To abandon the extension?

We did our kitchen/diner and utility extension and spent more than twice this, don't regret it. 60k would be soon gone on holidays, especially with 6 of you to pay for, and big expensive holidays that three out of four of your kids (I'm including the potential one!) won't remember doesn't match up to more living space in my opinion. Now that we're open plan the kids are constantly in the extension with me, I feel like we hang out so much more.

I want to do this!

In 30+ years of homeownership I’ve only had a utility room for 2 of those years. The house we now live in is our forever house and, whilst it’s bigger and better in every way, we’ve lived here 20 years and I still often wish I had a utility room.

Yes, but you don't borrow against your house to have them, that is plain stupid

You should definitely not spend this amount of borrowed money on holidays and trivial stuff.

You spend most of your time in this house, it has to work for your family. How do you feel about being in a small kitchen on your own while the rest of the family is in a different room? Do you like cooking together with the kids? Is that possible in the current kitchen? Do you need to be able to keep an eye on the younger children while cooking? Do you have enough space for all 5 (or maybe soon to be 6) of you to have a sit down meal?

How many loads of laundry do you do per week? Do you have space/need a dryer? If you didn’t build the utility but knocked through the kitchen/diner, would the washing machine noise bother you while having a meal for example? Do you have other storage space in the house for your hoover, ironing board, tools, mop and bucket or whatever else usually goes in a utility room?

Imagine how you’d like family life to be in this house. Then make the changes that facilitate that.

I worked for years in insurance so I always look for a worst case scenario.
Plus we had a double story extension built 7 years ago giving us 4 beds, 3 bathrooms, a huge kitchen diner utility.

You say you don't want to commit to the house long term but consider:
One of you gets ill and can't work...3 kids in a small house
As above, a downstairs shower room huge difference
You come to sell but there is a fall in market value, you may not have experienced it but it happens...and you can't sell
The money you have borrowed is spent on holidays...that you are paying interest on...interest rates jump to 6,7 or even 16% as they were when I first bought...You are paying interest on memories.

You have a higher debt than you need. It's never ever advisable to be in debt.

Do the extension. Yes, holidays are lovely, but you live in your house all the time.

And your DC are so little. At the risk of stating the absolutely obvious, don't underestimate how much bigger they're going to get, and how much more you will value having more comfortable, practical living space when they are teens/young adults.

I'd personally do the extension, or reduce mortgage by 60k.

Holidays aren’t a fritter. Mine genuinely make my life better. DCs love them too.

We did a huge extension back in the day and the property market bombed. We didn't give a toss, the added space and beautiful new house we had built was awesome.
Eighteen years later when our family had grown up and left home we sold it for a LOT of money and downsized. Never once regretted that extension. Listen to your husband he's right.

We made the back reception into a kitchen/diner and then had a big conservatory on the back leading out from it, which made it seem like a big open plan area. The old kitchen became a snug.

So the extension bit is only a utility room, no extra living room or extended kitchen? Perhaps you could just knock through and create the open plan kitchen/dining, that would cost a lot less than an extension. I actually dont see you how you can achieve all that, knock though, new kitchen and an extension, for the price you are quoting anyway.

With 3 or even 4 kids the extension sounds sensible. And I do understand what you’re saying about the ceiling price of your property, but it will be much more sell-able with a large, useful space like this. You won’t lose the money.

I moved house a few years ago and spent £120k on a kitchen extension, side extension for a utility room new bathroom, en-suite and some other general updates on the house.

this was funded through a mixture of savings, and the mortgage.

i sometimes think I could have lively holidays if I didn’t have that extra payment on the mortgage. But my house is beautiful- it’s everything I wanted. I enjoy it every day.

I have also added about £200k to the value of my house.

now to rebuild the savings 😂

As someone who has had teens an extra lounge should not be underestimated - unless you want to get sent to bed to watch TV

Could you scale down the extension plans a bit, so it wasn’t as expensive?
I think a large kitchen-dining area would be great. I regret not doing it myself, but my kids 16 and 19 now, and it’s not worth the upheaval when they’re likely to be leaving home in the next 5 years. Plus I don’t have the spare cash. But if I had my time again I’d knock through for sure.

What's your household income like? Unclear whether this is a lot of money for you or not.

I have to agree. I personally like a certain amount of rooms I can close off however an open plan kitchen/diner always works a lot better. Buyers (and I) hate closed off pokey kitchens.

Thanks for quoting the OP @Bubblesgun. I'm sure I'm not the only one who had simply no idea what this thread was about.

Do you really think cramped, lonely kitchens with doors to negotiate while carrying heavy, hot things will come back into fashion? I'm sure some people prefer them, but I'd be surprised.

I cant believe the lack of financial knowledge. This isnt money you own you know you borrowed it on a mortgage you cannot soend it as if this is your savings and can see ypu through to the kids growing up. It s way to expensive.

to go in holidays you spend money you have, or like my sister you use your credit card to oay in advance but you can pay your card fully wvery month - she does that for cash flow management, we dont.

but you do not spend borrowed money on a mortgage.

so your only options are to do the extension or repay the money. Think about your future instead of spending miney you do not have