Red flags that aren't so obvious in potential property areas?

sparky130a

always_sunny wrote: »

parking too, what sort of cars and type of permit.

This is actually quite telling.

I was in Bournemouth last week. Lovely seaside town. Turns out DVLA had a purge.

The number of clamped cars in one area was truly shocking. One makes of that what they will...

HouseBuyer77

Search for the street name and surrounding ones on google/local newspaper websites. See what turns up.

Visit a few different times of the day and just walk around for a bit. Maybe there's someone that blares music with the windows open every Friday evening from 7?

Knock on a few doors near the house, say you're thinking of moving close by, ask them how they find the area.

Cakeguts

Look for broken glass around the pavement kerbs. It is an indication of car crime. Also look for walls with razor wire along the top. So walls at the back of shops and businesses etc.

Tiners

Not too sure the type of car is much of an indicator these days given that over 80% of new cars are on some form of HP/PCP/Lease/finance

At one time a nice car = someone doing well for themselves

Now a nice car = someone willing to take on a load of debt in order to be the registered keeper of something they couldn't otherwise afford

I probably see just as many nice new cars in undesirable areas as in more desirable areas these days.

Harryp_24

i offered on a house but was put off by a wall....
the semi had a long wall with a large grass patch along it. i work nights and all i could think of was kids playing football there (bad excuse i know) anyway i pulled out and 4 months later was driving past and kid you not there were 30 kids playing a huge game of football up against it screaming their guts out. There was rubbish everywhere and the house had some chalk writing on it.

It had been sold every year for the last 5 years and all in the winter. I guess they just clean it up and make it look good before the warmer weather.

So i guess something to look for is what it would be like in the summer with kids off school and if you could handle it.

[Deleted User]

Sofas left by the side of the road
Abandoned vehicles
broken, unrepaired windows
vacant boarded up buildings

All signs you don't want to be buying in that area

moneyistooshorttomention

Tiners wrote: »

Best tip I can offer is ask the postie... as long as it's the regular postie who's been delivering to the area for any length of time I guarantee he/she will have more local knowledge/info/gossip than anyone else.

Nope - it's got to be the corner shop (if there is one). I've always found them the best source of info.

Red-Squirrel_2

Look at the nearest shops. Bookies, bargain booze, chicken/kebab shops, corner shops that look like nobody ever buys anything legal there and e-cig shops would put me off.

Tiners

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

Nope - it's got to be the corner shop (if there is one). I've always found them the best source of info.

I've been interested in 3 houses previously but info from my postie contacts have steered me clear of them

One had next door neighbours who were frequent recipients of ASBO's despite their house looking nice and respectable

One had a lovely open aspect and countryside views across the road, but I found out the land affording the view had been bought by a developer

One backed onto a small industrial estate which looked innocuous enough but it turns out one of the units was operating a very noisy stone cutting operation that was driving local residents barmy!

All this info came FOC and avoided me wasting time and money putting in offers, instructing a solicitor, carrying out searches etc

knightstyle

If in the country long sheds full of chickens, the stink in summer will make you sick!