Your moving horror stories?

[7yo7yo]

I’ve been to help a friend move house today, loaded up the first van went to the new house and......the old owners are still there.
Didn’t realise they actually had to move today! Thought because of covid they had a period of grace and would move when it was mutually convenient.
Meanwhile back at friends house, removal men from their buyers will arrive in an hour and these little still had breakfast plates on the table!
They’ve been forcibly removed, but the mess!
Aibu to ask if anyone else gas gone through this? How do people not realise?

@Coughsyrupsucks that’s vile! Good for you!
We once bought a house and they insisted we bought their carpet for £300. The whole sale was contingent on this.
They had a dog that wasn’t allowed in the carpet but once they’d secured the sale, they didn’t really care and let the dog do everything on the carpet that it wanted.
It was disgusting and had to be changed.

I saw the wife in the local costa a few weeks later, she was with friends as was I and she was telling her friends what a great deal we’d got and how she’d cleaned the house top
To bottom.
I didn’t say anything but my friend was pissed of as she’d seen the state of it and loudly asked if that was the woman who’d left the house in a filthy state .

Moving into this house was a comedy of errors.
We had exchanged before hand and on the day of completion thought nothing could go wrong. Had the keys in my little hand for the new place. New buyers not moving in until the following day so 24 hours to get moved.
Everything was packed and labeled and I had list upon list going. Having one last cuppa in our old house I smugly said to dh “I don’t know why people say moving is so stressful we’ve got this”
What an absolute fool I was.
The removal men arrived and started loading the van. I handed the keys to dp and he drove the car which had been loaded with essentials to the new house and I supervised the removal men.
20 minutes later dp phones, his car has conked out at the side of the road no idea what’s wrong with it. So he waited for 2 hours for the AA to come out.
Removal men carry a wardrobe down the stairs- lost his footing and let go of the wardrobe. Luckily he wasn’t injured but it completely fell through the plaster board and demolished the wall between the porch and the sitting room.
Phoned the solicitor and buyers to find out what on earth I was supposed to do. Dp has all of the cleaning stuff in the car as I had already scrubbed the place top to bottom so ended up going to neighbours to borrow dust pan and brush, black bags and a hoover.
Removal men are all ready to move the first load but dp has the keys for the new house. In my infinite wisdom I decided to just go in the van with the movers to the new house and start unloading things on the drive until dp comes with the keys.
By the time he arrives in the car the van is empty. Dp goes to open the door and the key breaks in the lock. I can see the keys for the patio door and the back door glinting away happily on the kitchen counter.
Phoned a locksmith who gave the helpful timescale of “I’ll be there when I’m there”. The removal men and do go off to the old house to collect the next van load and lock up. Leaving me sitting on the sofa in the middle of the driveway heavily pregnant looking like an absolute sweaty monster waiting on the locksmith.
Luckily one of my new neighbours came out and finding out what had happened brought me in like orphan Annie to use her loo and have a cold drink.
The removal men arrived back before the locksmith did.
By the time he arrived it was 4.15 and the men finished at 5. If it went any later then 5 there was a ridiculous fee to pay. Dp asked them to carry the heavy items in and just put them anywhere- taking him at his word they put every single thing in the living room and dining room. Beds wardrobes you name it.
We waved them off at 5pm and ended up ordering a takeaway and sleeping on the mattress in the kitchen as that was the only clear floor space down stairs.
Luckily his mates came round the next day to move everything around and we can laugh about it now. But I still maintain I am never moving again.

Not a moving day horror story, but closely avoided one. First house I bought was from a separating couple, six year old daughter of the couple was very sweet and would follow me around the house on the few occasions I went to measure things up.

On my last visit, the daughter and I were upstairs measuring a window and she happened to mention that "the big tv is broken but mummy said we're just going to leave it here, and she's going to leave all the stuff in the loft, and my trampoline!". I explained to the little girl that she should tell her mummy that we'd spoken and Haunted said that if she moved in and it was all there then Haunted would have to speak to her solicitor...

Moved in three months later to a house free of broken crap. Phew!

@hauntedvagina that was well lucky!

Okay, so I'm looking at moving from rented to bought and this thread has convinced me that I shouldn't give notice on my rented until I have exchanged and actually got through the front door of my new place. It will cost me 2 months rent (I can just about cover that), but what price heart muscle?

