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Original poster

To have buyer remorse over first house purchase?

29 replies

Croissantsfordinner · 27/02/2025 16:47

Sharing here on MN as I don’t want to speak to DH about this in RL. I have an ever so small touch of buyer’s remorse I think.

We have just bought our first home after 10+ years of saving. We live in an expensive are just outside London and we had to compromise quite a bit (didn’t want to change area due to DS school being there). Although small, I like the property overall, it has lovely period features and a nice back garden, which we never had before as we always lives in a block of flats. We have only been there 4 months and have made some changes to improve it, like some nice wooden flooring (had old, stained carpets), have repainted the whole place and decorated it to suit our taste, within our means. So I am overall happy with the property inside.

The issue that keeps hanging at the back of my mind though is that it is on a busy road. I don’t mean a motorway type of road but a busy road, e.g. a fairly constant stream of traffic all day.

The only room facing the busy road is the living room, the rest is on the side and back of the property. Kitchen + back garden feel very secluded and cannot hear any traffic noise, just birds with lots of squirrels etc. The noise isn’t too bad from the living room either as we have double glazed windows, although if the tv is off you can definitely hear a bit of car noise during the day.

The main thing that concerns me is the potential risks of pollution but I don’t know whether I am over thinking it? The road itself is busy, yes, but we are surrounded by lots of quiet and green residential streets as well as a lovely park just on the other side of the road (so it’s not like we live in an overall very busy area, the are itself is very sought after and residential and lovely, it’s just our road that is busy).

I am thinking that maybe we made a mistake and we should have settled for something less pretty but not on a busy road – this will not be our forever home but we will definitely have to be in it for at least the next 5-8 years or so.

Can anyone share their experience, do you get used to it? I keep telling myself that if we lived in the city centre or in any other busy city, lots of cars and traffic would be the norm? My DH is originally from Milan, which is a very polluted city, I am sure that would be worst than living on a busy road in a cute surrey village?

OP posts:
cmma01 · 27/02/2025 16:57

Croissantsfordinner · 27/02/2025 16:47

Sharing here on MN as I don’t want to speak to DH about this in RL. I have an ever so small touch of buyer’s remorse I think.

We have just bought our first home after 10+ years of saving. We live in an expensive are just outside London and we had to compromise quite a bit (didn’t want to change area due to DS school being there). Although small, I like the property overall, it has lovely period features and a nice back garden, which we never had before as we always lives in a block of flats. We have only been there 4 months and have made some changes to improve it, like some nice wooden flooring (had old, stained carpets), have repainted the whole place and decorated it to suit our taste, within our means. So I am overall happy with the property inside.

The issue that keeps hanging at the back of my mind though is that it is on a busy road. I don’t mean a motorway type of road but a busy road, e.g. a fairly constant stream of traffic all day.

The only room facing the busy road is the living room, the rest is on the side and back of the property. Kitchen + back garden feel very secluded and cannot hear any traffic noise, just birds with lots of squirrels etc. The noise isn’t too bad from the living room either as we have double glazed windows, although if the tv is off you can definitely hear a bit of car noise during the day.

The main thing that concerns me is the potential risks of pollution but I don’t know whether I am over thinking it? The road itself is busy, yes, but we are surrounded by lots of quiet and green residential streets as well as a lovely park just on the other side of the road (so it’s not like we live in an overall very busy area, the are itself is very sought after and residential and lovely, it’s just our road that is busy).

I am thinking that maybe we made a mistake and we should have settled for something less pretty but not on a busy road – this will not be our forever home but we will definitely have to be in it for at least the next 5-8 years or so.

Can anyone share their experience, do you get used to it? I keep telling myself that if we lived in the city centre or in any other busy city, lots of cars and traffic would be the norm? My DH is originally from Milan, which is a very polluted city, I am sure that would be worst than living on a busy road in a cute surrey village?

Sounds like there's a fair bit of greenery and trees-ery around to suck up the CO2.
As soon as visitors come round and say they love your house, you'll be delighted with it and have no regrets.

BooomShakeTheRoom · 27/02/2025 16:56

Everyone has to compromise and all houses have pros and cons. If you went for a quiet street, you’d probably have to go even smaller.

flyinghen · 27/02/2025 16:53

I think your house sounds lovely! Congratulations!

GlacialLook · 27/02/2025 16:53

Buyers' remorse is practically compulsory, like a survey and conveyancing fees! I guarantee that if you had bought the less pretty house on a quieter street, you would be tormenting yourself about its ugliness or overlookedness or something else. I hear you on traffic noise -- we bought our house during lockdown so the roads were empty, and weren't fully prepared for how busy the road we're on can be in rush hour, though the front garden is enormous, and we're high up, over the road. But swings and roundabouts.

Just relax in the full knowledge that you're undergoing an inevitable part of the house-buying process.

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