Suspicious or a sad sign of the times?

[JustJasmine]

Hi,

Be interested to hear your thoughts on this.

Dp and I have just come back from a house viewing. I had already seen it a week a go and really liked it, hence the second viewing today.

Anyway, the estate agent told us that the vendors have only been there for 8 months and are simply moving due to unforeseen financial pressures. Straight away, my spidey senses tingled, but then I thought that with interest rates rising and the cost of living crisis generally, I guess this could just be a sad, but true reason and I shouldn't automatically assume something fishy is going on.

My reason for being suspicious is we've had terrible neighbours in the past and have moved very quickly because of this. Took longer than we hoped and it was honestly a nightmare, so I suppose this is why we are extra cautious about the next move.

Would this make you at all suspicious or would you just assume it's a genuine unfortunate situation that has forced them to sell up.

Tia

I'm not surprised it's on the advert because selling so soon, that's gonna be on the mind of any perspective buyer.

Nevertheless I would be inclined to treat it as suspicious, if you had financial difficulties but really liked the place there are many things you could do first before going down the road of selling it, ie mortgage holiday, getting in lodger, BOMAD loans, unsecured loans. If someone lost a job, it's not as if you stay unemployed for years if you had bills to pay.

Trouble is neighbours could be pleasant when you speak to them but still turn out to be nightmares. Or it could be something that is nobody's fault but is not apparent on viewing, like very bad soundproofing.

Just visit at different times, Google the street name to see if any incidents, but you still might not find the real reason. Indeed, it could even be genuine.

I would be suspicious. Have any other houses sold in the area recently? Or been put on the market?

It could be job loss, or perhaps a surprise pregnancy or a divorce. I suppose they could be the actual problem neighbours as well. There's lots of reasons but I think best thing to do is knock on a few doors in the area

@Xmaswomble I know that sounds strange, regarding the decorating. It's hard to explain. I've viewed a lot of houses over the years and I've seen lots of beautifully decorated, neat, obviously wanting to sell quickly houses, but this is like a new build show home. Mirrored trays on beds, bottle of wine and two expensive looking glasses stylishly positioned on the kitchen table. As I say, it's hard to explain, but it just seemed off.

You make a very good point about the neighbours though.

We were going to buy a new build this year but pulled out at the last minute. The developers slipped paperwork into the exchange bundle that required me being a director of the maintenance company that would manage the grounds of the estate and collect the service charge payments. At no point was this mentioned at all during the buying process. It was a really slippery move on the part of the developers and could have left me in a really precarious legal position if/when the maintenance costs rose or weren't paid and I'd have to manage the consequences!

The development site is now really struggling to sell the properties and the building pace has slowed right down.
Recently one of the houses that was purchased on the same street as we would have bought has come onto the market 6 months after the owners moved in. Its at a lower cost than they bought it and its still overpriced.

I suspect the service charges hasn't helped and has gone up significantly. People on the estate may not be able to afford it and this poor family may be trying to find an out.

If its a new build, double check what commitments they want you to make.

I'd definitely tread very carefully

https://www.adt.co.uk/crime-in-my-area

This tool has helped me avoid buying one, possibly two houses with wife beaters on the street. House one: asked the vendor why there had been six incidents of violence and sexual assault in his tiny little close in the last 12 months; after temporarily looking stunned, him and his wife told me that next door but one sometimes 'slaps his wife around.'

House two, there were about 12-14 incidents of V&SA on the same street in 12 months. So then I looked up the land registry sales, and found that houses 9, 11 and 15 (for example) all sold in the same year, 2016, whereas house no 13 had sold about 2 years prior, when probably about 6 sales had occurred in a close with 30 houses in over 20 years. Enough to nope me out of considering viewing it. I assume 13 moving in was the cause of the problem in 2014 and three houses around it had enough by 2016. Of course, these are possibly completely irrational assumptions, but the house was a 'might just do us if we change a bunch of stuff' anyway, so it wasn't worth my time.

And yeah, ask the neighbours. But bear in mind the neighbour that you're asking could BE the problem neighbour, so maybe pick someone who's outside washing their car that you like the look of, or more than one neighbour in opposite directions, or one across the street. I once stopped a lady power washing her drive and was given superb information, including which dozen or so houses on a really long road were suffering from subsidence, and which had planning applications in to become hostels, and which particular cluster of houses had the most internal floor space.

