What were your let-downs/disappointments when you bought a house?

[MossyOilTank]

We're buying a house I viewed once for about twenty minutes. DH saw it twice. We know the area really well and it ticks the boxes so I'm not hugely concerned, but there's so many things going through my mind right now and it's still more than two weeks before we move. I've pretty much forgotten about anything not in the schedule photos already!

How much work will it be to rip out the horrible wood facia in the dining room? Should we just refit the utility room? Is that bay window going to make it impossible to have a decent sized sofa? And will it work having the kids' clothes storage in the hall rather than their bedrooms?

Just want to get in there with a clipboard, and find all the glitches ... argh!

Loads of worrying cracks in the walls. Really don't know how on earth we didn't see them when we looked round the house (twice).

We have just decided to ignore them as if it's something bad we can't afford to fix it anyway.

A botched electric shower which could have killed us. The fuse box started smoking, fortunately

In hindsight I wish I'd had a few viewings. But we were first time buyers and were excited. We moved in over 5 years ago. We only had the basic survey as we didn't know any better.
Previous owner was a landscape gardener who thought himself to be a diy king. Put up the conservatory themselves, but got rid of the stench pipe for the toilet in the process, so now the smell comes out through the drain that is right outside the conservatory door (think they moved the drain as well). Also lots of gaps in the conservatory where you can feel a breeze coming in, and lots of ants and woodlice get in. Filled in so many holes.
Windows in the bay upstairs and downstairs didn't fit, you can tell it's been padded between the side windows and the main window to make them fit. We've replaced the upstairs one but can't afford to replace downstairs.
Combi boiler (in a cupboard in the kitchen above plugs) constantly leaked. Had to get it replaced after a year.
Hole in the kitchen tiles above the cabinets, but no hole outside so don't know why (maybe something to do with the really old boiler that used to be in the airing cupboard before they got rid of that and extended the bathroom) which they filled in with plastic bags.
Plug sockets and light switches upside down.
Loose wire hanging down by outside light so it kept tripping.
One section of spotlights in the bathroom stopped working after a few months. Finally got that fixed this summer.
Sectional garage missing a section at the back filled in with plastic wall, sectional walls not completely fitted properly so water coming through, garage lower than the patio so the water constantly drained into it. That's finally been taken down this summer and has been replaced with a shed that is on higher ground.
Found out the wiring for the garage was put in the wrong way round, so when we tried to put lighting in the new shed it kept tripping. That might explain why the security light in the back constantly tripped as well.
The oven was broken as soon as we moved in, so we could only use the hob until we bought a new one.
And something that isn't broken but I cannot stand is the kitchen floor. It's dark tiles, maybe slate, that are all uneven (on purpose to look more natural). Except it's a pain to clean, things get stuck in the crevices, and it rips to pieces our slippers. I've steam cleaned it with a wire brush so many times and it's never fully clean.

Our house was filthy. We had viewed it three months earlier and I don't think the vendors had done any cleaning since. The cooker was disgusting and the grill tray had about an inch of fat at the bottom of it. They had taken everything that had been screwed into the walls (they were meant to leave everything that was a fixture or a fitting) and all the rooms had holes in the walls which hadn't been filled. They had even taken the loo roll holder and loo roll.

When I moved into my first flat the vendor had removed every light bulb. This wouldn't have been a huge problem, but the hall was internal with no windows to the outside.

who checks that the taps actually turn on?

Oh, me. Sorry.

How the noise transfers from next door,

Oh yes. That one too. Thank god its an old man and not a screaming family that live next to me.

Not me but old friends of our family
Moved into their new house and every wall had been stripped of wallpaper.
After careful examination and a chat with the neighbours the wallpaper had been pinned to the walls with thumb tacks/drawing pins.

A radiator that doesn't work and a REALLY noisy loo. I'd be asking them to have the heating on and then you can check each radiator.

Filth everywhere! Doors on kitchen cupboards which fell off on day 1, overgrown garden which had been fine at viewing. Lightbulbs removed, curtain rails removed, toilet roll holders removed, floating shelves ripped out and damage not made good. Huge gouges to walls and damage to laminate flooring where furniture was removed carelessly. Oh and 4 different wasp nests in the roof and eaves which had been there a while. Solicitor said not worth pursuing.

