for a different reason. The previous owner had died and was a recluse and hoarder. I had the whole house to clear - it still had brown bakelite electric fittings and round pin plugs, no heating and windows falling out. I got it for a good price and luckily, as the previous owner was my aunt, I was able to get in and do the clearing before the sale went through. I did have to live in it through all the renovations though which was fun.

Flat 1: previous owner took the lightbulbs and there was a decade of grime on the unseen bits and silver fish in the cupboards.

House 1: was ok and there was a bottle of champagne in the sink and a bunch of flowers but a skid in the bog

House 2: was a builders renovation and fine but dusty as had been empty a while.

House 3: we refurbished before moving in was alright but had been empty for 9 months. Didn't matter due to the building work we were doing.

House 4 - spotless althiugh again empty for 9 months but we had written into the contract that we expected it to be clean and they did send through contract cleaners.

Have always left houses spotless but the last two sales have had contractual clauses relating to professional cleans being undertaken prior to possession.

We didn’t leave our place in a good state at all when we sold. The bathrooms/kitchens were clean and there was nothing gross or too bad but the place needed a sweep/hoover/mop and I really wish we’d been able to leave it spotless.

We had a really hard time moving. It was 9 hours to our new place and the company we hired to move our stuff realised they had underestimated how much stuff we had (even though they’d done surveys twice) so they did a runner. This was after moving some of our heavy furniture to the van which they dumped outside for us to deal with before driving off. They didn’t even tell us - just left.

We then had 48 hours until the new owners moved in to find a new removal company which we did after a lot of calling round and begging. Even then most of our stuff was in storage for months. We had a toddler and 6 week old baby and all our furniture was packed up. We only managed to empty the flat with an hour to spare and me dh and toddler had all caught a 24 hour sickness bug and were vomiting every few hours. We did not have time or energy to clean the property when all the stuff had been moved out. We had intended to leave a note to explain but we so sick and facing a 9 hour drive (which was spent throwing up into carrier bags) so we didn’t manage it.

I will always regret this - always!! I would love to explain to the family that moved in why it wasn’t spotless but will never get the chance to.

We’ve always paid for cleaners because we have tiny kids and would hate to leave it in a horrible state given the things we’ve seen. Very very dirty bath and included loo was the worst

^unflushed not included

I think it is perfectly well documented on Mumsnet that every seller says they leave their old home spotless and every buyer says the house they have moved into was filthy.

When we moved into our house, the place was spotless and they had left a folder with all the information on appliances and the house alarm, a bottle of wine and a 'welcome home' card. It was all very lovely except they'd called DH 'Richard' in the card. His name isn't Richard 😂

Old pizzas in the oven and layers of grease isn't on.

But some people think not tipping 5 litres of bleach around each day is "disgusting". Anything less than operating theatre sterile is a germ ridden fleapit hovel.

My current house was absolutely filthy when we moved in. The hob was covered in burnt on food, the carpets were full of dust, bathroom had clearly not had a clean in months.
It took me, my sister, my husband and my Dad 3 days to deep clean it to a decent state. We were literally washing down the walls with soapy water.
The kitchen cupboards were full of food and they had left a box with paracetamol, plasters and some other medicine bottles in there. I was exhausted, pissed off from cleaning my previous house as well as the new one, and I threw away the entire box. A week after we moved in the previous owner's mother came round to collect her 'very important' medicine which I had obviously thrown away.
She then got really angry at me for having done so! Maybe bother to clear the cupboards out next time you move, lady!

I’m moving out soon, i won’t be leaving the house immaculate, it’s going to take all my effort to pack the stuff up. It won’t be awful because we don’t have pets and we keep it reasonable but I’m not cleaning cookers and cupboards etc. This is due in part to the fact that their solicitor has been as nitpicking and awkward as possible. If it had all been lovely I might have tried to put myself out.

Our house was absolutely spotless when we moved in. The owners had left a vase of daffodils, two mugs and a wee jar of coffee and two glasses with a bottle of wine.

It has never been as clean since, and probably never will be unless we sell it, and get it professionally cleaned ready for the new owners.

I just bought my first house a few months ago. Fortunately I didn't plan to move in right away as it needed a lot of work doing but it was in a revolting and filthy state when we got in. Kitchen covered in muck and grease, all windows filthy inside and out, carpets stank of smoke and dog, mud all up the walls in the hall from muddy dogs, and every room had holes all over the wall which hadn't been filled in from removing pictures and shelves. I nearly cried when I went in and wondered what I had done!

The garden was also a big problem as loads of unsafe stuff had been left in it: large planks of wood, broken plastic window stuff, satellite dish, blocks of concrete, bags of trade cement, piles of broken wood... the list went on and on. It was a problem as we couldn't get in the house for a while with my DS (14 months at the time) so we had to move it and give him somewhere to run around. In the end it was the volume of a skip. It hung around in the front garden for about two weeks until I said I was hiring a skip and charging it to the sellers, then it miraculously disappeared. part of this was vindictiveness as I had negotiated a small price reduction due to problems with the house that they hadn't been honest about and also made them put some stuff right like taking down the satellite dish. Finally they removed some shrubs and plants from the gardens leaving big holes.

So yes there is an etiquette but suffice to say that my sellers had no etiquette!

I think the cards and bottles of wine are overkill personally. It’s just a business transaction.

I don’t want or need presents from the vendor. If they’ve behaved well during the transaction, that’s enough.

Anything less than operating theatre sterile is a germ ridden fleapit hovel.

This. I’m really struggling to see what’s wrong with that loo seat.