To think new builds are too small

As you could see from my original post I was responding to someone who was defending new builds by saying lots of them being built in her town are massive, which she felt was a viable reply to the op complaining that new builds are too small.

My point was the larger new houses in my small town are being sold at a cost totally beyond the average person, so just saying some new builds are bigger is an unhelpful point to make when only the rich can afford them.

Housing here is so expensive the average person here can, at best, only afford the shoe box sized two or three bed semi that the op was describing.

To cement my point further I don’t think people working hard on average incomes in my area should have to live in tiny houses with no storage. An average house should have bedrooms big enough for wardrobes, reception rooms big enough for a dining table, somewhere to store a hoover, etc.

Also, did you miss the four bed at £800,000? Lots of people might hope to get a couple of promotions and move up the ladder from a three bed semi to a four bed one day. What income do you need to achieve that in my area? Unless you are mega rich it’s shoe boxes all the way here.

I went to look round a new build detached. I noticed that the "Double Bedroom" only had the bed and 2 Bedside Tables in it. And then realised that the door was pushed flat back against the wall and the bed was in the way so it wouldn't even close. There was no Wardrobe or Drawers in there.

I live in a 2000 sq ft new build with a detached garage and large garden. We have lots of storage and all the rooms are large.

But it cost an absolutely insane amount of money so we'd never have been able to afford it when DC were small.

Not all new builds are tiny, but the vast majority of houses on this estate are 3 storeys and have too much upstairs for the amount of living space downstairs so feel really cramped. They also have parking spaces as opposed to garages, which cuts the storage space down further.

I went to view a 4 bed new build and its got no more floor space than my current 2 bed property.
The kitchen was tiny, living room was OK but definatly not big enough to have a dining table and sofa.
Bedrooms was all the same size and no way could two kids share a room.
There was 2 nice size bathrooms and a large toilet room downstairs.
Rent was £600 a week

My town is full of old mill worker Victorian terraces which are narrower than my 2000s 3 floor townhouse and have the toilet on the back of the kitchen. There seems to be this idea on MN that it's easy to come by 1940s and 1950s semis on a nice road - we have those but they're £100k more than the new builds because the 1960s ex-council houses are on the mugger-filled estates you avoid after dark.

i made the mistake of watching the virtual tour that has really sinister music playing 😅

I agree but our house isn't a new build and it's tiny. 5 person house but we can barely all fit in the living room. No dinning room either.
Bedrooms also small apart from one.
I absolutely hate the house but it's what we can afford.

So no under the stairs? No lounge? I mean it’s your house so you know the layout, but I wouldn’t have put it there. Plus you knew the layout before buying it.

ive a new build and we’ve the space for a settle, sideboard, tall boy, umbrella stand and pushchair in the hall.

Ha, I'm going to look out for that phrase 'neatly designed', AKA dolls house.

The technical space standards published by govt are only for use if a local authority have adopted them in their local plan. London has... most authorities don't bother, meaning new homes are often "better" in terms of internal floor are than elsewhere.

not to be unkind but you've put that shoe storage in a dopey place, surely that makes it difficult to open the door. do you not have an under the stairs?

whats the square footage of your house?

my mum has a large 4 bed house built in the 70s and she has limited storage, just one cupboard in the study that takes up 1/3 of the room

Mine is big and has a good layout with a massive L shaped hallway. Like any houses it depends on your budget.

We have a beautiful new build home with amazing space in every room, even the downstairs toilet and storage cupboards are larger than normal. The garden is a perfect size too

Our house is only coming up to one year old and we have had no problems with space or anything else for that matter.

Our Victorian end terrace has absolutely massive rooms, 3 bedrooms, living room and dining room. They certainly gave people more space back then, plus the big windows let in loads of light. On the downside it's bloody freezing and prone to damp, although saying that my sil has a new build and they've had to fit air con as it's so stuffy in summer so you can't win really!

If I were lucky enough to get a new build HA property I wouldn't care about its size. But then I don't have children.. I see your point though.

Yes, three bed new build semis are pretty small. Four bed detached if buying a new build would definitely be needed to have enough space. But they aren’t worth the money because of how overlooked the back gardens are. Plus, when you’ve seen one new build on an estate, you’ve seen them all.

And another thing...
The big new builds near me (of which there are 100s, as our nation enthusiastically builds all over our productive farmland) cost £££££.

You could buy a similarly sized, older, more solidly-built house in good repair on a larger plot with all sorts of outbuilding for LESS money.

Bonkers.

My daughter has recently bought a five year old two bedroom house, it is a very similar size to the 1980s two bedroom house we used to own but better laid out.

I was surprised at one ex council house I saw on Rightmove (probably 1920/30s) which was very poky inside and very little storage.

Yeah I agree. We have a 4 bed detached new build but it's the size of an older 3 bed semi as they've squeezed 4 bedrooms and an ensuite into the space of a normal 3 bed house.

It works for us for now but it's definitely not our forever home and I wouldn't have another new build again.

No one really uses dining rooms anymore just another room to clean and heat.

We use our dining room every day. The kitchen's too small to put a table in, but I like it that way. I don't like eating in a kitchen & I like to be able to shut the door on the kitchen when I'm elsewhere in the house.

That floor plan is literal lies, to make it look bigger they have drawn beds in that are not bed size. They have 2 end to end beds - with a gap between - in the 'twin room' that is 3 meters long. That makes those beds about 140cm long. Which is the size of a cot bed, but a room that can just fit 2 cot beds in is not a twin room! All the other beds are drawn the same length too.

Our new build is massive but we had the budget to buy a pretty big one 🤷‍♀️

When we were looking for a three bedroom, a lot of homes (non-new build) were advertised as three bedrooms but what they actually were were two bedrooms (not doubles) and a third that was could barely fit a crib. The one we did find eventually, the third bedroom was a bit bigger and there was a massive garden but we ended up having to move because the last owners had some work done by a builder friend and he hadn’t done it properly and it was something that an inspector would miss because it was underneath the house.

It was an older house and DH didn’t want to go through it again with another older house so he looked into new builds. We’ve been in ours and love it, four double bedrooms, three loos, front and back garden, plenty of parks and safe, well-lit areas to walk, close to everything we need including public transport.

Only downside for us, well, autistic DS1 is it not being detached. I don’t hear the neighbours’ appliances (semi-detached) unless I really strain but he does.

Looking back at the other house we were in, it would have been a problem for him and us and we would have had to move anyway because where we were last, it was a narrow path separating us from the neighbour on one side and a wall from the neighbour on the other.

I would rather buy out our neighbours if we could than move somewhere else.

Detached homes in our county are an extra £100,000 from what I’ve seen and I think that is ludicrous.