Second-homer wanting to be part of the community

[IMustConfess]

I live in a village on the coast in a semi-rural area. It's a place where people come to live for a relatively quiet life with great walks, fresh air and unspoiled beaches. Lots of artists and writers and gardeners.

Two years ago a couple from London bought the small detached property next door to me. It's a holiday home for them and their friends and family. They're in their 50s, clearly used to a busy lifestyle in London. Lots of talk of theatre and gigs and nice restaurants. They moved in and invited a few locals to dinner and said they wanted to get involved with whatever's going on. They clearly expected to be invited back to eat with everyone and were surprised when some didn't reciprocate. 'But we were told there was a great community here!' They went round knocking on lots of doors and introducing themselves and saying how much they wanted to be involved, but they're probably only here for 10 weeks of the year max. One of my neighbours was really pissed off by it. She said it was like they had an idea of country life they'd got from a TV drama.

When their families come down independently they knock on my door and introduce themselves and say how wonderful that we're all such good friends/ such a lovely community and seem to expect to be invited in and given tea and told what's on. If there's something happening they want me to take them along. They've clearly been told I'll be happy to include them.

This year the husband's been working away a lot and so the wife has been coming down on her own. She always messages me a day or two before she's due to arrive and announces she's coming and wants to know what's on in 'the community'. She messages me when she's arrived so I know she's arrived safely. 😱She expects to be included in anything I've got going on. I took her to my book group when she was down in the summer, and now she expects to be included and tries to get us to schedule our meet-ups for when she's here.

When I moved here I got to know people slowly and worked out who I got on with. My neighbours seem to think friendship comes on a plate and everyone loves them. We have friends who live next door to an AirBnB and say something similar: many of the people who rent the place want to talk to them as if they're friends and happy to spend half an hour telling them which coastal walk is most scenic or which local pub does the best beer. We live here: we're not tourist information or rent-a-mate.

Are we the unreasonable ones? What's going on with people that they think they can just waltz into a new area and everyone'll love them?

@Expletive - the term is racist, and shouldn't be used. It's not 1698.

Ultimately, you found the words to post it here, you could be a nice grown up and find the words to say it the new part time neighbours without indulging in umbrage and moans with the old neighbours. Or, you could carry on seeing these new folk as a good source of gossip and complaint to spice up the chat in a slow village life.

It's up to you. No one is blocking you from talking to them like a fully-capable adult. Give them the same respect and care you would hope for (and, no, they probably would do the same in return... if that particularly bothers you, ask yourself why).

@krustykittens They were genuinely gobsmacked when I asked them to leave one day and to ask before coming up as they were interrupting my working day - they said they didn’t think we worked!

Hence the reason they'd soon be asking you to clean their gutters for them. Give you something to do!

I too think that OP {allegedly from London} is being spiteful to the second home owners as a way of ingratiating herself with the people born and bred there.

I'm a Londoner who has to spend half a year in the countryside for family reasons and I think sending texts on arrival and inviting yourself to everything is OTT, but I also know we are damned if we do and damned if we don't 😂

PS We happen to have nice neighbours both in London and in the country, maybe just lucky.

Well then your argument regarding local people for local houses makes no sense, if you live in such an industrial area rich in work roles why are you selling houses to these awful "outsiders"?
Of course you were one once remember, we all were.

What do you want them to offer to the community? Although they have gone about it in quite a bullish way, they have offered their friendship and they made people dinner didn’t they? They also want to give time to go to community events as they ask you what’s on. I assume they mean farmers markets or whatever? Which supports locals? don’t really understand what you want them to offer? It sounds like you want them to donate money, quite honestly. And having donated money, to be publicly lashed on the village green for daring to buy a 2nd home in your village.

It’s clear from your post that you resent 2nd home owners. They made different life choices to you - I bet it is not pleasant living in London I can understand why they’d want a place to get away to.

if you don’t like them and think they are shit people, then have the guts to say it to them: “No Catherine, you can’t come to our book club because we don’t like 2nd home owners”

the bottom line is that they’ve done nothing illegal or wrong - but it has become quite acceptable to judge (and hate) people for 2nd home ownership. It isn’t acceptable. Unless you’d also judge and hate someone for not having been able to buy a home? No - it’s fashionable to think that someone rich is evil amd someone poor is the salt of the earth. Nonsensical. There are cunts in both categories.

No, I am not one of the 2nd home owners!

I doubt she's inviting herself to everything, and maybe the text is just being friendly and polite?.
It all seems somewhat overblown.

Would you be friends with her if she was a permanent resident? If the answer is no then stop making so much effort. If yes then try and focus less on the fact that it’s a second home.

You could also take the opportunity to let them contribute to the community, especially if you have her number! “We are looking for raffle prize donations for the local school”, “we need volunteers to help at the village fair”, “we are doing a litter pick tomorrow, please join in” etc.

This is bizarre. I blew in from London in 2009 and after a couple of years I'd made friends and connections and was accepted. People are friendly here. I'm friendly. I live here, this is my home. I'm committed.

But when you're here on holiday for 10 weeks a year, and when you send your DS and BIL and nieces and nephews here for holidays with the advice that if they have any problems they're to go next door and ask me to help sort it out (they didn't tell me they'd told their family that, or asked me if that was okay) then it's a different sort of relationship. And that's one of the reasons why second-homers may struggle to feel they belong: because their real home is elsewhere.

Funnily enough, I did used to get a few requests of, “if you are going to shops, could you get us a few things?” ! Withdrawing from the WhatsApp group they kindly set up for us was a smart move!

I had to google that...I rarely watch TV, but will see if it's available online!..Oh, it is!

“Love thy neighbour” is on very short supply in some areas. It only works if they are “people like us”. It’s shameful and unfriendly. We seem to have forgotten how to be pleasant.

Your attitude is bizarre. Either you want to give them a chance or you feel like they've already blown their chance, so what's the point of posting this here? Be honest, are you enjoying the whinge and the gossip, or do you want to try to make your life better? If it's the latter, then you're clearing capable of having a tactful conversation with them. Why are you choosing not to? Bizarre, don't you think?

You misunderstand. There was nothing racist about it back then. Not in the UK anyway. It most definitely is now.

After 300 years as a term for an idiot in the UK, its meaning has been corrupted to mean something else entirely over the last 50 years. Its origins as a racist term only date back to the mid 20th century USA.

It sounds to me like they're just being friendly, & you sound deeply offended that they're there at all, so what if they're only there for part of the time, it's their house & they paid for it. If you don't want to live & let live you could always move there's no shortage of clique villages around

The greater good.

I mean you have to move with the times & refrain from using racism. It's about being respectful to others. If someone finds it offensive regardless whether it used to be ok, you don't have to use it. Public flogging, hanging & wife beating used to be legally acceptable but we don't want to see it coming back!

"But when you're here on holiday for 10 weeks a year, and when you send your DS and BIL and nieces and nephews here for holidays with the advice that if they have any problems they're to go next door and ask me to help sort it out (they didn't tell me they'd told their family that, or asked me if that was okay) then it's a different sort of relationship."

You'll just have to be clueless about what to do ....

I absolutely don't ''misunderstand''.
Who cares what words were used back in past centuries?

You have probably only googled it this evening.

It's offensive to use that term now.

If you want to find out how it is perceived, by most people, start using it.

Just call the biscuits something else. Dear lord.

A word of warning @oakleaffy
its really creepy!

The 1960s was hardly past centuries.

It's amazing. Harvey, Auntie Val and the twins made me never want to stay in anyone else's house. Ever!

Local Facebook group?
That's what we have to tell people what is going on.