@TheSecondMrsAshwell, Our buyers are moving from rented, into our house. They have been advised to do exactly that.

Our chain is tiny, but even so, something could go wrong at any point.

If you're the lady buying my house, I promise that it will be left in immaculate condition for you!

Was due to complete on a Friday and got a call 5pm Wednesday saying buyer insisted we had to complete on the Thursday or sale was off

I could not get the Thursday off as I was due to go on a round the world trip for 8 weeks and was handing over my whole department that day!
DP, his Dad and the maintenance man at work (God bless you Bob!) used the work van to do my whole move

Posted too soon!

The buyer then sat on my lawn from 10am demanding keys when money was not transferred

He was such an arse that when I did get the call at 2pm to say money was through my FIL would not give him them but took them back to the agent and he had to drive there to pick them up

Then had my Dad's stag do, wedding and had to leave the keys to my new house with DP whilst I went away.
He unpacked everything, decorated and knocked out the hideous fireplace

He's now DH

We have had the 'arriving at new house to find everything/ everyone in situ' experience in one house. My DD was very upset as she thought their ddog came with the sale!
The house was filthy too.

We had a lovely move too. The old chap selling the house we were buying had let us have it despite our offer being the lower one as DD always stopped to chat to him. It was just across the village green to us.
He also let us have the keys the day before completion to help with the move. Cue my brother who was over for a coffee, and I, running over the green with a couple of sofas, deconstructed beds etc!

[quote TheSecondMrsAshwell]@hauntedvagina that was well lucky!

Okay, so I'm looking at moving from rented to bought and this thread has convinced me that I shouldn't give notice on my rented until I have exchanged and actually got through the front door of my new place. It will cost me 2 months rent (I can just about cover that), but what price heart muscle?[/quote]
When we bought this house, we were moving from rented. We had about three weeks where we had both houses, which worked really well. We actually completed on a Friday, and we're due to go to France on the Saturday, so we told the vendors (our children are at the same school) that they didn't need to rush out, but in fairness to them, they were out by 1230 and keys were with the agent by 1pm. We then went on holiday for a week and moved the day after we got back. Because we still had the rented house for two weeks, it meant that I had plenty of opportunity to clear stuff we hadn't moved and get a professional company in to clean (I've cleaned rentals before myself and I swore never again. Best £100 I've ever spent getting someone else to do it).

I'm also pleased that I got a company in (who left it gleaming) as the EA inevitably tried to rip us off. Told us that we'd left it unclean and that we'd damaged some built in shelves. When we presented them with the cleaning invoice and told them to take it up with the company, they went quiet on that. And happily they accused us of the damage in an email that included the words 'wear and tear'. They kept trying to charge us for things that were there when we moved in (sticker marks on doors etc). Thankfully it's the law to hold your deposit in a protection scheme now, so when they moved to telling us that they'd 'just take it from the deposit', we went over their heads to an independent. They wanted £147 from our deposit for cleaning and weeding (which we'd already done and had invoices to prove it). They eventually got £20 for a few weeds we'd missed (that we were happy to pay). I don't they expected such a fight, but we knew we'd left that house in a better condition than we'd received it. In fact the independent party actually noted that on their report, that we were under no obligation to professionally clean it, and leave it in a better condition, but that we had and this should be taken into consideration.

Saw the main EA in question in town a few months later and she just blanked me.

We haven't had any moving nightmares, but offering on this one was more stressful than it needed to be thanks to the shady agent.

Property went on the market at 5pm on Tuesday. I was straight on the phone and got a viewing booked in for 1045am Wednesday, second ones in. We saw the first people leave.
Viewed it, spend ages talking to the vendor and put in a full asking price offer to the agent as soon as we got home (3 streets away) at 11.15am. Waited all day to hear back. Rang the office several times. Fobbed off constantly.

As I was getting ready to pick up DS1 from school, I said to DH that I was tempted to ask her about it if I saw her in the playground. He told me to go for it. So I caught her (3pm at this point). Asked if she could let me know what the delay was. She was completely baffled, and had no idea what I was talking about. I told her we'd put in a full asking offer four hours earlier and she was furious. Said that the EA knew they wanted a fast sale as they'd found the property they wanted to offer on. Said she'd ring them when she got home.

