To feel sad when I see my old house?

[avenueaspirr]

I sold my house in April 2020 and then saw that it was again on RightMove and now sold - so obviously I had a look.

They’d change quite a bit but I’d seen they’d ripped out the shutters in the bedroom that I’d paid £1000 for and replaced them with floral curtains - that one stung

I know I’m being unreasonable and it’s not mine! It was just sad to relive the memories I’d made there and see the changes. Anyone else felt like this?

My old house now has the most beautiful kitchen in it. It's gorgeous and they've done the living room up beautifully. The inside of the house looks amazing.

They have left the garden to rot, my husband and I put our heart and souls into creating a beautiful space that was adult, kid and pet friendly. Low maintenance and pretty.

It was sad to see the state it was in.

@Giggorata

The house I grew up in was a1930s treasure, with stained glass, dark oak doors, skirting, etc. Every little detail was there: Bakelite door handles, bevelled glass doorplates, geometric shaped fireplaces, and the bathroom was an Art Deco delight. When I last looked at it on Rightmove, all the period features were gone. It looked as though it could have been built last year.

I am not actually an Art Deco fan, but it was such a period piece, it probably should have been graded. ☹️

Oh God. That's heartbreaking. I would to have moved into a house with those features.

Two out of the previous houses I've lived in are demolished and now blocks of flats and terrace houses.

We’ve seen DHs family home online. Although he was upset (he thinks it should have been totally untouched even the hideous decor) they’ve made loads of positive changes. They’ve rearranged the living spaces and it makes so much more sense now (I’d suggested it and was told it wouldn’t work).
The only pity is it’s a rental so it’s very white with neutral carpets so no personality. But looks much more liveable.

I have sold since the mid 80s:
Flat
Terrace
Victorian semi
90s town house

Every property was renovated and decorated to maximise the sale price. In total 35 years of my and then our lives. We took our memories and the love built in those properties with us. Those who bought them transferred the purchase price to us and now own the houses to do with as they please.

I found every time we moved that once our possessions were packed up and the houses were empty they stopped being our home. I miss the neighbourhood of our old family home that we lived in for more than 20 years; I have wonderful happy evoking memories of our time in that house. But the house itself is no longer ours and therefore we have no say or emotional investment in its present or future.

Don’t look back!

My seller came back 6 months later to collect a summerhouse - we’d allowed them to leave it in situ, no problem for us.

We are a generation younger and though we hadn’t at that stage made any structural changes, the lounge was now solid wooden floors, spotlights, blinds and leather sofas instead of chintzy fabric sofa, floral full length curtains and busy carpet.

They seemed to take it as a personal affront, lots of, “oh well we were going to do that, but then when we decided to sell…” very pursed lips!

I get it though… I’m divorced and let my XH keep the house (he couldn’t have without me generously delaying repayment). My sons tell me about the latest decor change and a little part of me still thinks “hmmmmph” 🤣

But it's people's prerogative to put their own stamp on their home;thé day you move out the money you spend on x,y&z becomes null and void.It did whatever it was suppose to do for you.

Unfortunately a couple of year after my parents moved out of my childhood home someone was murdered in it.Now I can't think about my childhood home without that popping into my head.

@OhRene

My old farm cottage had a beautiful garden with a stunning climbing rose bush hanging over the dry stone wall at the bottom of the garden, a tall hedge that was filled with birds and their babies every year, separating the cottage from an ugly building works a field away, a huge 50+ year old rhododendron near the car parking that would be alive in the summer with thousands of lovely bees (who never bothered anyone nor left the bush) and two gigantic old trees beside it. I think they must have been at least 50 to 60ft tall at least. No neighbours to bother with leaves of lack of light etc and they were healthy and quite a way from the house. It was lovely. And as it was all plants that took care of themselves, gardening was as complicated as getting a lawnmower out every now and then and a quick once over with some hedge trimmers every couple of years.

New people bought it and ripped everything out. Goodbye bees, bye bye little conifer and rose bushes in the garden. See ya later wall climbing roses. The hedge? Gone. Even the trees were cut down for the new wood burner they installed. There is NOTHING but grass and road planings now. Not a single plant or flower surrounding the entire once picturesque cottage. It's not even nicely done either. It just looks tatty and bare. There is no neatly trimmed lawn and fancy deck, patio or gravel. Just roadworks stone chips chucked down.

I don't understand why people want to move to the countryside into a pretty, really old cottage and then make it look like it's in a concrete housing estate.

That’s tragic.

I was sad to see my parents’ old house now has a monstrosity of a fence halfway up the drive. It looks dreadful and opening the gates to get one of their two cars in must be a pain in the arse. I’m so glad I can’t see the inside.

I feel very upset going past my childhood home. I guess that's different though.

The buyers of the home we sold 10 years ago haven't changed a thing. They even asked where we bought things like bedding, picture frames, tea towels, etc so they could buy the exact same so it would look how it did when we were there. I should be flattered but I'm honestly more creeped out, and sad that they've not done anything to the house which suggests they've not been maintaining it. It's up for sale at the moment and they could've just used the photos we had taken when we sold it.

My first flat looks lovely now- a young artist friend-of-a-friend bought it and invited me to have a look around. He has lovely taste and ideas about how to arrange furniture, I wish I'd thought of it when I lived there!

