Previous owner asking to buy back property!

lincroft1710

Woolsery said:

Look on the bright side, with such controlling people it's unlikely neighbours will have been sorry to see them go. They'll probably welcome you with open arms.

I thought of this thread last night when I heard an apparently pleasant person living at the end of our private lane had suggested another neighbour and I re-paint the walls of the visibility splay in white, "Because it would look so much nicer and improve the value of our properties." Currently they're cream and in good condition having been refurbed and painted by us in 2020.

"What shall we tell him?" the other wall owner asked.

I can't write my exact answer here, but it was short. I'm all for being polite and I'm sure she will be, but these kinds of people seem to be totally unaware of others' rights and feelings.

"Well if you pay for the paint and for a competent tradesman to do the work, you are welcome to paint my wall"

TheJP

lincroft1710 said:

If I found that the "time capsule" had been buried on my land, I would be tempted to do one of the following 4 things,  none of which I would suggest the OP does.

1. Dig up box, empty contents into bin, replace box in ground.

2. Take pickaxe to box, so that there is a hole in it, so contents will suffer.

3. Concrete around the box

4. Plant trees/shrubs around box so it would be impossible to dig up without disturbing them

.

5. Fill with tea & cake

Woolsery

lincroft1710 said:

Woolsery said:

Look on the bright side, with such controlling people it's unlikely neighbours will have been sorry to see them go. They'll probably welcome you with open arms.

I thought of this thread last night when I heard an apparently pleasant person living at the end of our private lane had suggested another neighbour and I re-paint the walls of the visibility splay in white, "Because it would look so much nicer and improve the value of our properties." Currently they're cream and in good condition having been refurbed and painted by us in 2020.

"What shall we tell him?" the other wall owner asked.

I can't write my exact answer here, but it was short. I'm all for being polite and I'm sure she will be, but these kinds of people seem to be totally unaware of others' rights and feelings.

"Well if you pay for the paint and for a competent tradesman to do the work, you are welcome to paint my wall"

Hmmm...That ignores the fact that the other land owner and myself agreed we might smarten-up the entrance to the road and deliberately chose a colour common to the area, rather than one that matched our properties. It was our idea. We then spent our own time and money doing a good job. We have enough paint to do it again in a year or two. This guy is only interested in changing the colour and his house is 200m away, so he can't even see it. How he thinks an EA's valuation would be influenced baffles me.

But you're right, the proposal didn't come with an indication of who would pay and Weathershield's expensive. I suppose I should be grateful he didn't suggest a rainbow with "We love our NHS," as seen in a nearby village!

Woolsery

TheJP said:

Woolsery said:

TheJP said:

Woolsery said:

Look on the bright side, with such controlling people it's unlikely neighbours will have been sorry to see them go. They'll probably welcome you with open arms.

The neighbours are the relatives of the seller, maybe they are but I'm guessing this wont be the last the OP sees of the crazy bunch.

Is there only one neighbour? If there is, I missed that.

We have 15 neighbours, though only one actually borders us. I suppose what counts depends on circumstances.

Of course not but I'm stating its not as clean cut as you implied.

OK.  I thought the OP was sounding rather down after yesterday's encounter. Sorry if I  mis-spoke too positively.

JuanBallOfWimbledon

Well today we had a visit from 2 doors down. They were very lovely and brought us a little hamper of wine and treats. No mention was made of yesterday’s debacle, but I got a definite sense that they were sympathetic. They repeatedly told us to shout if we ever need anything. All in all, we feel less mortified about the scene that played out on our driveway.

