Buyers - control your children

grifferz

Errata wrote: »

Fair enough, but what exactly are you looking for when you shift sofas and rugs around? What do you expect to find?

Rented a house once, took a picture down which I didn't like and found WH*RE written on the wall in marker pen behind it.

That made for an interesting amendment to the inventory.

JuicyJesus

grifferz wrote: »

Rented a house once, took a picture down which I didn't like and found WH*RE written on the wall in marker pen behind it.

That made for an interesting amendment to the inventory.

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

And that marks the first and only time that word has ever appeared in tenancy documents...

LisaLou1982

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.

I was just about to respond to this and say that i cannot believe you are suggesting that your LITTLE children cant be controlled when you are in someones house!!!!!!

...and then i realised Googler and others beat me to it!

Seriously, if you cant get childcare then thats pretty tough, but leave the kids in the car for a few mins or get someone to sit with them and then switch over afterwards!!!

Yes people want to sell their houses, but there is an element to how much a seller needs to deal with. And having some little out of control brats run riot whilst their parents feebly ask them to come back and behave would be long past any patience i have!

Ive taken my nieces out as well as friends children and they all know that when they are told to behave then they behave. Youre not reasoning with a child. You are parenting them. Put them in their place and make them behave.

<sebb>

DLTAG89 - I agree with the others. I can't believe you find the :rotfl: smiley appropriate here. Fair enough, if your normally well behaved children run riot the first time you take them on a viewing and you are so taken aback that you don't know how to handle it but it sounds like you are now fully accepting this as the norm. At least do the first viewing separately and if you find somewhere that's the one, then sort out 30 minutes of child care so you can go together. You have no excuses.

bylromarha

Lionel_Thinkbag wrote: »

Really there should be a standard set of rules handed out by EA prior to viewings. Could avoid a lot of the scenarios described above, and wouldn't put the EA or sellers in an awkward situation.

But then, that would be common sense

Or it's so obvious that EAs shouldn't need to say it.

Please don't allow your child to rip pages out of books and scribble in them.

Please don't allow your child to bounce and run on beds.

Please don't allow your child to drool on the vendors cushions and destroy them.

Please don't ignore your child so much that they fall asleep in one of the beds.

Please don't allow your child to touch any of the items belonging to the vendor unless permitted.

Any parent that allows their kids to do these things on viewings aren't going to be detered by a set of rules the EA gives out.

Thing is, as a buyer, I want time in the property without the EA/seller standing next to me every minute I'm in the house. However, as a seller, this experience has put me off letting my buyers have the experience I want myself!

J_i_m

I can well imagine my nephews and nieces rushing round at full volume and bouncing off the furniture because that's exactly the kind of behaviour they exhibit when they vist mine and the house is treated as an extended playground. Everything is a potential toy and they often have to be told several times not to do something and will then continue what they were doing soon afterwards anyway (if not immediately). The "naughty step" gets regular employment.

They are all under 8 years old and feed of each others energy. They're not bad kids by any stretch of the imagination they just like doing what they want to do and don't seem to have yet developed the cognitive awareness that sometimes the things they do could be seen as a tiny bit naughty. They don't deliberately set out to be pain in the proverbials even if they do enjoy being a bit cheeky a little more than is strictly nessecary.

With this in mind, if I were selling a house then I'd do my best to tidy away anything valuable or sentimental to me to reduce the risk of it attracting in warranted attention. As I'm realistic enough to appreciate that children will be children, curiosity will get the better of them and sometimes even the most effective parent might not be able to retain control especially if they have a brood of several in tow.

So whilst I think it's entirely reasonable to expect a visitor to behave themselves appropriately in your home and I would for sure be very upset if something of mine was spoilt by someone else's inconsiderateness (or nosiness) I do believe that there has to be a degree of realism on both sides of the equation.

eschaton

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.

If you came to view my house and let this happen you would find the house off your list and booted out immediately.

If you can't control your kids then try parenting classes.

Desperado99

Marshflower wrote: »

We are putting our house on the market soon and this has made me very nervous!! I hate the thought of children running round our house and rooting through our stuff. We also have a very nervy,
ancient blind old rescue cat who is blind and usually hides under the bed if anyone he doesn't know is in the house. Hate the thought of him being chased out by some of the types of children mentioned on here. I had best ensure the EA knows about him. It never even crossed my mind that parents viewing a house would let their kids just roam about unattended. Surely it's not too hard to tell you child to stay with you! We have a 3.5yr old and will not be taking her to any initial viewings even if it means DH and I going seperately- I know this is more inconvenient for the vendor but maybe better in the long run. We will take her on any second viewings and I have conplete confidence that she will be as beautifully behaved as ever but just in case I shall take the seemingly novel approach to some and hold her hand as we are walking around to ensure she doesn't slope off....

Speaking of cats............ we have 2 which we always kick out just before a viewing (although it doesn't work when the viewer turns up early like last time). It doesn't matter how I plan it but just about every time, we walk into the kitchen with a viewer, we're greeted by 3 miserable faces peering into the patio door (ours plus next doors cat). they then make pains of themselves when we open the doors (to show the garden) because I've had the audacity to hide the food bowls for all of 10 minutes.

You know people aren't going to buy the house when they spend more time talking about the animals

DD normally gets sent out to the cinema or shops when we have a viewing and we're yet to take her to any houses that we've looked at. When we do, it'll be a second viewing and she'll be told to be polite and to save any comments until we've left (she's 12 BTW).

AlexMac

Re " the sellers children can be just as bad" and the business about the wisdom of poking around under rugs, etc...

Forget the kids; what about the horrid vendors and their adult friends? My OH tells the tale of a sale of her 1st Georgian rabbit-hutch slum of a house in an area which was 'coming up' in the early 1970's. Her titled and rather intimidating older friend sat firmly in a chair, on a rug in the corner of a semi-basement room, effectively defying the surveyor to disturb her; he didn't (disturb her, nor note the weak spot).

Many years later, in what was by now a very desirable bijou residence, and had been through several subsequent owners (and had escalated astronomically in price!) she nodded tactfully... as the then owner recounted the tale of the collapse of said floor into a jumble of old concrete, bike-frames and rotting timber... " How strange?" she murmured sympathetically at the unfortunate outcome of her long-dead, botcher-builder father's early flooring efforts.

All's fair in love, war and conveyancing...?

Guest101

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.

I think you have a discipline issue, i think you should resolve it.