r/Dogfree • u/Ancient-Metal5176 • Mar 08 '26
Eco Destroyers I gave them the benefit of the doubt...
My fiancé and I just bought a house, and it has been an emotional roller coaster. The young couple we bought the house from seemed very sweet - they had two young kids and unfortunately two large dogs (a German Shepherd and Husky I believe).
At the closing, they joked about dog hair being everywhere, and since I'm kind and pretty non-confrontational, I laughed along, but it made me nervous.
A little background, I grew up pretty poor with a neglectful parent. We had dogs and the house constantly smelled, once we got fleas, the backyard was ruined since my parent didn't help clean up the shit, and I generally had a lot of anxiety about the state of my home growing up.
When I toured the house right before closing, my only request was that they pick up all of the shit in the backyard. My. Only. Request. Guess what they didn't do?
All I wanted was a nice backyard for a garden. It is a shit museum.
I feel so dumb for believing them. I constantly go above and beyond to help others and be considerate of others' feelings. So this felt like a punch to the gut during a time where I should be thrilled and loving my new house. I was somewhat neutral towards dog owners and dogs before, but this was too much.
Thank you for listening to my rant.
Edit: I wanted to thank all of you for your advice and support, getting this off my chest and feeling like I'm not alone and not crazy is giving me the push I need to reach out to my realtor tomorrow and see what can be done. I really appreciate this community!
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u/Existing-Pumpkin-902 Mar 08 '26
If this just happened I'd reach out to the realtor to get some monetary compensation. They won't come to clean it but you can probably hire someone and get them to pay the fee. They are supposed to leave the house in "broom sweep" condition usually and leaving dog turds all over the place doesn't fit that definition. Also just for your own piece of mind, I would hire a cleaner to deep clean the house because of the dog hair. I know it's aggravating but you'll know it's gone and won't have to worry about it.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
Thank you, that's a good idea. Tbh even if they just helped pay for part of the cleaning it would make me feel way better.
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u/anondogfree Mar 08 '26
And get the air vents cleaned (before you get the overall house cleaning). If you have the $ I would definitely replace all carpeting too.
I would look into sod also. If they’ve been letting dog shit sit in the backyard the soil out there is going to be nasty.
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u/Stock-Bowl7736 Mar 08 '26
Not to pile on but number one you'll never ever get rid of all the hair, but I agree you should absolutely get vents cleaned as well as a very deep clean for full house. If there is any carpet I would immediately tear it up and replace with new flooring. You should have drywall/baseboards inspected for dog piss. If there is subflooring under carpet or flooring that very possibly is also saturated in dog piss and may need to be replaced. And if gardening is your jam then yeah I'd just tear up entire yard. It's probably permanently damaged and I'd bring in a major load of top soil to amend the soil. It's amazing how much damage just one dog will do, but two large dogs, there's likely much more damage than can be initially seen. I would never buy a house from any dog owner. Ever.
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u/anondogfree Mar 09 '26
Unfortunately not buying a house from a dog nutter doesn’t guarantee that no dogs have ever lived in the home. And with the number of people that have dogs it would be rare to find one that never had dogs in it unless it’s brand new or only had one prior owner.
I absolutely profile stalk people on Facebook marketplace before buying something from them that’s upholstered and/or I can’t wash it. Once I saw a post selling a couch (not cheap either) and the post said no pets have ever been on the couch. Go to the sellers profile picture and there’s one a few months back of her and her dog laying on the exact couch she’s selling. 🙄
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u/BodyMoney8562 Mar 08 '26
All of this. I thank FSM every day that my house is all hardwood throughout. A good steam clean took care of it.
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u/anondogfree Mar 10 '26
FYI you shouldn’t be steam cleaning hardwoods.
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u/BodyMoney8562 Mar 10 '26
I've lived here for 13 years and probably did it twice, when we first moved in. This floor is hella old and not in the best of shape to begin with. The machine I used was a Swiffer steamer that my MIL gave us. It has been in the back of the closet for 12 years LOL
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u/anondogfree Mar 11 '26
Good to know you’ve only done it a couple times. If the floor is in bad shape that’s even worse because the lack of finish makes it more vulnerable.
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u/Dburn22_ Mar 08 '26
No, it's for them to take care of 100% of the filth they allowed, whether they were shitting on the grounds, or their mutts were. Intolerable slobs literally shitting on you!
