Fixtures and holes in the wall

PMMLondon

I had an offer accept a house last week. I had originally viewed it two months ago and the owners rejected my £5k under asking price offer then. The house subsequently sold for the asking price. However, it fell through due to a problem with the buyer's mortgage offer. The owners then accepted my offer. The estate agent told me that the couple have since split up, neither are living at the house and are slowly moving out their furniture.

Things are progressing quickly and the survey is being done next week. I went back to view today and saw that they have removed the curtain rail in one of the rooms and loads of shelving that had been fixed to the walls. I'm not bothered about keeping the shelving, but there are now loads of holes in the walls - it looks awful - and I had wrongly assumed that curtain rails were fixtures so couldn't be removed.

I'm now concerned that they may intend to do this throughout the house and also remove light fittings. I'm nervous to see the fixtures and fittings list. Am I within my rights to ask them not to remove any further curtain rails, light fittings etc and to make good any holes in the walls?

mh09abi

Unfortunately anything can be removed (including flooring!) so long as they are stating this on the fixtures and fittings form. We are selling at the moment and have taken down some shelves etc, but we've filled and re-painted the holes. Not sure if its a requirement, but seemed the decent thing to do.

Mutton_Geoff

mh09abi wrote: »

Unfortunately anything can be removed (including flooring!) so long as they are stating this on the fixtures and fittings form. We are selling at the moment and have taken down some shelves etc, but we've filled and re-painted the holes. Not sure if its a requirement, but seemed the decent thing to do.

On the other hand, as the couple must be suffering with the sale of what was once their dream home, make it easy and hassle free for them by NOT asking them to make good. Either accept you need to spend a day or two doing it yourself or ask for more off the price to do this work. It sounds like removing these personal touches is more to do with their squabbles than the sale of the house.

Make it easy for this ex couple to move on with their lives, not add complication during the sale.

middleclassbutpoor

When you agree the price, if you want anything specific as part of the deal, you should really make it conditional of the offer. i.e. £200k which includes X, Y & Z remaining in the property...

eddddy

PMMLondon wrote: »

I'm now concerned that they may intend to do this throughout the house and also remove light fittings. I'm nervous to see the fixtures and fittings list. Am I within my rights to ask them not to remove any further curtain rails, light fittings etc and to make good any holes in the walls?

Sadly, the stress of separating means that people can sometimes lose perspective, and do petty, irrational things - which they would never do in other circumstances - like removing shelves to leave behind holes, when they're trying to sell a house.


In your position, I would mention to the EA that if fixtures are removed leaving holes and damage, you might have to reduce your offer to cover the cost of redecoration (and the cost of replacement of the items).

And ask the EA to have a 'gentle' word with the sellers about it.

PasturesNew

When I bought, expecting shelves to be present, instead I had LOADS of holes in walls from the seller having removed lots of floating shelves.... daunted by the task of finding somebody, I eventually had to get them sorted and so found a local handyman. Just a random one, truth be told... somebody who responded, gave a price, who turned up.

The holes had a variety of differing fixings to be removed, so several "techniques" were required. Some had the fixings still in, some had the fixings removed... a real hotch potch.

It took under an hour for him to dig them all out and fill the holes. After that I took on the job of sanding back (easy peasy/first time tried) and painting over it.

Annoying, but, in the bigger scheme of "spending £000s buying a house", getting them sorted would cost you about an hour of somebody competent's time.... just find enough jobs that need doing to make it "worthwhile" and you could just have a handyman for half a day doing "bits and bobs".

csgohan4

Nothing a bit of polyfilla won't fix, welcome to owning a house, you will find more holes in the house, we did

PMMLondon

Thanks for your replies.

Please know that I am sincerely sorry for their circumstances and don't want to add to their problems. I am buying the house due to a relationship breaking down. I am moving very quickly to progress the sale which is what I have been advised they want.

To respond to one of the points raised, I do realise that if my offer was dependent on these items then I should have made this clear at the outset. However, they weren't a factor in my wanting to buy the house.

That said, whilst they may have wanted to take 12 or so shelves with them, I find it odd that someone would need to remove quite a basic curtain rail to take with them, so my guard is up that there is more to it. Holes in the wall I can fill, but if they do this throughout the house, I will be moving in in the middle of winter with the windows uncovered until I arrange for someone to put up some new ones. I could do without any added expense and inconvenience.

hb2

As eddddy says, speak to the EA and ask them to have a quiet word with the vendors.

Carrot007

PMMLondon wrote: »

but if they do this throughout the house, I will be moving in in the middle of winter with the windows uncovered until I arrange for someone to put up some new ones. I could do without any added expense and inconvenience.

Curtains? Nah. I have not one of those in my house. Think of it as a bessing for removing those silly things and get some blinds. (and if cost is an issue many places do cheap rollerblinds (get blackout ones) for next to nothing. All you need is scissors to cut to size a hacksaw for the pole and a drill. Quick job if not the nicest blinds. Still better than curtains!).


Just a thought anyway OP!


And yes I got that here too. Not discussed and not mentioned removing on the whats it called? PIF/F&F form. But they decided to remove every shelf, and from what I can tell from the fireplace when I moveed in, burned them and left the ashes for me.


Mostly just small holes. And poeple. Plaster not polyfilla! Much cheaper is you have to do a lot. And also.... Some removals took down a large ammount of plaster so real plaster (ish just all in one not going to base and top coat or anything!) was needed.


And you are probably better off not asking them to fix it becuase unless they are both the 0.01% of people who are receptive to criticism they might just a. do and bad job and, b. find something else to cause trouble. And unfortunatly there is not much you can do about it unless you want to waste money punishing them, and even then a judge might just go against you as being petty.

helejenkins1

I am moving next week and have taken all my curtain rails down. I plan on filling the holes although I was advised by my estate agent that it wasn’t necessary that I do that.