I now have a new quandary about their mail. It’s been almost 2 weeks since we completed and we’re still getting letters and the odd parcel for them. They asked that we post them through next door, ordinarily I’d give them a bit of time to sort themselves out, but I’m thinking this might be the time to ‘RTS - not at this address’? I don’t want to make things worse but I feel we need to put distance between us. Is that reasonable? I’m doubting my judgement. 

london21

JuanBallOfWimbledon said:

Well today we had a visit from 2 doors down. They were very lovely and brought us a little hamper of wine and treats. No mention was made of yesterday’s debacle, but I got a definite sense that they were sympathetic. They repeatedly told us to shout if we ever need anything. All in all, we feel less mortified about the scene that played out on our driveway.

I now have a new quandary about their mail. It’s been almost 2 weeks since we completed and we’re still getting letters and the odd parcel for them. They asked that we post them through next door, ordinarily I’d give them a bit of time to sort themselves out, but I’m thinking this might be the time to ‘RTS - not at this address’? I don’t want to make things worse but I feel we need to put distance between us. Is that reasonable? I’m doubting my judgement. 

Your ex-sellers need to get a life and move on.

They could have done a redirection to make things easier. 

Their deliveries are another reason to keep in touch with their mess. 

If I was in your position, I will be returning all post and refusing deliveries because this will go and on and on otherwise and annoy you. 

lady1964

Refuse to accept deliveries if you are home when a delivery is attempted and send back all post marked RTS. We’ve been in our house over 2 years and I return all post RTS and I refused delivery of a package the other week. I did though message the previous owner on Facebook and said I’d refused a delivery for her. That should ensure she doesn’t order stuff and forget to change her delivery address. 

Seriously, the ex owners of your house are just that, you’ve tried being nice and got the rude brother attempting to dig up your garden, time to be assertive.

Sapindus

JuanBallOfWimbledon said:

Turns out it was him in the garden next door, digging right next to the fence that separates our gardens. Upon looking later, it seems he may have attempted to dig down and then across to get it in our garden, I can’t be sure but there’s a definite biscuit-tin-sized dip in the border next to the fence on our side.

I can sort of excuse wanting to dig up plants, maybe he thought it had been agreed and your vendors just hadn't had enough time.  Maybe they'd been having second thoughts all along.  Maybe wanting to take plants is a sign they are accepting they're not coming back.

But digging a tunnel under your garden to bury a time capsule speaks of sheer desperation.  And this is the brother.  Not the bereft vendor or even their devoted/harassed son.  I can't believe it's some cunning strategy to have the box still "belong" to them so they can demand to come and dig it up again in the future.  I think they are just obsessed with the idea that someone in the future will find it and know something about who once lived there.  Maybe they are archaeology nutters.  But either they have some sort of hold over the brother to force him into taking such bizarre measures, or he's as bonkers as they are.

I've never heard anything like it.  So all this talk about goods left behind and accidental bailees and not binning kids' footballs, how does this apply to something someone has deliberately buried on your property whilst trespassing?  Is it comparable to a burglar leaving a shoe behind?

youth_leader

So they didn't pay for post redirection either? That's one of the basic things you do when you move, I feel cross on your behalf having to spend time sorting their mail out.  Next thing you know they'll be phoning because they are expecting 'an urgent letter'.  Not on.  

grandadgolfer

JuanBallOfWimbledon said:

Well today we had a visit from 2 doors down. They were very lovely and brought us a little hamper of wine and treats. No mention was made of yesterday’s debacle, but I got a definite sense that they were sympathetic. They repeatedly told us to shout if we ever need anything. All in all, we feel less mortified about the scene that played out on our driveway.

I now have a new quandary about their mail. It’s been almost 2 weeks since we completed and we’re still getting letters and the odd parcel for them. They asked that we post them through next door, ordinarily I’d give them a bit of time to sort themselves out, but I’m thinking this might be the time to ‘RTS - not at this address’? I don’t want to make things worse but I feel we need to put distance between us. Is that reasonable? I’m doubting my judgement. 

Careful......it could a ruse to make drop your guard and before you know it its back to square one again, with previous owners knocking on your door, the brother climbing over your back fence to dig the garden up and the sister sniggering behind the net curtains