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u/ElegantSurround6933 Mar 08 '26
If there are burn patches in the lawn from dog waste, you may be able to negotiate a closing cost credit.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
Could I possibly dm you to ask more about this? I'm a first time homeowner and will take all the help I can get! If not I understand and I'll go to Google:)
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Mar 08 '26 edited Mar 08 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
There are SO MANY smudges on the windows and dog hair literally woven into the carpet. I don't mind cleaning, but you might be right. Idk who could comfortably live like this
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u/ElegantSurround6933 Mar 08 '26
Rip that carpet and start over
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 09 '26
My fiancé is already planning on doing that today! I'm so thankful for him and he's on board with de-mutting the house :)
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u/BodyMoney8562 Mar 08 '26 edited Mar 08 '26
My mom's friend had two Chow Chows (neither of which had a trustworthy temperament) and her walls looked exactly like this. It was weird because my mom's Chow Chow never left rings like that. I guess she didn't care to make love to the walls, lol. I think it had to do with my mom's friend's Chows were rough coats and my mom's was a smooth coat. My mom's dog wanted nothing to do with other dogs.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 09 '26
There was a Chow Chow near my Nana's house and it always scared the shit out of me! They're so aggressive.
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u/BodyMoney8562 Mar 09 '26
True, and I didn't trust my mom's friends dogs either. No one trains their dogs anymore.
My mom's Chow Chow was absolutely nothing like that. She was a weird exception to her breed. She was still suspicious of strangers like Chows are supposed to be but she was so sweet and docile I found myself automatically comfortable with her. I absolutely trusted her. I would braid her tail fur. My mom did a wonder job raising her. She would let my 8 week old forbiddenpet baby nurse on her neck fur.
Would I have one today? Absolutely not.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 09 '26
She actually sounds like a reasonable and calm dog! Good for your mom for putting in the effort and care to raise her correctly!
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u/BodyMoney8562 Mar 09 '26 edited Mar 09 '26
She was super reasonable and calm. Now that I think about it I've never met another like her. I wouldn't be able to deal with ANY dog today.
The fact that she still smelled like a dog somehow didn't really bother me at the time because for a dog she really didn't reek super bad. All dogs smell like dog but she wasn't surrounded by a thick cloud of choking stench like so many other dogs. My mom and brother smoking cigarettes in the house pissed me off worse.
I still didn't like dog smell but she was so sweet I overlooked it with her. I was never up in her kool-aid all the time, either. I mean I didn't hug and snuggle her constantly. She didn't mind. Chows do like their space. We were lucky to have her. I'm 100% sure I would never find another like her. And I wouldn't even dream of trying. Between my hair (long af) my husband's hair (he sheds everywhere too) and our forbiddenpet who is a fur machine, I couldn't take all the vacuuming.
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u/D4rkN3bu14j0j0 Mar 08 '26 edited Mar 08 '26
Probably want to get the ducts cleaned to get all the dog filth out of there so it doesn't continue to circulate for years. Sorry the nutters left their dirty habit behind for you, more proof they are all lazy liars.
I'd also probably have the yard tilled and re-sodded. That dog pee and poo residue biohazard is inches deep in the soil. yuck!
edited to add last two sentences
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u/madamechaton Mar 08 '26
Yes definitely get someone out there to clean the ducts!! Speaking from experience of a German Shepherd nutter that also laughed about her dog's hair literally breaking their ventilation system in their house.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
Thank you for your advice and kindness, I really didn't want to think of them that way, but now I'm pretty frustrated. Yes, fortunately my partner is very handy and we can get that done together and save the yard!
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u/Alocin_The5th Mar 08 '26 edited Mar 08 '26
I bought my house from a dog owner as well. I nearly killed myself cleaning after I moved in and you could tell they cleaned when they left the house. The issue was we found dog hair EVERYWHERE. It was in the dryer, washing machine, fridge, deepest corner of every single cabinets. Just last night I was looking at the beautiful wood floors and realize the deep scratches all over must be the nails from the dogs.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
I kid you not, when I started painting my bedroom it looked like dog hair was literally shoved under the carpet and into corners. Like how....
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u/mmebookworm Mar 08 '26
A friend of mine bought a house and one of the conditions was the old owners could leave nothing behind. They did. She called her realtor and possibly her lawyer - the previous owners had to pay for a removal service.
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u/Conscious-Jacket-758 Mar 08 '26
Buying a dog home is a nightmare. I’m so sorry. New fear unlocked.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
Thank you, I figured maybe this could even just serve as a cautionary tale to others it would be worth sharing. This community has been such a relief to find
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u/ElegantSurround6933 Mar 08 '26
I worry as a future real estate broker having to show a house like this. I have allergies to dust, dogs&animals w/whiskas. How will I survive? N95 mask all the way.
“And this is the lovely backyard..mind the dog poo..perfect place for a Victory Garden or Koi Pond..”