EA rang us at 6pm to say that the first people were considering a second viewing and that the vendors were now considering whether to let it go ahead. We decided privately that if that did happen, we would pull our offer. The vendor didn't want any messing about either and they rang back about twenty minutes later to say that it had been accepted.

I later spoke to the vendor and she told me that when we put our offer in, rather than contact her, they'd spent the day trying to get the first person back for a second viewing so that they could get a bidding war going. They'd planned to do the second viewing before telling her about our offer.

DH was telling me that on completion day, his work colleague got a call from the agent to say that the keys wouldn't be available until 3pm, but if he paid £250, he could arrange to fast track it so he got them at 12. Said colleague was buying the property from his mum who was stood next to him holding the keys. Apparently the EA wasn't even embarrassed when he was told this.

*Our chain is tiny, but even so, something could go wrong at any point.

If you're the lady buying my house, I promise that it will be left in immaculate condition for you!*

Regrettably not, @lachy - still in the getting-money-together phase. But you're right, it could go wrong at any time and where am I going with my cat and guinea pig at short notice?

My last move from rent to rent, I was supposed to have a week, but due to a fuckup by the EA, I got three days. I thought I was gonna die. It was within walking distance, but the old flat seemed to take forever to empty.

This way, I'd be able to sort out any problems in the new house (see the whole damn thread for what could go wrong), decorate it how I want it (without painting round the furniture), move my stuff and make sure the old place is cleaner than clean, etc. Obv, I'll get a cleaner in for the invoice, but I'd want to go in and get photos after they're done. All at my leisure.

We didn't get the keys until 7pm. They clearly hadn't started packing until the day itself. They left a double bed upstairs and a fridge freezer, single mattress, chest of drawers, rug and various other crap in the garden. They also left behind an undetected gas leak which we had to fix by ripping kitchen cupboards out. Luckily we had somewhere else to stay. I don't know what we would have done otherwise. We were very naive first time buyers!

I've actually remembered a better one due to DH, I think I blocked it out actually.
I broke my foot moving the time before this.
We had one of those IKEA block shelving units that has space for a TV.
DH and DBIL both thought they didn't need to dismantle it, despite my telling them they should, because apparently, they knew better. They figures the lorry had a lift on it so they would just lift it on sideways.
Fucking dickheads the pair of them and I'm so pleased I only live with one of them
Of course the thing bloody collapsed, massive crash, on my foot.
Me being me after much swearing, I just ignored the throbbing pain and the fact I could barely put weight on it knowing if we didn't move out that day we would have to pay extra for the lorry and extra to our bastard ex landlord who already swindled us for years.
So when DH said his back had gone, I carried a full 1,000 records from the lorry to the house with his bro, along with sofa and beds and boxes.
When we were done, I sat down for a coffee and my dsil dropped the DCs off for us, she is a nurse.
She took one look at my foot and said I needed a+e, it was hugely swollen but I was that knackered I took ibuprofen and strapped it up
It's still, 6 years later, wonky and it swells up every so often if I do lots of walking around or if it's too hot.
She still tells me off.
Although the best one I've ever heard from someone else was when their mil was coming to see how they were getting on, just as their DH dropped a bed drawer on the ground with her vibrator in. It proceeded to set itself off and panicking, her DH put it in his back pocket and then tried to stand and have a chat with his mother.
He got away with it but anytime any of us move we always say to put those in a sealed box

Surprisingly, my easiest & best house move was done the day after I'd been in hospital for cervical cancer day surgery. I spent the day worrying that the wadding would come out with all the activity (supposed to rest for a few days after) and I would bleed everywhere, but everything went absolutely fine - though I did have a few peculiar aches that night.

I guess I'm the only one who thought this was about spooky yet emotional stories?

EggyPeggy Similar thing happened to my brother. First people to view put in an offer within half an hour of the viewing but EA didn't pass this on to him despite not having any other viewings booked.

Luckily the prospective buyers ran a local cafe so when brother popped in for a coffee a few days later they were able to have a very interesting conversation!

Bro and SIL wanted a quick sale as they were relocating abroad for work and the EA knew this but obviously wanted a bidding war.

I've only had one really bad EA. He made a racist comment about the vendors of a house we were viewing. We walked out there and then, reported him to the agency and let the vendors know what had happened.

