A house swap deal has turned into a nightmare for one party involved in a recent exchange, something the irate new tenant has documented in a series of eye-opening videos on TikTok.
Suzanne Elizabeth was appalled after participating in a ‘mutual exchange’, a process where council or housing association tenants can swap homes. In a GoFundMe page set up by Suzanne, she explained that it was a “five-way mutual exchange with housing association houses”.
After receiving the keys to her new abode on December 6 with her teenage sons, she has since been working non-stop to clear the rubbish, dirty belongings and grime left behind. A clip she shared on ‘Day Two’ quickly went viral, with over a million viewers tuning in to witness the house’s state of disrepair.
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Starting her clip by a window, Suzanne revealed an extensive mould infestation. “After travelling for two hours to get here, this is what I turned up to,” she lamented, panning her camera around the room to expose smoke-stained walls covered in dirt.
“The woman I swapped with was full of promises she’d get things done – she promised she’d clean, but she didn’t do anything,” Suzanne stated. To illustrate her point, she directed her camera further at her new kitchen’s tiled floor, which was also filthy with mud stains. “The feelings I have right now are beyond disgust,” she vented as she entered another room.
In a damning revelation, Suzanne expressed her disgust: “I don’t know how anyone can live like this or anybody could leave their home like this knowing that somebody like me has gone above and beyond for them in helping them in any way I could. I even cleaned the garden because they said they couldn’t – I bent over backwards to help them.”
Suzanne then proceeded to show the clutter left by the previous owner, including shelves stacked with ornaments, cabinets, and even a dirty snooker table leaning against the wall. The living room ceiling was next, riddled with cracks and additional areas of mould.
“They were meant to get rid of everything,” she exclaimed angrily. “The toilet had faeces everywhere, all over the floor and as you can see – all over the back of the toilet and all up the walls. There’s no way, even though they said they had a deep clean, you can see nothing was done and they just moved out in a rush.”
Opening a cupboard to find more mould, a jacket, and numerous rolls of wallpaper, Suzanne went on with her rightful condemnation: “They didn’t give a damn about who was moving in. I don’t think they’ve ever cleaned, it just looks like it was left for the rats. Look at this carpet – it’s absolutely stinking, it’s vile.”
Reaching the end of her video, Suzanne expressed further horror, stating: “Every nook, cranny and surface is mouldy, greasy – there’s years and years of layers of grease from these people never cleaning.” She also cursed the abuse of a kitchen appliance, noting: “It’s serial deep fat frying – once upon a time these blinds were white.”
The garden didn’t fare any better, meanwhile, with bags full of rubbish bags strewn across the yard by the previous occupant. Suzanne felt betrayed: “I thought I knew these people and I thought I’d built a relationship and friendship with them, but this is what they left me with. Half of this stuff [dozens of bin bags] I had to move out of the house. They were told by Housing they had to move it out, but they left it as a little prize for me.”
Her followers were baffled, with one asking: “The council wouldn’t allow an exchange whilst the house is in this state. Why did you agree to it?” Another echoed the concern: “This should have had a council inspection before you swapped so both councils were happy with both properties conditions.”
Despite the mess, Suzanne’s composure impressed another follower who couldn’t believe her calmness amid the chaos. “You sound remarkably calm considering. I’d be spiralling I’ve now seen the house you moved from to what they left absolutely shocking.” Suzanne clarified in response: “This voice over was recorded 12 hours after I moved in. There’s only so much crying you can do. Hence my voice.”
Since the video was shared, Suzanne has been posting daily updates on her progress. On day 23, she revealed she had finally received a response from the authorities after reaching out to her MP, although she didn’t specify the area.
“The housing association [which she didn’t specify] has reached out to me and they said they were very sorry after seeing my videos,” she explained. “They said they didn’t realise it had been left like that and thought it had been cleaned. They asked for my bank details and said they’d like to help me out with the carpet and cleaning products, ones to help with decorating and money towards a skip.”
However, Suzanne disclosed that the Housing Manager was only prepared to contribute £100 towards her expenses and that they would send someone to check the asbestos found “in all the rooms”.
“Do not let them fob you off with £100!” one commenter urged. “You need to go back to them with quotes of how much carpets, skips, cleaning products are. If they refuse you go back to the MP. The MP will write back to them.”
Another concurred: “Your HA [Housing Association] is taking you for a ride. I’m in a similar situation as you and I managed to get £900 from my old council and that’s barely touched the sides, £100 is not enough for all that stuff.”
Meanwhile, a third person criticised sharply: “Omg £100! Tell ’em to shove it where the sun don’t shine and go to the papers! They should be offering more than that! You are too nice.”
Others took to sharing their own tales of moving misadventures, with one TikTok user recounting: “My exchange was just like this. The morning of moving they said they couldn’t get a van. My partner told them in no uncertain terms that van or not we were moving in. We were 200 miles away.”
Another gave Suzanne some advice: “Mine was worse – honestly, really bad… clean the living room and camp in there until you’ve cleaned. Then paint what you can until you go back and do properly… you’ll get there.”
Whilst a third contributor revealed their own frustration, adding: “I had this done to me, I left a beautiful, brand new house all decorated and cleaned for her. She left me a dogs’ home with holes hidden, dirt, black mould, broken windows etc. I was devastated.”