Buyers - control your children

cattie

Yes, people who don't warn their children to behave themselves before taking them along to viewings are a real pain!

Last year a couple with 2 young children viewed my house & allowed the kids to run wild, including jumping up & down on a rattan ottoman, which of course resulted in a broken lid.

It wouldn't have been so bad if they had wanted my house, but they said it it wasn't for them because it was on a busy road. They were from the area, so before viewing already knew that the road could get pretty busy, so why bother even coming round to destroy my house in the first place!

ERICS_MUM

My former boss and his wife took their 2 young children with them to view a house. When ready to leave they realised their 3 year old daughter was missing. They eventually found her asleep in one of the beds. ! They did actually buy the house

lessonlearned

ERICS_MUM wrote: »

My former boss and his wife took their 2 young children with them to view a house. When ready to leave they realised their 3 year old daughter was missing. They eventually found her asleep in one of the beds. ! They did actually buy the house

That one is rather sweet - a nice little Goldilocks moment.

OK - here's a real shocker for you and I swear it's the absolute truth.

One Saturday afternoon I was in my office on site, dealing with a mountain of paperwork. Feeling a bit fed up I decided to "walk the site" - something I used to enjoy for a nice little break.

Went down to the bottom of the site where the new build was in progress, everywhere nicely fenced off for the weekend as per health and safety.

To my utter astonishment I spotted a group of boys - around the 12 to 14 mark, riding their bikes along the scaffolding at roof height

I called them down and patiently explained that a) they were trespassing and b) they were dicing with death.

I recognised one of them because he and his parents had visited the showhouse the day before. Before I sent the little darlings packing I tried to get them to show me how they had gained access, assuming it was our negligence, that the guys on site had failed to properly set up the perimeter fencing.

The little s*ds legged it so I searched around until I found out where they had trashed the fence in order to gain access.

Went back to my office to report the incident to the police (not interested;), report to head office and log the incident in the incident book we keep on site.

Within 10 minutes two sets of angry parents barged into my office "effing and blinding" yelling, ranting and raving at me and accusing me of being a "right miserable old cow" for spoiling their childrens' fun.

I calmly pointed out that I had probably saved at least one of them from a serious accident but they couldn't grasp it. The parents were too drunk, stupid and ignorant to either realise or care.......

As I said in my last post - half the time it is the parents who are at fault - their poor offspring know no better.

Seakay

DLTAG89 wrote: »

I'm the other side of the story.

I thought this thread could have been about me :rotfl:

We have been viewing houses over the past few weeks and the second we walk through the front door its like a switch is flicked in our kids heads (two boys aged 2 and 4) and they just run riot.

Me and DH do everything we can to tell them off without embarrasing the sellers. Its a total nightmare and would be so much easier if i could leave them with someone but we dont always have that option. I know its not ideal and parents should control their kids but its so difficult when your trying to view a house and your kids just start being total pains in the bums.

I do sympathise with you and its not something you should have to put up with but its hard for the buyers to look round and try control the kids at the same time.

I have now taken to the tatic of sitting the boys in a corner and letting DH have a look around and then swapping over.

Your story isn't an excuse or the other side of anything, and I don't know why you would imagine a role around laughing emoticon is in any way appropriate except to emphasise that you have no idea how to behave in someone else's home and you haven't brought your children up to know how to behave or to obey you. If you insist on dragging them around viewings where their input is irrelevant and their presence unwanted then the least you could do is to leave them in the car. Or are you worried that they will wreck that?
If people were forced to pay a bond before viewing and had deductions made for any and all damage then they might consider the cost of a babysitter more seriously

paddyrg

"I hope you enjoy looking around our property...please note for your own safety, I leave open cups of bleach and platefulls of mixed colourful tablets about at toddler height - you may want to keep your eyes on your sprogs"

googler

ERICS_MUM wrote: »

My former boss and his wife took their 2 young children with them to view a house. When ready to leave they realised their 3 year old daughter was missing. They eventually found her asleep in one of the beds.

This is exactly the sort of parenting that posters above are taking issue with. In a stranger's house, a 3-year-old should NEVER be out of the parent's sight. The fact that she was 'eventually' found in one of the bedrooms seems to imply that they had no clue where she was, nor what she was doing.