Likely, loss of job, relationship breakdown or illness. Not necessarily bad neighbours.

ah, so it looks like it’s been professionally dressed for sale? given that, neighbours wouldn’t be my first thought - more someone who is used to buying and selling houses as investments as they know how to professionally present a house. Interest rates and cooling markets have really hit those people.

did it feel lived in at all? A friend saw one for sale she said just didn’t feel lived in, then found out it had been air bnb’ed for the previous year, which made sense.

@KievLoverTwo does the number in the circle indicate the house number?

Do a search on google of the street name
see what come up
you often get the local papers court info which is tagged to the defendants street name 😂

join next door app for the street - see if it’s bat shit crazy street nosey neighbour street

see if you can see on right move how long the previous owners had the house .

check right move and see what houses have sold recently in the same street and when

see if you can find out via the land registry who owns the houses either side of the house

if it’s a HA it will say on the deeds not to sure if it’s council

No, the results are fuzzed, for want of a better word, to preserve anonymity.

Thanks @KievLoverTwo I have used that before actually and one incident did pop up.

@Headband no, it's the amount of that specific crime. I.e 2 incidents of burglary on that road.

Actually @headband, I don't think that's right. It's just the number of crimes.

The 'two glasses and winebottle' thing is just that tragic house-staging company stuff aimed at the terminally unimaginative house viewer.

I wouldn't necessarily think of suspicious neighbours (though I would absolutely knock on all doors, and do as much snooping at all hours of day and night as possible). We sold a house (at a healthy profit) after owning it for less than a year because we decided to leave the country.

Oh check on AirnB and see if you can find any potential AirnB in the street
postcode search should be enough

Thanksssd 😊

Hmmm i really wouldn't like the immaculateness.

It doesn't fit correctly for me. If its job loss you are financially broke and yes you want it to get sold asap but do you have the £££ to pay someone to get the house staged....or waste money on fancy props.

I would be on extra high alert if you want to proceed.

• 100% talk to the neighbours (it's pretty formulaic "hello I'm thinking about buying the house next door, what's the area like? How long have you been here? Do you like the area? What are the other neighbours like? Is parking a problem? Blah blah"
• Do drive bys at various times over an extended period at different times (rush hour AM and PM, weekends etc. We uncovered some issues with one flat doing this. (Scally kids hanging around swearing and drinkinh on the front wall 🤨😱)
• Check local authorities for proposed building works
• Check the surveys carefully
• join local nextdoor if you can stomach the petty nonsense on there....

We viewed the house once. Looked it up. Did some background checks.
Basically the couple exchanged and then decided to separate. Poor things. They got themselves locked into this nightmare. Imagine a house going on the market straight after getting the keys?

Have you looked to see how much they bought it for?

I used to watch lots of shows like homes under the hammer and the people would buy it, live in it whilst doing it up and then sell it on a few months later.

Don't touch it...

Either they have dodgy neighbours or there is some serious work needed on the house (something internal you might not pick up on) and they don't want to do it.

Immaculate decoration sometimes hides substantial structural problems.

things like scented candles etc also are used to cover damp smells.

your gut feeling is just your subconscious mind recognising something it’s seen before and doesn’t like.

be careful

The decor and accessories just sounds like insta hun stuff.

I would definitely ask around the area. Have you met the sellers? I wonder if meeting them in person might shed some light.

Personally I'd tell the estate agent I was suspicious of the reason for selling and be prepared to walk alway if you don't get the answers you want. It's not worth the risk if it feels shifty.

How long were the previous people there?

Yes, the good old days, many of the homes in the show eventually made a loss, some of them quite big I think. Looking at price history is very important though because rates have moved up so quickly, what something was worth in 2017 or whatever doesn`t apply now.

I would ask to meet the vendors and just ask them outright

Tell them you have had a horrid experience with neighbours before and if that's what it is, please say? If it's financial etc hopefully they will say and I'm fairly sure you can gauge from their reaction what the truth is?

Worth a shot anyway.

It's the most expensive purchase you'll ever make, don't assume the best for the sake of feeling sorry for people - definitely check out the neighbours and search for any planning permissions nearby

Thanks for all the replies.

I'm genuinely quite surprised that the vast majority of you don't think I'm being unnecessarily suspicious.

Will definitely be doing some more digging.

I think when buying a house they say 'buyer beware' so investigate everything. Its too big a purchase not to.