What's the worst cover-up you've come across?

prutter

The flat we're in at the moment (but should be leaving next week) was a complete doer-upper from the start (kitchen, bathroom, flooring, redecorating). We knew this, and thankfully could see the potential from the first viewing.

The owner, who had left the flat empty for sometime, had obviously had some feedback from the agent that people wern't impressed with the decor or original 1960's council bathroom.

So, he painted everything with white emulsion. Including the entire bathroom. One coat of white emulsion over a black, plastic cistern was a classic!

Obviously it didn't bother us as it was the first thing to be ripped out - but how he thought this might improve things I do not know!!

barnaby-bear

Tiger_greeneyes wrote: »

That's exactly why I was able to overlook the cosmetics!!! I have to say, the beach here is beautifully looked after, and we've got the broads two miles away

I'm sure what that's all the natives say at Happisburgh too.

Tiger_greeneyes

barnaby-bear wrote: »

I'm sure what that's all the natives say at Happisburgh too.

Through gritted teeth, I'm sure

Tiger_greeneyes

On moving into one of my houses, I started to notice a smell - it was faint at first but became more pungent as the days went on. We couldn't work out where the smell was coming from - it seemed to be upstairs as well as downstairs. In the end, on day three, we lifted some carpets. Underneath, the floorboards were soaked - literally right through - with urine. Downstairs it was animals - they had cats and dogs. Upstairs in what was the children's bedroom - it was humans urine.

I wondered why the vendors had a lock very high up on the outside of their bedroom door... obviously the kids were only allowed to wee in their own bedroom :rolleyes:

Needless to say, I spent the next few days ripping up and disposing of all the carpets, and drenching the floorboards with gallons of bleach.

Why do people do it?

pinkshoes

I lived in a bizarre (student) house once.

The front downstairs living room had been divided up to make 2 small odd shaped bedrooms (no walls at 90 degrees!), and one of the walls had damp, so I had to put the single bed across the doorway, so you could just open the door, then climb over the bed to get into teh room!!

The kitchen was a corridor, and what we think used to be the kitchen (a room off the right hand side of the kitchen!) was now a bedroom!!

walking through this corridor kitchen, then down some steps was the lounge. This was actually the old outside yard. They used the old outside toilet, added a shower to make the "2nd bathroom", then used corrigated plastic from the wall at the back of the yard to join to the house and create the "ceiling"! They didn't even bother plastering the bathroom, just painted over the original brickwork and put some lino on top of the concrete! They also but the lounge carpet straight on top of the old yard concrete...

Did I mention the toilet/waste pipe from the upstairs bathroom ran through the middle of the lounge?

Upstairs was similar; a large chunk of the only double bedroom was cut out so that a bed would fit in the box room next door, with paper thin walls so you could here EVERYTHING... To cover up damp, they'd just put a piece of board up and wallpapered over it!

Given that this house was originally a 2 up 2 down terrace, I think the landlord certainly made lots of money turning it into a 6 bed student house!!!!

stokegal

We went to view a house which all looked fine except the owner had a mass of clothes washing on top of a cupboard in the hallway, it looked strange but never thought anything of it, went back with my dad for a second viewing and there was washing there again - my dad looked behind it and there was a massive hole in the plasterboard!!!!

Went to visit another house and there was a garage at the bottom of the garden, the estate agents conveniantly didn't have the keys for it, as we peered in underneath the doors we saw the old bathroom suite inside.

Tiger_greeneyes

Nicki wrote: »

I appreciate this was a horrid experience for you, but find your assumptions and attitude to be inappropriate. We have a child with a serious learning difficulty, who has been known to wee on her own and other people's bedroom carpets (which obviously we clean properly when this happens). The children's bedrooms also both have locks high up on the outside only - so the disabled child can be locked out of these rooms during the day, hence not weeing on her siblings floor or bed or destroying their property. She's never locked in her own room and made to wee on the floor :mad:

BTW its not our house you are talking about as we've been here since before she was born. Don't make assumptions about other people's lives though - particularly if you are accusing them of child cruelty and neglect, without knowing the facts

Excuse me? Where did I mention child cruelty or neglect???

The facts are that the children were perfectly normal boys - I met them on my viewings - they weren't locked in their room as there wasn't a lock on the door. They just used a corner of the room as a toilet. The parents obviously knew about this because they were able to mask the smell on viewings. The smell came back once they weren't there to cover it up.

I knew the situation in my own home and I personally find your assumptions and attitude to be inappropriate. I'm sorry you've got family difficulties but crusading wrongly against someone else when you don't know what you're on about isn't the way forward.

Tiger_greeneyes

pinkshoes wrote: »

I lived in a bizarre (student) house once.

The front downstairs living room had been divided up to make 2 small odd shaped bedrooms (no walls at 90 degrees!), and one of the walls had damp, so I had to put the single bed across the doorway, so you could just open the door, then climb over the bed to get into teh room!!

The kitchen was a corridor, and what we think used to be the kitchen (a room off the right hand side of the kitchen!) was now a bedroom!!

walking through this corridor kitchen, then down some steps was the lounge. This was actually the old outside yard. They used the old outside toilet, added a shower to make the "2nd bathroom", then used corrigated plastic from the wall at the back of the yard to join to the house and create the "ceiling"! They didn't even bother plastering the bathroom, just painted over the original brickwork and put some lino on top of the concrete! They also but the lounge carpet straight on top of the old yard concrete...

Did I mention the toilet/waste pipe from the upstairs bathroom ran through the middle of the lounge?

Upstairs was similar; a large chunk of the only double bedroom was cut out so that a bed would fit in the box room next door, with paper thin walls so you could here EVERYTHING... To cover up damp, they'd just put a piece of board up and wallpapered over it!

Given that this house was originally a 2 up 2 down terrace, I think the landlord certainly made lots of money turning it into a 6 bed student house!!!!

That's got to take the prize, Pinkshoes!!! Every time I read a new paragraph my mouth fell open further

I bet the landlord had a really luxurious place for himself - in fact, I think we may have had the same landlord

pinkshoes

it certainly was a peculiar run down house, although between the 6 of us I think we paid about £1000/month in 2000/2001!

If you tapped the board covering up the damp wall, you could hear bits of plaster falling down, and when i pulled out the bed, there was rubble on the carpet.

I think we also counted 8 varieties of carpet, and not one of them plain!

Oh, and when it rained (happened quite alot in durham!), you couldn't hear the TV because of the noise of rain against the corrigated plastic roof in the lounge!

at least they painted the toilet pipe running through the middle of the lounge orange to match the walls! on drunken nights people would use it to pole dance :-o

Tiger_greeneyes

Landlords have such a cheek sometimes! He should have been paying you to live there

I also had a rubble situation in my rented flat - the corner of the bathroom floor was nothing but rubble. It was covered with a manky rug when I did my all too brief viewing. The electrics left lots to be desired too - there were big thick cables hanging all over the place - draped over architraving etc - you couldn't close any of the doors (where there were doors, that is). Also the front door was made of hardboard. The whole place was cobbled together - there were even windows along an internal wall (just outside my bathroom) which looked into my next door neighbours living room. We got on really well so it wasn't a problem - we had a sort of 'trust understanding'. I wasn't worried about him breaking it though, he was gay!

My landlord also used to let himself into my flat and go through my stuff while I was at work. I had a feeling he was doing it so I left things a certain way and when he'd disturbed them, I knew about it. He also used to stand with his finger on my doorbell for 20 minutes at a time - in the middle of the night. Oh, and he was convinced he was entitled to stare at me through the windows because it was 'his flat'.

I didn't stay there that long...