She could have been helping herself to the alcoholic drinks that the sellers had on the premises, she could have opened and drunk a bottle of bleach or other cleaning product that they'd left in the bathroom, all manner of things. (EDIT - just read Paddy's post, he/she is clearly a mind-reader)

lessonlearned

googler wrote: »

This is exactly the sort of parenting that posters above are taking issue with. In a stranger's house, a 3-year-old should NEVER be out of the parent's sight. The fact that she was 'eventually' found in one of the bedrooms seems to imply that they had no clue where she was, nor what she was doing.

She could have been helping herself to the alcoholic drinks that the sellers had on the premises, she could have opened and drunk a bottle of bleach or other cleaning product that they'd left in the bathroom, all manner of things. (EDIT - just read Paddy's post, he/she is clearly a mind-reader)

This is exactly it isn't it.

Whilst the thought of a little girl curled up in bed like a modern day Goldilocks is rather sweet it also demonstrates the appalling negligence on behalf of the parents.

If said little girl had drunk a bottle of cleaning fluid or swallowed a handful of pills you can bet your life the parents would have blamed everyone else but themselves, rather like the parents of the daredevil boys practising their "ride on the wall of death" on a building site.

I am constantly amazed by the ineptitude of parents, by the risks they take when they do not supervise their children, by their cavalier attitude to other peoples property and belongings, by their utter selfishness and lack of consideration for the feelings and well being of others.

Whenever I came up against this kind of behaviour during my career as an EA I always nipped it in the bud before it got out of hand. I was always polite but always very firm. I simply would not put up with any nonsense......

Most of the time it was as much out of regard for the safety of children as it was protecting my Vendors or my employers property.

Some of the responses I got from parents had to witnessed to be believed. I have been sworn at, called some dreadful names, threatened and even spat at on one occasion.......

I might have been paid well when I worked on site, but by golly I damn well earned it. :rotfl: The abuse that was metered out to me at times would make your hair curl.....

It is my contention that more often than not the children were merely copying the crass behaviour of their parents.

The parents who were polite and well mannered seemed to produce children who were charming and delightful.

The parents who were rude, arrogant, selfish and inconsiderate seemed to produce utter obnoxious little monsters.

barbiedoll

When we viewed what is now our house, the vendor was lovely with our son, she gave him an ice lolly and took him by the hand to show him the garden as she knew that we were living in a flat

She commented on how well-behaved he was. Obviously, this was all due to our meticulous parenting and absolutely nothing to do with her huge drooling doberman dog who followed her (and us) around all throughout the viewing. When we got home and asked him if he would like to live there one day, he replied "Only if the big dog isn't living there any more"

DKLS

I have always told house viewers to watch their kids closely, as I dont have kids and thus my houses aren't that child friendly. If someone disrespected my house like that I would ask them to leave asap.

DLTAG89

phill99 wrote: »

Absolute rubbish. You are the kind of parent who has no interest in disciplining their children. To say 'we do everything we can to tell them off' is poppycock. You clearly have no control and do not set boundaries. You are no doubt the same parents that let their children run riot in shops, supermarkets and worse, restaurants, and will be the same parents, who, when your children are in their teens and have a string of asbo's will be blaming teachers, social workers, key workers, support workers and health visitors for you children's bad behaviour while at the same time insisting that the police are wrong to arrest them.

How could you possibly make this judgement for a small statement i wrote on a forum?

It was supposed to be a little light hearted, god forbid someone actually has a laugh on this site. I'm guessing you don’t have children them. I also meant “run riot” as a general term. Its not like the running around the place trashing it and screaming. They like to have a root in the cupboards and my youngest always seems to find the creaky floor boards and thinks they are hilarious.

I also meant by "we do everything we can do discipline them" by I don’t want to be smacking them in front of people who do not know us as in today’s days and age its classed as "abuse" and certainly would not set a good impression on the seller. But yeah they will end up with Asbos when they are teens, honestly :wall:



We don’t have a choice other than to take them with us, no everyone has “granny” living round the corner.


OP sorry for turning your thread into a slanging match.