Viewing houses- surely everyone does this?

[Sophieagain1984]

We're house hunting. Whenever I view a house, I always knock on the door of the next door neighbour, pretending I've got the wrong house- I like to know what the neighbour is like and sometimes they even give you useful info.

DH says no one else does this and it's weird. WDYT?

I’ve never done that, but I do love to engage a neighbour in a chat if I see one. I also visit the street and different times of the day before making an offer. Less of an issue in suburbia, but on a street with a shop/s or on a road, it’s a must.

My Dad who helped me buy my first house knocked on neighbours’ doors to find out what the area was like - whilst I was mortified, nobody was surprised or shocked and lo and behold , it turned out to be a great place to live. I’ve since always followed his lead and in the past 35 years of house buying and renting ( 4 moves) have ALWAYS checked our neighbours either by catching them in the road or knocking. Never once has someone ( openly!) found this weird , and in a country where apparently the ave person struggles to name two neighbours I’ve always known at least three quarters of people living in the road, and always been fortunate enough to have fantastic neighbours. I think it’s a HUGE thing - neighbours can make or break a happy home , but I’ve never been duplicitous about it - just a straightforward “ we might move in next door but wondering what the areas like, is it noisy/ friendly etc. “. Everywhere we’ve lived has had a neighbourhood what’s app and it’s been invaluable during Covid, for safety alerts etc.

You'd have bad luck with me, I never answer the door lol

Also yes that's weird

Never done this myself but had couple buying house next door knock on the door for a chat.

I knock on neighbours doors and say we are thinking of buying the house next door, what is it like to live round here.

No, not normal.

We had terrible neighbours in the past (all night parties, drug deals etc), so yes, when we moved house I definitely knocked on the neighbours’ doors each side of the house we wanted to buy. Nobody thought we were odd/unreasonable for doing so. If anything they were also a little concerned at who might be moving in and glad to meet the people it might turn out to be! It was a kind of final thing to check at that stage, and we did explain we were about to put in an offer etc.I made my mum do this too, when she moved house! To us it was important to get a good vibe about the community, as well as just the house.

I do it if we are seriously thinking of offering on the house. Partly to see what the neighbours are like and partly to ask them how they find the area.

I knocked on the neighbour’s door and asked whether he liked the area. He said, “Buy it! It’s the best place to live!”
We did, and we became firm friends. We lost our lovely neighbour last year, and I miss him so much 😔.

We almost put an offer in on an old, listed house last year that was beautiful on the outside but had a few quirks. I knocked on the next door neighbour's door and she was so enthusiastic and clearly loved her home but told me enough to confirm that upkeep would be huge so we walked away. Still think it's beautiful, but it wouldn't have been practical.

I knocked on the neighbour's door and asked them if they knew any reason the house I was looking at hadn't sold the first time. She said no, and that had the house been available when they were looking, they'd have snapped it up.

They've been wonderful neighbours.

Never done it but it's a good idea. I'd be up front though and ask questions about the area, any problems that may have occurred with the house.

I wouldn’t dream of doing that!😮

Great idea, you never know who your moving next door to. If you get it wrong it’s a pain in the arse to have to move.
Although I probably would have told them I’m thinking of buying next door.

I don't think this is odd. I have done something simliar myself in the past, except I don't pretend to have knocked on the wrong door - I'm open about what I'm doing. I tell the neighbour I'm thinking about buying the house next door and ask for their thoughts on the area. I have also looked up who owns the house next door to the one I'm thinking of buying by getting their title deeds from the Land Registry (you have to pay a small fee of about £3 to do this) and looked them up on social media. Buying a house is a huge commitment and you should do your due diligence, which includes knowing a little about your prospective neighbours. You shouldn't feel embarrassed or ashamed about doing that.

do you know what those words mean?

Are you a twat?

@dillydally24 No, asking isn’t weird, it’s common sense. But the subterfuge element of ‘pretending that you don’t know which house it is’ is a bit odd, and also isn’t necessarily the way to make a good first impression on your potential new neighbours yourself…!

Weird and completely unnecessary comment 😲🤷‍♀️

We knocked on the neighbours' doors before we bought here, but not at every house we viewed. Only when we were pretty sure we wanted to buy it.

We didn't come up with any weird back story - they'd find out when we moved in, anyway! We just said we were seriously considering buying next door and asked what the area was like. They were all lovely.

It’s odd behaviour. I wouldn’t ever think of doing that. What a thing to do! 😆😆

Such a weird and creepy thing to do. If I got wind that a potential buyer had done that when coming to view my home, I wouldn't accept an offer from them.

This is cringe! I once had a potential buyer for my neighbours knock on the door and ask me how much the extension we were doing cost!! I thought it was quite rude and couldn’t help him anyway as my husbands in the trade so we only paid for materials and building regs plus if I told him that could you imagine if he tried to get DH to help with his extension! Thankfully he didn’t buy it!