Ok here's mine.

The end of a very non amicable separation from XP who had refused to sell and dragged it out for 3 years. So I was already stressed having had to live with my awful XP for 3 years (big house luckily!) Plus the terrible emotional wrench of leaving the home my DD grew up in on top of it all.

My buyer was insisting on completing by a certain date but the vendor of my house could only do 2 weeks after (as her vendors were going on a bloody cruise, which in the end was cancelled by Covid of course) So exchanged on my sale, waited a nerve wracked week then exchanged on my purchase.

Thought me and DD could go on holiday, air B and B, stay with elderly parents to fill the two weeks between completing on my sale and completing on my purchase.

Then along came a pandemic! Hotels closed, air b and b's stopped, couldn't risk inadvertantly infecting elderly parents, brother and family had Covid, couldn't stay with him, best friend and family had Covid, couldn't stay with them, couldn't go on hols, catteries all shut. It was like every door I tried to go through shut in my face.

Had to agree to go live with my awful XP for those two weeks (even he didn't want to see his DD homeless in a pandemic.) In lockdown, living in a much smaller house, with my XP - was the longest two weeks of my life.

As my stuff was going into storage I managed to move my packing/loading forward and I think I was literally one of the last people moved as lockdown came into force. On the mornings of the packing /loading I have never been so glad to see a van full of blokes, I was really worried they were going to cancel or be stopped from coming. Was the very day lockdown came into force!

But my tightfisted XP, of course, wouldn't pay for proper removals. And as I had nowhere to go I had to go along with him. Ended up doing at least 50% of his packing (having paid someone to do mine!!). The vans he hired were tiny and he was keeping way more of the stuff in the house. The night before the move he hadn't even packed his office up. I had had to order loads of boxes for him though the internet or he wouldn't even have had them! He was just sitting in his office moaning about being overwhelmed. I did all the postal redirects, meter readings, everything really.

Council skips had shut down, couldn't get a skip delivered, couldn't get a house clearance so had had to leave quite a bit of (XP's not mine!) junk.

He was completing on his house purchase on the same day as our house sale, and the money for various reasons didn't come through until really late and didn't get the keys until after 5pm. I really though me, DD and the cat were going to be homeless in the middle of a pandemic. Luckily our buyers weren't moving in that day but had decamped to their holiday home to sit out lockdown. So started moving in way into the evening, and he made ME phone up the buyer and ask if we could go in the next morning to get all the stuff he had to leave behind. He couldn't do the phone call of course and I just had to go along with it as his home was literally the only place I could stay. I had to absolutely beg our buyer to please let us, was so humiliating. Plus Dcat was locked up in the bathroom, traumatised and crying/meowing. Was awful. Thankfully the rag tag group of movers he had got together were the only saving grace and were brilliant, came back the next morning when they didn't have to - we had had to leave the all the white goods, all his computers and work paperwork, motorbikes in the garage, you name it.

My plan had been to walk out of the house with just suitcases for me and DD, with cat in a cattery, and not even say goodbye to him. Ended up living with him for two long weeks, keeping my mouth shut and going to bed early, and worrying that something was going to happen to my money that the solicitor was keeping for the purchase (catastrophising I know, but I was very stressed!) The day my purchase went though - the relief was actually physical. I felt light headed.

Managed to get all my stuff delivered from storage at the height of lockdown thank god or me and DD would have been in sleeping bags on the floor for god knows how long.

Now happily installed in said house, no longer speaking to XP beyond the bare minimum and never moving again!!!!!!

When my parents moved 250 miles away they put their stuff into storage until they found a permanent home. The removal company packed their home up for them and, upon unpacking, this included a bin full of rubbish with the obligatory banana skin and a vase of flowers compete with rancid water.

The move back was also eventful. Plenty of damaged furniture and my Dad kindly gave one of the removal men an old guitar of my brother's he didn't want anymore. Unfortunately it seems they helped themselves to my Dad's Marshall amp to go along with it. We just couldn't prove it. Bastard.

When we bought our 1st home many years ago, it had been a rental previously with multiple occupancy.
We were only a couple of miles away, living at PILs so were moving ourselves & turned up with our 1st van of furniture & things. After unloading, DH who is quite savvy changed the locks - thank goodness!
When we arrived back a couple of hours later with another van load, our neighbours told us that there had been a constant stream of people trying to get into the house - using keys!
I’m soooo glad we changed the locks straight away, but it is something I never would have thought of doing.

