Owning your own home

I thought peddler were fine. I bought through them. Firt agent to offer a lift in between viewings. Fiest ones not to be cunts.
Completely on sellers side though.

yeah the lady we spoke to was sound. 1.25% is smack bang in the middle of the 5 quotes we got and the only one to give us a follow up call and a written quote without having to be prompted to do so.

they're top of the list.

I ask because our flat backs onto an LA block and we do get kept up reasonably frequently by loud noises, whether music from cars / flats, arguments etc etc. Enough to make me think about avoiding it if I move.

When we moved to the estate where we are now, I visited the place without the estate agent about five times at different times of the day to see what it was like. I suspect it varies from location to location massively; where I live now is peachy (touch wood), where we came from kinda sucked.

Agree with that. They seemed nice enough but fairly sure they pulled some classic hike the price up tricks on us by saying there was another offer at the same time...

Yeah I felt like I was rushed into the sale.
But. Turned out ok. Wouldn't have got space we have now. Live on an estate.worst thing? Bus route.is right on door step.

#se26

Sorry, no offence intended!

Yep, we have some of all that, but I'm not sure it's disproportionately high given the concentration of people (lots of high rise blocks). The rubbish and state of the streets is more down to the couldn't give a fuck attitude of Veolia, and Lambeth's inability to manage them, than anything else. Noise isn't really an issue, certainly not in my street. Reading the "bastard neighbours" thread, it seems that it's Victorian houses poorly converted into the flats they were never meant to be are much more of a problem. Nice to be surrounded by families too.

I was about say crime isn't an obvious problem, until my 13 year-old ironically had his phone stolen off him at the bus stop about two hours ago :(

Personally, I'd live here over what I'd get for the same money in a bland, anonymous residential street at the other end of Brixton - any proverbial day of the week. But I do have the aforementioned dog, just in case... (kidding).

is there anything that should set our alarm bells ringing with this correspondence?

No, that's sound. The only other thing to check is whether they sign you to a long sole agency agreement so you can't end the contract if they turn out to be shit. Lots do no contract, 8 weeks is pretty OK, much more than that can naff off.

If I was Mr or Ms Pedders I'd do an amusing day-in-the-life blog called the Pedder Files.

@Markyboy
Sorry to hear about your son's phone. I have an old HTC beater phone if thats of use. So uncool it would be practically theft proof

The owner of our mews courtyard has agreed to sell it to us.

What's the actual advantage of this? Investment? Or being able to park where you like?

Haha, thanks! He was shaken - 13 year-old threatened by a much older boy/young man, who made him unlock it and wipe the phone. It was his mum's old phone, so I think he's due an upgrade, but thanks for the offer.

Hope your boy isn't too shaken.

Release the hound.....obvs.....

Thanks. He's OK now, quite philosophical, but not a great experience

Blah. Really shit.

It's only a phone though.

We have a folder of all the stuff from buying our place that is called the pedder file. Makes me and the Mrs chuckle

None taken! You are right about Lambeth / Veolia. Fly tipping is an obvious consequence of charging £20 to pick up bulky rubbish in an area with very low car ownership and no tips nearby. Plus now we have a green bin we are sharing one bin between 7 flats. Yuck

It comes and goes for us - during the daytime it's drowned out by Heathrow / City planes anyway so no problem!

There is some archaic complication with titles which means parts of my house actually belong to the courtyard and my neighbour has right of way over my balcony (a hangover from before they converted down and got a ground-floor front door). Buying the courtyard allows me to solve those issues. It also removes an absentee landlord from the equation when arranging maintenance and repairs.

It won't do much for the house price but it will simplify the title and that would make it easier to sell in future. The mews is too small to allow cars to be parked in it, but if I own it I can make it nicer and plant things

Cheeky.
It's definitely Best Hampstead.

Ah. I can see that having neighbours clambering over one's balcony is not ideal. And so much better not to have absent landlords in the picture.

Dunno if this is really the place, but it's where people who know about such things hang out, right?

Two doors up from us has been unoccupied since we bought our place a couple of months ago. From what we can gather, the previous tenants were arrested in a drugs bust or something. The place is in piss-poor condition and the garden is overgrown. In the last week various people have been in and out clearing some stuff out of it and possibly the worst signage I've ever seen has come up offering it for rent. It still looks a state from the outside. The price isn't even THAT cheap for the area.

Basically, what legislation is in place to ensure that everything going on here is above board and it's not going to end up another drug den or some such? What obligation is there to make sure a place you're letting out is safe and suitable to inhabit? The whole thing looks dodgy as fuck.

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What obligation is there to make sure a place you're letting out is safe and suitable to inhabit?

Should have gas certs and whatnot...other than that, not a whole lot. Council can step in if it's a threat to the occupants but things have to get pretty hairy before that happens.

Not much you can do to prevent drug den funtimez- obvs. potential tenants aren't going to declare their intentions before moving in.

Some info here on landlord responsibilities here, enforcement by local authorities seems to vary:

https://www.gov.uk/renting-out-a-property

Few weeds, but it doesn't look all that bad. Even compared to next door's luscious hanging basket.

You can ask the council to look at it, but provided it's fire safe and has a gas certificate the only thing they're generally worried about is over crowding.

Borrow a police car and park it outside to put off drug dealy viewers?

Regulations are even more minimal than I thought. Thanks folks. Might give the council a ring

Have an informal chat with the neighbouring property owners, see if they share your concerns. contacting the council puts you in formal complaint territory and it's difficult to go back from there.