Viewings, an uncomfortable experience

Horseunderwater

Oh Boy! I've so totally enjoyed reading this thread! Not laughed so hard for ages.
I know when we bought the house we live in now, the vendor at time was moving to France and the price had gone down to £65k from £85k '92 prices. 3 bed semi with DB garage. So a wee bit over priced back then. Dogs had to be locked up in garage in one of the cars, so we could look round safely. Likely to bite anyone we were told! Sum total of our horror and over all it is a nice house.
But I have to say viewing a house where a dead person's stuff was still there - at least they did remove the body? And the ones in their bed with dirty washing etc. Well you cannot make it up can you?
Get a list of questions written down on paper and ask the vendor or EA all of them. Be as daft as you want, after all it is you that may be buying the house and it has to be fit for what you want, or at least adaptable to it.

dizziblonde

We had one hideous viewing where the vendor was trying to do the have his cake and eat it thing of having the house rented out but on the market as well (EA hadn't told us this at the time we arranged the viewing)... cue the tenants having invited every single one of their biggest, scariest looking mates around to sit in the lounge and stare at us on our every move. Wouldn't have viewed the house if we were told it was currently being rented anyway - so was one of those situations where we uh-huhed and ah-hahed and got the hell out ASAP.

The one we did buy was empty, three doors down from where we lived - and mid-viewing the neighbour (who knew us) popped his head over the fence and told us off for not just asking him for the key to go look round it (he'd been keeping an eye on the place while it was stood empty)! Estate agent looked incredibly confused by it all!

tbs624

It's great that some buyers are so easily dissuaded from buying a property - it generally means less competition and lower prices for the rest of us.

As for letting the LA show people round, nope, I haven't ever used them for that purpose when selling. I loathe them and like to keep their input to an absolute minimum. Have always shown buyers round then left them to wander afterwards, as another poster said.

On the buying side have had viewings conducted by cantankerous/downright peculiar vendors and it made no difference. It's about the property's potential and you have to be able to look past personalities and the vendors lifestyle.

ruggedtoast

I don't understand this at all. I love viewings, I enjoy poking around other people's particulars and checking out all their crevices that they may use for storage.

I also enjoy viewing other people's homes.

tbs624

ruggedtoast wrote: »

I don't understand this at all. I love viewings, I enjoy poking around other people's particulars and checking out all their crevices that they may use for storage.

I also enjoy viewing other people's homes.

Please tell us that you are not one of those people who undertakes random house viewings as a Sunday afternoon hobby...;)

ruggedtoast

tbs624 wrote: »

Please tell us that you are not one of those people who undertakes random house viewings as a Sunday afternoon hobby...;)

One house we went to was absolutely jam packed with bears. Bears on the stairs, on the beds, lining the bookshelves, on the sofas. The EA quipped that they probably all had names and special places, and she would know if we moved them, so we moved some of them.

I'm not sure what happened but she did sell the house eventually.

Philippa36

I really enjoyed viewing properties (we were 'under offer' 3 times before we finally sold 2 years on so did a lot of viewing and then stopping as the sales fell through) and got used to the odd properties and owners. People sitting in rooms always meant I would peer in and then retreat and leave feeling I hadn't quite seen the house properly.

I left my husband to do all the viewings of our property and went out with DD & DS so that potential buyers could wander round without disturbing anyone and hopefully imagine themselves moving in to our house.

I never liked empty properties because I could never imagine them with furniture in, or see how the spaces would work. However, it was much more fun viewing with an estate agent as you could be as honest as you'd like about the property, to see how well the estate agent was at selling the place!

tommie1shunt

Well we found out why our vendor had a look of surprise, we was 24 hours early, rung the EA up on Saturday and they said 4.PM tomorrow, told the vendor it was PM Monday. Ah well it happens.
Still on the subject of preferring to view empty properties there is the added bonus of the property have no motivational status with anyone, i.e. it is a repo, they have bought another house, or corporate. My brother in the 70,s had one pulled 2 days before completion. The EA drove up to his house to tell him. He went to the phone box to phone the vendor and ask what was going on, the vendor told him that it was non of his business (this was mixed up with several four letter words)
My brother got his next door neighbour to run him up to the vendors house and as the vendor did not answer the door he started to kick the door in, vendor wisely or wisely opened door and promptly got a smack in the face, at which point the vendors wife came out with a shovel and she got the same treatment. Police turned up and told them to break it up or end up in the cells.
We laugh about it now but at the time he was out a good few quid and mortgages in the 70,s where pretty hard to come buy.
Will still view lived in properties, will still feel uncomfortable doing it, but give me an empty any day.

anggrrr

pineapple wrote: »

The agents sent round some part time pensioner (sorry pensioners) to represent them and he couldn't answer the most basic questions about the property.

I deliberately use my Dad (a pensioner) to show people round my property. He's under strict instructions to NOT tell people anything an estate agent wouldn't know. He does slip up sometimes but mostly he's quite good. I prefer to not show people round myself as I find myself practically telling people not to buy it. Let's face it: I want to move. I can't think it's that good a place to live!