I feel very sad when I see my old house. First, it was decorated nicely and the new owners haven't done a thing to it - literally, they've just neglected it, now the front garden is overgrown and full of rubbish and they just keep the curtains closed all day, and the driveway's full of weeds. My new house is undecorated, so no one can come round. I wish the owners of the old one appreciated how lucky they are to have somewhere nice to live, and might consider picking up the rotten fence panels and crisp packets from the garden.

Aww some of these stories are lovely to read. We recently downsized from our very large family home to a much smaller property, to help me cope with my disability. I have totally accepted that people need to make their home “theirs”. I would love to see the changes made at our old house, I am sure they would do a great job. We have made lots of changes in our new home. Best move we have made.

Our first house, that we moved out of when I was 3yo.
It had a lovely rose garden at the back that df had put hours of work in.

Several years later I was doing leaflet drops and when I put one through their letter box I could see they'd ripped all the garden out and paved over the back garden. It wasn't even nice patio, plain concrete.

We had a beautiful old detached cottage with exposed beams, farmhouse kitchen with pantry, no wall units, roll top bath, cottage garden etc. Sold it 12 years ago as I wanted to get off the main road. It sold within a few weeks.
The new owners ripped out the kitchen and replaced it with a shiny modern kitchen, knocked out the back wall and installed patio doors, modernised the bathroom. Flagged over most of the garden to create a second driveway. They must have spent thousands on it in the 12 months that they owned it. They then put it back up for sale. It took more than 4 years to sell, and the last time I looked, the selling price had been reduced to £10 k more than we sold it for, so they made a huge loss on it.
It broke my heart to see the photos as they had ‘ruined’ my house. I only hope that the new owners restored it to an old cottage again.

My Nans house was on Rightmove a few years back. I remember a huge 100 ft garden and trees .They had an extension ,but I luckily couldnt see how much garden they had left! Inside was nicely done ,but a million miles from Nan and Grandads scullery ,and front (best) room and back room !

@tallduckandhandsome

They ripped out plantation shutters?!

The trouble is, nowadays they are made of veneered chipboard and are in every council estate up and down the country and they just look a bit chavvy.

My ex in laws were professional carpenters and had renovated their house restoring original features, fireplaces, tiles, wooden floors, windows, stripping paint from the stairs and bannisters, wood panelling hand making the kitchen cabinets etc.

The buyer painted over everything in white.

Giggorata Yes my Nans house was 1930s semi , long garden ,picture rails ,and so on .Thing is of course its their house now not ours! We lived in N London then ,but are now on SC so not much chance of driving by anyway! Lots of houses that are "done up", seem to follow a pattern ,white kitchen/bathroom ,obligatory extension ,Shutters and so on .No character left!

@ablutiions and @catwithflowers It's heartbreaking driving past. It's not like the garden required maintenance other than an odd mow or cutting down dead what I think were called peonies? And according to google the others were Montbretia. (I know nowt about gardening but it still looked wonderful without my interference.)
I think I wouldn't be so bothered if it was replaced by a neat manicured modern lawn and nice gravel, flagstones or decking but it looks like a unkempt field.

this thread has made me curious to look up my old childhouse on google maps and lo and behold its just as i remembered , still the same , only thing missing is the pampas grass in the middle of the front lawn , theres a car there instead , they have 2 , the other is in the unchanged driveway , 2 neighbours houses look same as well , its been literally years , i moved out when i was 12 when my parents split ,im 49 nearly , couldnt find photos though which is annoying , 2 sales listed on rightmove ,but no photos of it sadly

When we moved into our house over 15 years ago the front garden was beautiful. With 3 cars though and very little parking in the street we had to put in a driveway. We removed a lot of the mature bushes and trees and my mum out them in her garden. The previous owner had planted a beautiful rose bush when her grandson died and we Managed to keep that and the beautiful azaleas by creating a border round the edge of the driveway. I’ve never felt so guilty! Inside there are beautiful 1930’s art deco wall lights. The glass in them is really thin but we have kept them and carefully wrap each individual piece of glass each time we decorate. I’d be gutted if someone moved in and got rid of them but I know when we sell, they probably will.

In our first house we were really into bright colours. We moved 15 years ago. Every room was painted a different really bright colour. In the kitchen my husband who is a carpenter built a beautiful kitchen but we put multi coloured tiles on the wall as in 6 different colours randomly placed. Loved it at the time but definitely wouldn’t do it now, they were really in your face 😂. Weirdly the house has been sold 3 times since and the kitchen has never changed. I’m glad the bespoke kitchen was appreciated but gobsmacked no one ever got rid of the tiles.

Anyone wanting to try and track down house sale photos that may not be on Rightmove, try looking on themovemarket.com/

@Conchitastrawberry

When we moved into our house over 15 years ago the front garden was beautiful. With 3 cars though and very little parking in the street we had to put in a driveway. We removed a lot of the mature bushes and trees and my mum out them in her garden. The previous owner had planted a beautiful rose bush when her grandson died and we Managed to keep that and the beautiful azaleas by creating a border round the edge of the driveway. I’ve never felt so guilty! Inside there are beautiful 1930’s art deco wall lights. The glass in them is really thin but we have kept them and carefully wrap each individual piece of glass each time we decorate. I’d be gutted if someone moved in and got rid of them but I know when we sell, they probably will.

I’m surprised she didn’t take the rose bush with her?

@tallduckandhandsome

They ripped out plantation shutters?!

I would. They’re ugly 🤷‍♀️