I saw someone on here who moved in and the seller had removed the kitchen or bathroom. I forget which.

Another one for noise transfer from next door. I am 'blessed' with fairly noisy neighbours anyway, but I hear everything through the walls.

Next time I buy, I will do a viewing when next door are in and stand in silence for a few minutes to see how much I can hear.

Oh and whoever says "buy a house with adjoining stairs to avoid noise issues", that's bollocks if your party wall is paper thin and the noise just flows through the shitty concrete walls inside. It's miserable.

When we stripped the wallpaper in the master bedroom there were over90 real plug holes in the walls that needed them removing and the holes filling....
Great way to spend my 50th birthday

*Rawl plug holes

Oh and I nearly forgot... the carbon monoxide alarm was going off when we first got the keys.

I am seven months pregnant.

Turns out it was broken, but still...

And will it work having the kids' clothes storage in the hall rather than their bedrooms This is worrying!

@thatmustbenigelwiththebrie we sold recently in London and the extreme heat put more cracks in rooms. I was worried our buyers would pull out, but maybe like you they didn't see them.

And will it work having the kids' clothes storage in the hall rather than their bedrooms This is worrying!

Due to an internal redesign there are huge built in cupboards in the hall which used to belong to the bedrooms opposite - I can't work out if this is going to be a boon or a headache!

So far we have discovered:

A loft ladder that has taken an immense dislike to dh and amongst the injuries almost chopped his finger off last week. New ladder being fitted next week. The 1960's relic can go to the scrapman.

One toilet was constantly running, the other, there was a knack to flushing it (I.e it was pretty impossible to do so). Luckily I know a good plumber.

A gap in the conservatory roof. Storm Ali gifted us a pile of leaves in the middle of the floor. Whilst someone was round to quote for that they noticed that one of the windows needs attention.

Some lovely 'daisy chaining' of extension leads in the bedroom. Not too overly worried though, all fully out and not overloaded.

A very old plug socket in one of the bedrooms. There is no switch. I haven't put anything near it.

The vent in the lounge was covered. When SSE came to service our boiler etc they threatened dh with the fire having a notification unless he removed it.

One of the fences is held up purely by the ivy. That needs sorting.

Garage door needed a new lock very early on, may also need a full mechanism replacement.

And not their fault and not even our tree but part of it has come down in the storm and may have damaged a gate.

For all this though I love my house and am so much happier here than I was in my previous 'new build'.

Is this a stealth boast?
Bay window
Utility room
Dining room
You know many can only stretch to a 2 up 2 down!
Enjoy what you get and make it your own over time!

The first ever apartment I viewed was horrible. The paint was disgusting and the smell too. We also found that the sink was not working properly either. Eventually we rejected it on the spot after having a tour of the place. Our current one was better. We decided that we could live with noise from the street and poor lighting too. However we just ordered new lightbulbs and new tiles for our bathroom. I have a quote.

Surely it depends where you buy. My mil has a bay window in her dining room, her house is worth less than a 100k.

I have all of them in my 3 bed detached, which cost less than a 1 bed flat in great swathes of the country.

Is this a stealth boast?

Ouch.

It isn't grand, I promise, it's a 60s concrete bungalow with flat roof tacked on everywhere. I am genuinely stressing a bit because we're mortgaging ourselves up to our ears and I can't remember what sort of floor there is in half the rooms, that's all.

I am duly shamed though, sorry.

Stealthy boast?
Our 2 bed 2 reception and utility ( with endless rawl plug holes) cost less than a bedsit where we moved from......give your head a wobble and don't let the green eyed monster nip your butt

Weirdly inaccurate completion of the fixtures and fittings form.

I.e. - Bedroom 3 - no shelving, no blind.

Except it had both - we didn't especially care if they decided to remove either, but at least admit their existence!

Garden - promised to leave dining table and chairs for free.

Oh, nice. We didn't ask for them, so it was a pleasant bonus. Except the fuckers then took them.

All sorts of bizarre inaccuracies like that that made very little difference in the end - no shelves taken, curtain poles where we expected etc - but just bore no relation to the property as we viewed it.