Would you buy a smelly house?

[silkcut100]

One that smelt of cigarette smoke?

Yes because the smell will go, a lot of older houses would have had smokers in as it was not unusual to smoke inside back in the day. Loads of people used to smoke in houses and people didn't replaster the whole house when they moved.

The smell goes within a matter of weeks. So it wouldn't put me off.

So you don't want anything short of nice? Lots of people have to tackle such challenges because what we'd like costs more that we can afford.

My first house stank of cigarettes and I would never buy another like this. I didn't have the money to replace carpets etc so lived with a stale cigarette smell for years. Fabreze just doesn't cut it.

I will also never forget steaming the wallpaper off the ceiling with yellow nicotine water dripping on me. Foul.

We did
For a cheap price though

The old lady who lived there had died probably of her smoking habit. It had wood chip wallpaper on the walls and the ceiling that just reeked of smoke and was all yellow. There was even a darker brown patch on the ceiling above where her favourite chair had been

It didn't matter to us as we ripped it all out anyway. All the wallpaper, curtains and carpets went in the skip and the walls were nothing that a good scrub with sugar soap couldn't cure. We actually got the ceiling replastered in the end because the nicotine stains kept coming through the new paint.

We once viewed a house that smelled very strongly of dog, it was a lovely house but I just couldn’t see past the smell, it felt like too much of a gamble in case the smell didn’t go away. The house didn’t stay on the market for long so clearly some people didn’t mind it!

Unless you are planning a full replaster.
Our first house. Nicotine Villas. Scrubbed, painted, repainted, painted with stain blocker. Sold it 5 years later with slightly yellow ceilings.

I’ve never bought a house that didn’t stink, just like I’ve never bought a house that had anything more than a pretence of a usable kitchen, a clean toilet or a roof/windows that didn’t leak.

Not in a million years.

Before viewings, I’ve asked estate agents to confirm that it’s a non-smoking house.

We did.
We don’t think the old owners smoked inside, as it wasn’t too overbearing. We think the stops in the back door so some smoke was blown in.

We steam cleaned all the floors and carpets, and repainted every wall in the house. (The few advantages of having the rental paid up for 3 weeks after move in day!).

No I wouldnt, we bought a smelly house but it was dogs it stank of. The smell didn't go until every floor and skirting had been ripped out and the walls repainted, took months even once the things had gone. Cigarette smoke does far more damage than stinking dogs, it seeps into the plaster, grim. I've said our next house will have to be pet free (I don't think many people smoke these days, but it'd be a no to smokers too), any smells really! My sister bought a house that backs onto farmers fields, lovely except the stench in summer is awful, she has to keep windows closed, but even then they can still smell it!

Nope, can't stand it!

Yes! We bought a house which had orange nicotine stained walls and ceiling. The double glazing oozed brown water when we steamed it. The house was in a really desirable area so we snapped it up. It did need a full refurb but after redecoration and new flooring the smell disappeared. We sold after 2 years for a nice profit and bought another refurb. If it ticks all your boxes then go for it. There are lots of products for decorators to use to combat nicotine stains and smells.

I would if everything else was good about it. Try boiling vinegar on the stove to get rid of lingering smells. Obviously repainting everything will help.

This thread is depressing me: my wife is a heavy smoker. She smoked when we met, almost 50 years ago. I didn't like it, but smoking was much more common back then. The world has changed; she has not.

If my wife dies before me I guess I'll see what the real estate agent says, but to be quite honest, it would give me great satisfaction to have the house demolished.

I would.

When we were really broke we rented a house that stank - it'd been empty for months, the last tenant had painted the windows shut so it was mouldy, she'd let her dog use one of the bedrooms as a toilet, and she'd had a badly ventilated open fire. Her smoking was the least of our worries. When we moved in the damp was five and six feet up the walls and it took months to dry out.

But, by the time the owners put it up for sale, we'd sorted the worst of it and knew exactly what needed doing. The carpets had to go and the wallpaper, but the bones of the house are lovely.

Very unlikely. I vetoed a house dh liked for this reason and we were planning on gutting it in any event but I couldn't get past the smell. The house itself had a few other issues so I'm not sure if I would consider for the perfect house if that was the only issue but I think dependant on smell, cigarette smoke gets in everything. I have an old cabinet passed down by a smoker and it continues to smell of smoke and gets on anything that is put in there.

We did but it was fine once the old carpets were replaced and we redecorated

Nope. I rejected a well-priced house for this reason. Walked in, breathed in, left immediately with apologies to the estate agent that I cannot be in that house, it reeks.

Smoke stench is very hard to get rid of and I’ll pay a lot to not deal with that grossness.

Not sure if it was for that reason but the house in Q that stank wouldn't sell. The owner was asking top whack and wouldn't negotiate and in the end moved back in to do so some work to it and rented it out.

Oh, and for tips - as well as taking up anything soft that soaks up smells, you can coat floorboards with baking soda then scrub them down with diluted vinegar. Also worth taking up a board and making sure it's clean in the cavity space - in my house, the space under the floor upstairs was full of inches of compacted dust and rubbish (including a blissfully undisturbed mid-Victorian coin), and I'm sure all of that wasn't helping the smell. There were inches of dust/sawdust where someone had clearly done work and just shoved it down between the cracks in the floorboards.

@SpiderinaWingMirror

Unless you are planning a full replaster. Our first house. Nicotine Villas. Scrubbed, painted, repainted, painted with stain blocker. Sold it 5 years later with slightly yellow ceilings.

What is stain blocker?

No. In my view the smell never really goes. Though I suppose someone could become attuned to it (once it was cleaned and painted and recarpeted and so on) in the way owners of smelly dogs don't realise their house smells of dog, and others don't notice cat wee...

Yes but tbh I’d prefer to buy a house I can do work to anyway

Remove carpets and strip wallpaper and wash absolutely everything.

I moved into a council property where you could see where the pictures had been on the wall. It didn't take much work as the council had removed the carpets already. The hall was fine thank goodness as I wasn't keen on wallpapering that.

But every door and frame and skirting needed cleaning.