I think I’d rather extend than move looking at these stories!
Here’s one from my cousin.
They (her and her DH) were moving from his parents house to a house about 15 mins away.
The previous owners had moved out a week before so house was empty but they had to wait for completion and weren’t allowed to have keys early.
They opened the doors and the whole of downstairs was covered in slugs.
From the downstairs passage way to the sitting room, dining room and kitchen.
Walls and floors.
She sent her in laws, parents and husband round to get rid of them and refused to move until they’d gone. Apparently it was like a horror film.

We had similar to some. Once our buyers were selling but not using an estate agent. Nightmare!! We were buying a vacant house (thank god). We agreed an exchange and completion date. My dad flew over from America to help us pack and move, gave notice to my son’s school (needed to give one terms notice). Problems with our buyers, everything pushed back a month at last minute but my dad already flew here. My son was enrolled in new school - in Surrey and we were in our east London flat. Not a possible commute. So son went to USA with my dad for a month. We had to move without my dad’s help. Movers showed up with a van not the lorry booked. Two trips from east end of London to Surrey so was very late. DH was extremely sweaty so decided to have a shower before bed while I boiled the kettle for well needed cuppa. Only to find out the water ran down the walls of the shower into the kitchen below.

Next move 3 years later we are moving around the corner to a larger house but we of course collected lots of furniture in our first house so needed movers. Agreed a lorry and one trip. You guessed it, they came with a van - and one hit!!! thinking they could do Multiple trips and my DH could help do all the heavy lifting, dismantle the beds etc. Our buyers were sat in their lorry for hours until we were out. We were throwing things into our cars and driving it over Just to get out as fast as possible. We did have to go back because in the panic, I forgot to catch our cats to move to new house!!

New house, gave kids a bath and huge water bubble appeared in kitchen ceiling below. I didn’t know what it was at the time, so stood in a chair and poked it. Ceiling came down. Turned out the guy we bought from was a mr bodget. Didn’t hook up the drain! We continually discovered poor work for years to come.

Fortunately when we moved from that house, we paid packers who packed most of our things two days before the move and we were moving a vacant house that estate agent let us go I earlier to clean and bring in some of our very delicate belongings.

When we viewed our first home it had awful, thick artex in the hall stairs and landing. The couple had a dog that slept at the bottom of the stairs leaving a round, black stain on the otherwise pristine white walls.

Moving day came, we excitedly opened the front door to see they had painted everything a shade of deep purple. To this day I don't know why and can only assume it was to hide the stain. I was painting it back to white at 9am the next morning.
This was the couple that had moved an electric cooker across the kitchen, trailing a wire that was bare behind the washer. Had anyone touched the washer when the cooker was turned on they would have discovered it was live....

Moving into this house was a breeze. We bought direct from the owner so no EA involvement and we weren't selling purple house so we moved in at leisure over a week. All went swimmingly and we eventually sold purple house to our son last year, so again no EA and no hassle.
We did change locks here immediately though as it was a short term let for many years. Even now we get post for about 20 different names.

I was moving overseas. DH has already gone ahead so I was at home with 1 & 2 year old plus heavily pregnant (Was last week airline would let me fly so had to get sorted).

It was Monday and completion was Tuesday.

We were also selling a car - it was a classic car and DH had had a sale fall through before he left. We really needed it gone.

Someone was coming to view car and so I popped out in bare feet to hoover back seat. DCs in house. Somehow car keys slipped out of my pocket into car and car locked. House keys on car keys.

So I’m stood outside house with two children locked inside, no phone, a distance from neighbours, wondering whether best option is to smash car window and lose car sale or smash house window and deal with patch up job before completion.

I was running like one of those cartoon characters who doesn’t know what to deal with first - up the drive checking in kids through window, down to road to flag someone down. Bloody nightmare.

Got sorted through a miracle: DC safe, no damage to anything, car sold, house completed and we all moved but is still feel sick at the panic i felt.

Broke down on the side of the A23 while moving from London to Brighton. We travelled with the removal crew. Hours later in the middle of the night we arrived and the removal men only knocked off 10 quid!