Hi

I agree with Sparky, it is always good practice to change the locks anyway. Particularly if keys are missing. You could be in difficulty explaining a loss to Insurers for a burglary, where there are no visable signs of forcible entry.

With regard to the Contents left behind, this can often be the case where an elderly owner has passed away and their relatives do not live nearby. They may have cleared the property as much as they can, without employing a house clearance company but there will still be old/unusable bits that they do not know what to do with. So rather than just dump, they would normally allow the new owners to do as they wish with the leftovers. If is more than just leftovers, give the sellers solicitors a couple of weeks to remove them.

If they don't your local councils recycling centre will normally offer a service to remove large or heavy/bulky items, sometimes at no charge for a few items, then a fixed amount for any other. Some local charities will remove items for no charge and then provide to the needy, but the items would need to be in a good and safe condition.

You should refer to your purchase information, before you act. Normally the seller completes a form, advising what fittings and fixtures are included.

Huckster

As a good security measure you should change all the locks on your new house, as you don't know who else besides the vendor has keys to the property including the garage.

You should also change the alarm codes if fitted.

Door locks are relatively simple to change with basic diy skills.

HTH

Sparky.

If the sellers have not left the property in the condition that was agreed....empty...then you may seek compensation for the cost to you. It will be a civil matter and probably won't be worth anyone taking action, so it will be down to how committed either party is to persue this matter. If they have left other items and the house in a poor state then ask them to collect all the items left and pay a sum for basic cleaning, this may settle the matter when they realise that it probably going to be more expensive than the item....unless it is a Van Gogh????

Hi, I can't seem to find the answer but everyone I speak to agrees, that once completion of a house sale has taken place and we have moved in, any items the seller may have left behind legally belong to us - is this true?

Our sellers left a lot of items around and didn't clear up very well before leaving the property but one item specifically they rang and asked if they could collect. We were happy to agree to this until we found that we had no keys to lock the garages and that it is now going to cost us approximately £60 to replace the locks.

We have spoken to them about the keys but they are adament they left them. I would now like to sell the items to pay for the locks we have to replace, can I legally do this?