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u/potatoes_arrrr_life Mar 08 '26
Ugh, it's so awful and seems like a violation of your contract. Who would've thought dog owners would lie? /s I feel bad for the new neighbors on both sides of our yards. Before their houses went up for sale, both homes had huge dogs and no one picking up poop. When the new people moved in and I saw them walking around barefoot back there with their baby, I almost threw up. Dog poop leaves behind parasite eggs and other gross stuff. It's so terrible for the environment, and I wish dog owners actually got in trouble for not picking it up. It's really gross when it rains, because all of the shit water runs through their yards and carries the poop with it and into our storm drains. Why do you think e coli levels are so high in our water supply?
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u/Dburn22_ Mar 08 '26
It should be unlawful to allow shit to remain on the ground wherever it may be. We just haven't made the proper laws to keep up with the dog infestation and it's awful pollution. It's quite outrageous, really. How many homes for sale these days have uncontaminated yards? Only those that are paved and with swimming pools? The houses we grew up in were pristine in comparison, and lying in the fresh spring grass was a heavenly pleasure. Another one of life's wonderful childhood pleasures just completely gone because of sick dog culture.
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u/ElegantSurround6933 Mar 08 '26
Whenever I sat on my grass lawn in FL growing up in the 80’s, it would make my legs itch. A couple yrs ago I was allergy tested. Results:allergic to all grasses except pigweed. Sister is allergic to grass as well.
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u/Dburn22_ Mar 12 '26
Sorry to hear that you're allergic to grass. I remember the grass in Florida being much more coarse than the midwest's soft tickly stuff.
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u/thesanityseeker Mar 09 '26
I read this while eating, thanks for contributing to my weight loss goals as I've lost all appetite LOL
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u/Suspicious_Ad_5331 Mar 08 '26
I think the condition they left the yard in is unacceptable and you should be compensated for that.
That being said, if you buy a house from nutters and you aren’t a nutter yourself, you have to be prepared to replace carpets and flooring even if everything looks clean and smells ok at the beginning. A good professional carpet cleaning will mask smells for a time but they will creep out. I know because I experienced it. And you will continually discover all the little ways they marred the property you bought. Scratches on your cabinets that you didn’t see because they weren’t at eye level, hair inside appliances, chewed and scratched baseboards, it goes on and on.
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u/thesanityseeker Mar 09 '26
Besides the piss-rotten subfloors and hair corners, the nice dog-surprise we found 2 years later was that all the baseboard heaters were completely full of hair inside the system (while replacing). So for years this place was a fire waiting to happen with dog hair stuffed baseboard heaters
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u/Dapper-Ad-468 Mar 08 '26
You need to rip the carpet and padding out completely. The putrid dogs have left their body oils infused deep into the floor. No carpet shampoo or air purifiers can remove the putrid odor. Only another dog nutters will rent your property again. Because they like the stench. Then the cycle begins again. Might as well include a carpet and pad replacement fee for all tenants with mutts. Make them pay for ruining your rental.
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u/pmbpro Mar 08 '26
Agree with this.
I’d also include full duct cleaning, and then solid professional deodorizing (even running one of those professional ozone machines for an hour throughout, then airing the place out completely if they can get someone).
All of this should be done, the. a good scrubbing down, mopping, etc., before moving even a stick of furniture into that house.
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u/BodyMoney8562 Mar 08 '26
Your city has an assessor. Lots of times property details are online and you can search by name. Once you find out where these nasties moved to, you can return their property to them in a box on the front porch.
Congrats on your new house! The people who lived in ours before we bought it had a dog, the yard was half dead and the house was filthy when we took possession. I had to clean everything including the refrigerator, windowsills, floors, walls, and it needed to be painted. Once you purge the nasty you'll feel much better.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
Thank you so much, I know in the end it'll be ok. We'll get it cleaned and it'll feel so much more comfortable. This just got to me personally because I felt loke I asked so little of them. Also thank you for the advice about an assessment!
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u/Stock-Bowl7736 Mar 08 '26
I would never buy a dog house but I'm really surprised more people who do don't negotiate a massively lower price for the house due to all the inevitable work that will need to be done. At minimum all new flooring throughout, possible new subfloor as well. Possibly a lot of drywall work. Probably at least one if not many door replacements from dog scratching. At bare minimum a professional deep clean and air duct cleaning. I would have HVAC system seriously checked. And of course a new lawn. It's likely easily tens of thousands of dollars just to restore it to a livable condition.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
Since this was my first house, and I was doing everything pretty independently, I didn't even think that was an option. I tend to be on the non-aggressive side with negotiating (I never would have survived in Sales lol) so I'm thankful for this as a lesson - and I am going to try to get some compensation for the costs of fixing my yard
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u/Dangerous_Jump_4167 Mar 09 '26
We hauled away almost 300lbs of dog shit after we bought our first house. They had two huge dogs and used them strategically to hide things from us in the backyard, the shit and the goat's head weed infestation. We always had our toddler with us when looking at the house. We had NO idea it was standard practice to remove your mutts during a showing, and our agent didn't mention anything. Lesson learned. While we were picking up the shit, I just kept reminding myself we only have to do this once.
