I have the money for repairs but cannot face dealing with trades. AIBU to just live in the house as it is

Yes, I agree.

I've decided to put up with it until I retire, then put all my stuff in storage, go travelling for six months and get it renovated while I'm away (with a project manager to deal with all the trades people).

That hasn't been my experience. In recent years I have required an electrician, a plumber, a builder and kitchen and bathroom fitters, and have had excellent service every time.

Was about to say this. And woe betide anyone who posts about their bad experience on these Facebook groups, in my area they get torn to shreds by relatives and friends of said crap tradies.

Second this. Also I found a female plumber through Stopcocks (national kind of register of female plumbers, you pay 10% more to fund the association, which I was only too happy to do) and she was brilliant, sadly has now decided to take a job rather than be self-employed. It was different having a female in the house and I trusted her.

Despite what you think, you can paint walls and skirtings.
Most DIY isn't that hard, plenty on youtube to guide you.

Can you speak to the tradies that you like and ask them for recommendations? In our old house, we got our plumber via our electrician as they worked together a lot. In our new house (80 miles away) we got a new electrician via our builder as they work together a lot. Once you get to know one person it’s good as you can hopefully trust their judgement if they give you a recommendation.

The problem with this (in my experience) is that people just tag their own business/their cousin/friend/uncle's mate. Getting genuine recommendations is really difficult.

I'll tell you what I have decided about builders. Apart from the obvious, (poor planning, buggering off to do another job, poor communication, going over budget, demanding more money etc etc), they cannot do all of the things. You need a specialist in each area, to concentrate on their bit which they are skilled in and will come and do that one part of the job, hopefully properly.
When we get our lounge done, I am going to hire, in this order:
Brickie
Plasterer
Carpenter
Decorator
Flooring person

If this strategy doesn't work I give up. It's a headache for sure.

Luckily my Dh is very good at most DIY jobs, he knows his limits so we get plumbers and electricians in if needed. A few years back we had major renovations in a house we owned. They left us for 6 weeks with a boarded up patio window and a huge gap at the side of it which led into the cavity wall. One of our cats went missing. We could hear the meows and eventually realised he was between the two walls. Asked a neighbour to help, he was a builder, he said well it's just a cat, leave it. My husband and I took the newly built outer wall down brick by brick until we could rescue our cat. When our builders eventually re-appeared they were not happy at the damage we had caused!! Never again. We both do the DIY and if it is an emergency we get in a trades person.

Just to add, it’s kind of a relief to know it’s fairly common to hate having strangers in the house, get quotes etc. I get very stressed whenever we have to have any kind of tradesperson in, we had an electrician looking for a fault recently and he literally went everywhere in the house and had to pull out furniture that hadn’t been moved in a decade - it was mortifying even though he was very nice about it.

I feel the same but I've lived in my house for 35 years. I have loads of ideas how I want it but I dread making the call. I haven't had bad experiences unless you count them not turning up when they say they will especially when it's just for quotes.

Although I have had an electrician around a few days ago for a quote (he was late) I'm still apprehensive. Then I'll have to get a plasterer, plumber to move a radiator, carpenter (one I've used in the past), painter and decorator then carpet fitter just for one room! Been putting this off for about 10 years and I'm dreading how to navigate it.

Something I came across in (England) is that each Council has a preferrred set of traders in their area who they endorse (under the Trading Standards banner)- they have been inspected, and they have to adhere to processes such as providing proper quotes a 14 day cooling off period, no paying until the end of the job etc. I need to replace some windows before Xmas and went this route and was happy with the result. Can't tell you the number of times I have been ripped off by various tradesman - particularly if it involves a roof. I have learnt to do alot over the years and only use tradesman now - where I actually have to.

I feel the same way, however whenever we get something sorted it feels so worthwhile.

We found a local company who did local authority repairs, loft conversions and similar and asked them to quote for a list of "small" jobs. They arranged all the trades, we had a project manager on call and paid them for everything. It wasn't perfect but when we needed different trades in the right order they made it happen. Probably cost us a bit more but was much easier than us trying to engage everyone separately.

I really sympathise re tradespeople. There are so many bad ones out there.

This will get me hung drawn and quartered but after a string of bad experiences I try to avoid English tradespeople now. I’m sure there are plenty of good ones but we’ve found they’re more likely to rip you off and do a bad job.

Have you tried putting a message on your local Facebook/Next Door page? I agree most trades are a nightmare, but if you get a couple of good ones, they will recommend other people to you.

Same. I'm not spending put again on another tradesman who can't actually fix the issue but will give it a go causing more damage and charging for the pleasure. 5 plumbers to try to find a leak...none could apparently - 2k down in total. 9k on electrics where they didn't make good after. 8k on new boiler where they've sawn through og floorboards and left them wobbling and holes in walls. Not doing any more so am now left with all the plastering needing doing and fixes. They make you feel so stupid while they're in your house too!

Money not the problem here. Getting quotes is difficult. Getting people to turn up is another hurdle. Having strangers in the house, hate it. So even if everything went well I wouldn't do it.
My DIY skills are limited due to health.
If we move it will be somewhere all done up and needing no work for the foreseeable future.

Same here!! Have a painter in at the moment and can’t wait for him to be gone. It’s cost a fortune and I have done a really good job in the rest of the house. I’ll be doing the rest myself again.

anyway. We need the kitchen done and I cannot face it!!

Sorry but not even this guarantees a good service.

Someone in my family had great (and on-going) service from a tradesman so I contacted him to do a job. He turned up on a Saturday, gave me a quote and said he'd be back on Monday to do it. He didn't turn up or contact me. About 6 weeks later he finally contacted me and said he'd be round to do it (I already found someone else to do it by then - and not overly happy with them either).

Other than that, I've had plenty of workmen in and most of it has been utterly shoddy (sometimes not discovered until months or years later). In one case one guy left a potentially lethal electrical fault (the guy who came to read the meter was so astounded he put it right himself).

So yeah, I have very little faith in workmen. So many of them seem to have no pride, no work ethic and perfectly happy to rip you off.

Sorry to hear that Its really shit. DH has COPD and when they come to do our door next week they are doing the wall around it too Dust and crap will be everywhere but because its HA we have to put up with it. NHS may likey be the ones dealing with the consequences

Agree dealing with trades is frequently horrendous.

here are two possible solutions.

1. you can learn to paint and do basic work. Unless you have a disability that blocks you doing basic decorating or diy, you CAN learn. You have a choice. Learning new skills gives you independence from dickheads which is a great motivation. Plenty of instructional info on YouTube.

2.hire a professional interior designer to deal with the trades on your behalf. They will use their contacts and they will be pulling their hair out instead of you having the stress, and it’ll be up to you to pay for their time and angst. But it gets it done.

Learn more about DIY. You can paint walls and skirting yourself and decorate/brighten up the house yourself.

A loft conversation is not essential.

Only do necessary maintenance work (dealing with any leaks/plumbing or electrical issues) so your house does not fall into disrepair to limit contact with trades.