Taking shelves when moving house

[legfaced]

We are due to move in a few months. We have long and quite expensive scaffold board shelving in our kitchen - AIBU to take it with us when we move?

12:02Nicknacky

"NotShinyOf course people don’t take carpets to use in new houses."

Well they clearly do, based on what posters have said on here!!

NotShiny It’s not normal to take carpets. It’s really not.

NotShiny I think taking carpets is quite an old fashioned thing to do. You used to be able to negotiate "carpets and curtains" as part of your offer but now you aren't allowed to do that. And unless you are moving to a same sized, or smaller house, the carpets wouldn't fit.

I don't know anyone under 35 who has taken carpets on a move or moved to a house where the carpets have been taken in the move. (out of maybe 50 house moves).

@NotShiny

I can sort of understand people taking carpets, after all they are "used". Would you really want someone elses carpets, it's a bit like keeping their mattress. Plus you will need them for your next house.

When you move house do you make sure the rooms in the new place are an identical size so the carpets still fit?!

Not in your world perhaps, but in lots of others it seems to be. I have a friend who took her wooden flooring from house to house. She told the buyers that's what she was doing. It was hers, her Father had paid for it and she wanted to keep it.

NotShiny Did she take the bathroom and kitchen too?

Its a fixture, not a fitting. These are treated differently on the inventory of the house sale and all fixtures are sold as part and parcel of the house. If you wanted to keep them and take them it should have been listed as a fitting explicitly.

Simon, I'd presume it was for smaller rooms. Plus maybe they wanted the underlay to save forking out for it again. Maybe the house they were moving into had crap carpets and it would save them money and the people moving into theirs agreed, like the poster above said.

@Nicknacky would you feel the same if I removed the plants and put them in pots before you even looked around the house? You would have no idea they'd ever been in the garden. What's the difference?

In other countries (Germany for one) it's standard to take the kitchen cabinets and worktops with you when you move, even in rented accommodation.

People are weird about what they feel they're entitled to. I've always asked vendors about specific things if they're something I really want to be left behind, like a really nice handmade door that they could easily have replaced with the old door and I assumed they would do that, but they were leaving it.

howaboutchocolate Jeez, just take the plants if they mean so much to you!

Be petty.

I'm quite old and would never even consider taking carpets, I think that was in the old days when you had a large rug on top of the floorboards that usually had a woodstain around the outside. as those rugs were usually very expensive and probably hard to buy and get home.

@Nicknacky how is it petty? Thats what I don't get. They are my plants that I bought or was given, and nurtured. They aren't a permanent fixture of the garden.

To be fair, nicknacky, you've been quite petty too saying it would put you off buying the house. I think you may have to accept that people live different lives and have different opinions.

Absolutely fine to take some shelves. Just make sure the legal paperwork reflects that. We took shelves and built in wardrobes (ikea ones that would fit our new place). We made it clear to our buyers.

NotShiny Oh god, you are right! Thanks for reminding me.

And it’s hardly petty to be put off buying a house for whatever reason when it it undoubtedly the most expensive purchase you would make. I would be wary about dealing with a seller who was so petty from the outset.

Blimey. To think it was implied earlier that I was spoiling for a fight in wanting to take a bathroom mirror when I moved. If I saw carpets or similar excluded on a f&f form I'd want a reduction in the price unless it was made very clear on viewing. Wooden flooring? This might actually put me off proceeding with the purchase as I'd be worried about how reasonable the vendor was.

Plants I'd also expect to stay unless they were in pots. I can understand about rare or very expensive specimens as someone mentioned up thread, but again it would have to be made very clear from the outset.

I'm someone living with my vendor's old-but-ok carpets and lovely plants several years on!

If you'd wanted to keep them you need to exclude them as a point in the inventory OP, if it's being done properly. Shelves do not come under the same bracket as permanent fixtures and fittings - such as fitted kitchen units, integrated appliances, sealed in bathtubs, there is no obligation that they form part of a sale. Indeed nothing 'has' to, if the owner wants it excluded.

No idea at what stage of the process you are but if sold SSTC part of the exchange process is clarifying with the vendors and they you, the full inventory included which is then agreed and signed by both parties before completion. If you've passed that and they bought house specifically for your pair of kitchen shelves you might hear from them after completion- not likely though is it.

There is some laughable hyperbole on here over some bloody temporary shelves - they may not even want them. It's hardly a universal style and I'm cracking up at peoples expectation that they might have holes to fill in a newly moved out of house. It's the norm. Things look very different once furniture is removed and you can see state of all things hidden or that you didn't notice. When we got the keys we realise they'd simply screwed bookcases into the wall to cover massive holes and shoved a carpet over various bodge jobs. The survey doesn't pick these things up since they aren't permitted to pull up carpet or remove anything fixed. It is the way it is, so said our solicitor when we raised it. If you're buying a non new build that's been lived in, it's going to likely have decorative disrepair.

"Wooden flooring? This might actually put me off proceeding with the purchase as I'd be worried about how reasonable the vendor was."
She was quite clear to people when viewing that the floor was going with her. She's moved 3 times, and never been short of buyers. I think it goes both ways. If someone was clear at the upshot what they were taking, I think I'd think that they were an honest person and being quite clear. It wouldnt put me off. Plus if people said "I'm taking x plant" I'd think fair enough, I'll sort the garden out once I'm in. It wouldnt be a deal breaker, unless they said everything in the garden was going, trees too, then I'd be worried.

Builder husband says fine to take them as they aren't part of a built in kitchen and are as much decoration as a clock. Make the wall good afterwards.

@NotShiny fair enough if mentioned on viewing. I think I have a mental hierarchy of things so major they need to be flagged as early as possible (removing wooden flooring definitely comes under that category), things that are disclosed at the f&f form stage and items so trivial that they don't need to be mentioned even if technically fixtures and fittings.

I do think a certain amount of horse trading is part of buying a house and as long as everyone is clear on what the deal is it's fair game. What would annoy me as a buyer is if a number of costly fixtures and fittings were excluded but this was only disclosed once the purchase was well under way.

AIBU? Yes you areBU. Well I'm just going to argue that I'm not!!!!

No you should not take the shelves.

And how on earth are shelves made out if scaffold boards expensive!?!

AIBU? Yes you areBU. Well I'm just going to argue that I'm not!!!!

There’s no law that says you have to do what AIBU tells you to do.

And plenty of people have said she should take the shelves.

I'd remove them, as others have said just mention it in your fixtures and fitting list.

I removed curtain poles, coat hooks, shelves, all sorts really. I just made sure that I polyfilled the holes once they were down and made it clear in the fixture and fittings list that I wouldn't be leaving them.

I'm in the process of selling just now - agent was clear when we did the fixtures list that anything screwed to the wall needed to stay or be explicitly excluded. We have similar heavy shelves in our kitchen and they are staying.