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?

Agreed. Be clueless, be absent, be silent. I wouldn't do any of the stuff about suggesting things; just stop being helpful. Think of some good lines in advance to deflect suggestions.

So you are a blow in to a scenic area, probably by out biddibg a poorer local. But now you are taking the moral high ground to a holiday home owner because you somehow think you are a local? Big news, you aren't a local and the locals don't think you are a local either.

This makes me want to never live in the countryside!

I’d just make sure to organise lots of things and be far too busy to catch up any time you know she’s on her way to stay. Even letting her know that you have housework to catch up on and won’t be socializing this weekend, etc if you just want to blob around at home. She sounds like she will only get worse if she moves in permanently later on and expect you to be her best friend.

Thanks, I'll most definitely give it a watch.

Small minded parochial villages would drive me round the absolute bend. Edit :This was in reply to someone regarding Royston Vesey!

ABSOLUTELY!!!
The hypocrisy of it- that's what seems so cheeky.

Londoners have absolutely ramped up houses in certain smaller Cities, as well. {I am a Londoner, but live in another City for the affordable house. London is still my 'Home' though as Family live there.

At least own that one isn't local.

😂

YABU, but then I live in a country where people are known for being friendly to others. This sort of attitude, where people have to live full-time in a community (and probably for years) before they are accepted is ridiculous. It sounds like something from decades ago.

You could either stop replying to her messages or just say you are busy with plans and hope she has a good stay. You are being too accommodating op.

It would annoy me too.

I dunno, OP. Your title

second-homer wanting to be part of the community

and the last line of your initial post

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

make this all sound like sour grapes from a sour person.

There's been some further drip feeding about how obnoxious she and her family are, but overall, my impression is what this is really about is you wanting to assert some kind of superiority because you came in from London and bought up a place but you're different. You're an insider who deserves to be an insider. She's an outsider who deserves to remain an outsider.

Just be polite but not friendly and move on. Hopefully they'll meet some more pleasant and accepting people and leave you alone. If not, maybe they'll decide it's not the place for them and sell to someone really unpleasant.

Yes, YABU.

This thread makes me so glad not to live in a village.

If I had a country retreat, no way would I want to be involved with the natives. I'd be pleasant but keep myself to myself and enjoy the peace.

This couple in their fifties may have been planning to move permanently to the village on retirement which is why they have made so nany overtures. I hope for their sakes they don't.

I bet nobody has told them any of this to their faces, they no doubt have a completely false perception of the village and its people, and tell others how wonderful and friendly everyone is.

I hope one of them reads this.

What do you think they should be offering to the locals?

They invited people over to make new contacts and widen their network but most people didn't seem to want to take it further.

You could suggest they join local groups, WI, church, bowls, cricket , volunteer at the local hospital or something .

You took her to book club, is she allowed to attend that without you?

But I wonder if the OPs neighbours think exactly the same, because on the surface it sounds like this might be the impression they have of their second home community. But they’re just oblivious to how people (or the OP anyway) actually feel about them.

Glad I read this thread, always good to count your blessings.

This Londoner is supremely grateful that our city has no second/multiple property owners, that children can always afford to live in the areas we grew up, there are no air bnbs, and tourists never ever ask you directions/how to use the tube/what you think of their itinerary. Oh also that people vaguely connected never ask to crash for the weekend when they need or want to be in town.

@IMustConfess I think you are being very unreasonable. When people buy seconds homes the common complaint is that they are not friendly, swan in and out ignoring locals and the local community. This family sound like delightful additions to the community. Ok I agree that messaging you to say they’ve arrived safely in a bit OTT but I could forgive that to have friendly kind neighbours.

What goes around comes around, you could get a few weeks in their main home in the city to go to a show maybe?’

Never heard of the Newt so have just googled. So you have to be a member to eat in a cafe? What about the craft workshops, are they members only?

You should absolutely dig some information about them out, then start making plans for your friends and distance relations to go to London and stay with them. I'm sure your 18 yo niece will need someplace to crash after a night out and your mate is going up to the theatre soon so they would be more then happy to provide them with dinner first and drop them off.

Turn it around on them and I'm sure they will soon back off

This woman isn't staying with the OP, though . She has bought her own property. So the equivalent would be for the OP to buy a property near this woman in London.
That's quite a different situation.

Well, they might have good intentions i guess, but i grew up in a popular holiday destination and there's definitely a proportion of visitors that act as if these places are "country living theme parks manned 24/7 by actors" like some rural Disney land. And they do treat the people who live there like they are there mainly to facilitate their enjoyment, not treating them as other real humans with real jobs and real commitments. And it is bloody annoying! So could easily be that!

Ignore messages.
Block them if you have to.
Don't go out your way to be mean but also don't be overly friendly.
They're not part of the community and they're stopping someone else from living there who would be part of the community.

No you aren’t. You are nice to their faces but bitch about them behind their backs. Thats not lovely.

They actually sound really nice and if you were a bit more open minded you might actually find them to be genuine friends (possibly more so than the other ‘locals’ who are being equally bitchy)

if someone bitches to me about someone else (barring very close friends) I always wonder what they are saying behind my back…

It doesn’t sound like the people in the OP are trying to change things at all. They just want to be involved and fit in, like you.

Second home owners are just that though, it's not actually their community but rather a community they visit.

It's really not, in my experience, but it's also not a theme park for people to visit and cosplay 'village life' for a bit of a lark...

Interesting thread. After a great deal of too-ing and fro-ing I think it’s now been finally established that Londoners are the friendliest (ergo enlightened and open minded) people on earth and country folk are, for the most part, the rudest and least tolerant.

Or perhaps we could all just agree that there is a middle ground, and every community, wherever it is, has its fair share of both kind and cunty people, and some of our opinions are simply formed via personal experience?

Op I agree with others that these people are damned if they do and damned if they don’t, however this kind of one-way ‘main character’ attitude that your pt neighbour is displaying would drive me mad. It would irritate me beyond belief if I was made to feel like part of the chorus on the stage of someone else’s life like this. I can only suggest that you maintain a degree of friendliness but fgs be clearer about your boundaries as you sound a little insincere and two-faced.