Did you leave a gift for the new owners of your house?

[Fourmoos]

We are moving soon and wondered what was the done thing re the new occupants of our home. Does everyone leave a gift and what would you suggest apart from champagne? Thanks.

A bottle of wine and a bunch of flowers cut from the garden, if they have been good buyers, nothing if they have been a PITA.

No, but I left a two page document giving the names of the immediate neighbours, detailing the businesses who'd done things like the splashback, flooring the attic, supplied the blinds, etc. in case our buyer had any problems or wished to change them, as well as the telephone number for the gardener and the window cleaner, colours of paint used on the walls etc.

Our buyer paid extra for some furniture we offered to sell to her (highly discounted, she was a FTB) and I left the bed we'd sold partially made up with fresh bedding folded on top so she didn't need to worry about finding bed stuff in her boxes on the first night.

I also cleaned the place like fuck for like two nights before we left- steam cleaned the floors and all.

I called over to get post a few months later and she said she didn't appreciate at the time how good we'd been, it was only after speaking to friends who'd bought places left in an absolute state that she realised it wasn't the norm!

Our vendors left us a bottle of red wine, a card, and a pouch with the user manuals for built-in appliances and the thermostat. They had cleaned top to bottom and the floors were still wet/drying from their mopping when we first stepped in the door!

I left wine, chocolates and a card. Received nice potted plant and a card - but the vendor took all of the internal door knobs (standard unexciting wooden ones), the lightbulbs and the carpets.

I left a bottle of prosecco, a bunch of flowers and a card, along with a pile of instruction manuals, some takeaway leaflets and a long list of information. And I cleaned. They had been lovely buyers.

I was left a tin of Quality Street and a card, instructions and info, and a spotlessly clean house. I was lucky!

Im planning to empty my house a week before completion (I'm fortunately in a position to do this) and then will give a tip to toe thorough cleaning. My daughter moved house recently and the previous owners didn't even put the Hoover round and the house was very grubby and lots of hidden faults. Instead of feeling excited when they got the keys it was disheartening and spoilt their first few weeks while they scrubbed and painted and lived with parents before they could move in.

I have made a house folder for the new owners. It has manuals for the boiler, oven and hob and the dishwasher. I've also included the service history for the boiler and will put details for bin days etc.

And finally I'm going to leave them a bottle of Prosecco, a houseplant and a card. They are first time buyers and I just want to make it a happy day for them when they get the keys

I made up an info pack with details of neighbours, takeaways (including menus and which ones best avoided), best people in the area to use for boiler service/repair, electrician, window cleaner etc, stop cock location, manuals and certificates for everything, paint tins and notes of which colour was for which wall, bin dates, and more. I also left a card and a houseplant, and an immaculate house and garden (including fruit and vegetables still to harvest).

Regretted it to be honest when I found out they were less than lovely to my old neighbours and tore up my beautiful garden.

Left spotless house, wine & a card. Next day discovered I'd sold to my bosses mum and she was really chuffed. Really glad I didn't leave it in a bad state 😊

I was left a filthy house and dirty carpets. It was raining when they moved out and they walked across the garden and back into the house, leaving a trail of mud behind them 😠

I'd never leave alcohol or chocolates, in the same way I wouldn't get them as gifts for people. Just because you drink, please appreciate an awful lot of people don't, and it's a useless gift that gets given away. Same with chocolates, I don't know what someone's lactose, nut, etc intolerance is.

My Sellers of my current house left me labelled keys, useful instructions, and toilet rolls. Practical and useful.

We left a bottle of Champagne & two glasses with a card:

plus a folder full of all the paperwork they’d need for things like boiler and cooker. A page of useful information like bin says and tradesmen we’d found reliable

also obviously spent two days cleaning and making it lovely for them

Cleaned and left some Buck's Fizz with a little card. Nothing special just seemed like a nice gesture. Buyer seemed so nice but since then accidentally an item was delivered (after reinfect) signed for item and was signed for (horse passport agency didn't change my address despite being told) and turns out happy to sign for stuff but not tells the solicitors they have had absolutely no mail! Ah well we tried to be nice!

The house we moved into we were left with lots of mess, a filthy oven and dog shit in the garden (along with other bits of furniture that we had to get rid of)

Luckily love the house regardless of the state it was left in, since found issues so it's a project! 😊

People can be so disgusting!

This is our first house. Nationwide, who we have our mortgage with gave (delivered rather) us a lovely, big hamper style box with a few essentials. Selection of coffee/biscuits, congratulations etc. Thought this was really lovely. Nothing left for us. Previous occupiers wanted us to buy their really ancient washer/dryer and the estate agents kept badgering us about 🙄.

Do people really do this? It would never even occur to me to leave a gift, especially with all the stress of moving. Selling a house is a business transaction.

I would have left something for our FTB if they hadn't tried to knock £5k off the agreed price 2 days before exchange 😡. They were lucky it was left clean

No I haven’t. The previous owners didn’t leave one for us, however last min their Labrador clearly had a change of heart and left us a fresh little surprise in the garden! 🤣

Professional deep clean, bottle of prosecco and a card.

The wonderful woman I bought my house from was an artist, and left lovely prints for each of my children, T-shirts and some of her hand printed porcelain mugs. There was a delay in my sale completing and so I contributed towards the three months mortgage payments between them leaving (they moved abroad) and the sale/purchase going through so they weren’t out of pocket. I’m still in touch with her.

My buyer was lovely a__nd I was so bloody grateful and relieved to sell that I left wine and a card and a bag of coal for the open fire (it was a cold, dark January day). We didn't get left anything but the house was spotlessly clean.

Clean house, house folder, always, even for difficult buyers. That’s for your self respect.

Ive rarely met most buyers, that’s the agents job. I did leave wine for our tenants ( we were involuntary landlords because of Covid). They were so horrid, damaged the property , didn’t pay the rent on time: I hope it choked them.

No. I was selling to someone who was going to let it out so didn't want to give them a present. Our seller left us a bottle of wine and a card though, as well as huge folder with all the instruction manuals in.

Not on any of the houses we've sold, unless you count a clean and totally empty house as a gift.

We haven't exchanged yet (fingers crossed soon!) but I'm definitely leaving a little gift like a hamper or biscuits etc, and a tidy house. Our buyers have been so patient and lovely and they deserve nice things. We are even repainting a few walls because somehow we've managed to get DC's dirty handprints all over the shop and I feel that they would probably appreciate if they had a blank canvas when they move in. We'll see how much time we have when/if we complete!

We'l leave them the "History of the village" book.

Yes. Prosecco and Celebrations. We also got a cleaner to follow us out on moving day, and had the oven done professionally a couple of days before.

Our vendor left us bob all but she was old so we didn't expect it, probs more of a faff.