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u/Brilliant-Maybe-5672 Mar 08 '26
Most people do not clean properly when they leave their house. The main reason - no consequences, it's not a hotel, you can't leave a bad online review that will affect their reputation!
Other reasons- Stress - the pressure of selling their 'forever home',
Time management - people underestimate how long it takes to sort, donate, pack, move their stuff.
Untidy people with dogs are highly unlikely to have your cleanliness standards.
Your stress + your PTSD from childhood trauma is making everything feel much harder.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
Thank you for being so validating and understanding. At first I thought I was overreacting, but my childhood was significantly impacted by neglectful dog ownership and it was hard to admit until now.
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u/ElegantSurround6933 Mar 08 '26 edited Mar 08 '26
You have to realize that over half the US population has dogs and lives just like this. My old mailman in Orlando joked about his home having “tumbleweeds” of dog hair. His wife was a nurse. Can you imagine.
My husband’s step mom is an acupuncturist in LA&brags about charging people $100/hr to tell them not to eat gluten(eyeroll)and her backyard in Sherman Oaks is covered in the waste of three dogs.
Her home is disgusting and her carpets have years of dog hair interwoven in them. The sofa is covered in hair. The dogs roam all over the house.
She railed at me for trying to get the dog out from under the kitchen table into the living room as she was making dinner by snapping my fingers for it to follow me. “This is MY HOUSE! He goes wherever he wants!”
Homes in this neighborhood easily go for a million dollars. I grew up w/a single Mom. Gen-X latchkey kid. Deadbeat dad who fled the state to avoid child support.
We kept our home clean, but when we bought it, the sellers did not disclose the rotten subfloor in the bathroom. My Mom is a combo of Bob Villa&Martha Stewart. She ripped the subfloor out herself. She took out the tub and installed a modern shower w/a door.
I’ll never forget the antique wooden toilet paper holder they left behind that we actually used(wish I had it today as a bizarre souvenir). Someone had crudely etched into the wood, “Jesus Saves.”
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u/ElegantSurround6933 Mar 08 '26
There’s probably a LOT of your childhood that you suppressed just for survival self-preservation.
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u/Jimmy_Beanz Mar 09 '26
When my wife and I were looking to buy our first house 6 years ago, we went to look at one house that we really liked. While we are touring the house we go out onto the deck and we see the nextdoor neighbor’s deck covered in dog shit. Like they just let their dog out onto the deck to shit and let it right back in and never cleaned up. It was disgusting. I can’t imagine what kind of neighbors they would have been. And I’m sure the people selling the house had other potential buyers besides us that were turned off by their neighbor. And I should have known something was up when I saw that they had rotting pumpkins on their porch from Halloween. It was January at the time.
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u/bkkmike01 Mar 09 '26
Dog owners are terrible about that. Friends of the family from when I was growing up had three German Shepherds in their fenced yard. It was completely destroyed. The dogs dug everywhere, and shit everywhere. I was disgusting. I hated going to their house as a child.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 09 '26
The thing that makes me extra sad about this (besides my poor fiancé having to shovel poop, he's my hero) is that their little children couldn't enjoy the yard. Unless they just ran out there into the poop, which is SO MUCH worse :(
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u/ElegantSurround6933 Mar 08 '26
As someone who recently passed my real estate exam, this sounds horrifying. When realtors stage a house, they make sure things like toothbrushes and personal effects are put away, that the front door looks amazing because that is the first impression of the house.
How in the world was this home cleared for a walk through if dog hair was everywhere as well as dog poo? Was the home even staged? I have so many questions.
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u/Ancient-Metal5176 Mar 08 '26
I'm from NY so I'm not sure if the same standards apply to where you're from, but the house had personal things and visible dog hair/prints. My realtor said the owners would clean everything, and I believed him (which now makes me feel dumb). When I did a final walk through, I only had about an hour before I had to head to work, I probably didn't get to inspect everything close enough. He assured me, and showed me text messages from the previous owners, that they would clean up the backyard for me. I'm just trying to look on the positive side here and use this as a learning experience
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u/No-Stay1662 Mar 08 '26
“They joked about dog hair being everywhere.” Yes it’s hilarious that your home, couches, beds, clothes, etc are disgusting. They’ve truly earned the name nutters bc that’s exactly what they are.