Are you happy living in your house?

[pretzele]

I'm not.

I'm very grateful to have somewhere to live but I'm just not happy here.

It just doesn't feel homely.
There's so many problems and worries with the house and it just gets me down.

I've lived her 5 years and never been happy.

Anyone else felt like this and managed to make things better and enjoy being in your home?

we own a semi (mortgage) which we rent out and rent the house we are in as it's a better location for us now.
The house we are in is good location wise, has a much larger garden and it is larger itself but its a typical rented house. Needs a complete overhaul on the inside, floors, stairs, kitchen are all old and dated. It's the type of house that no matter how clean it is it still doesnt look good. Gets me down but generally speaking we are happy here and the rent we pay is a lot lower than usual- we moved in 9 years ago and the landlord lives behind us- never bothers us and has never put up the rent- all in all its a very good deal. The house we own is in and out of negative equity- it was just in positive until the virus hit so no chance really of selling that and buying again for the foreseeable

Yes. Even though it's too small for us really. We looked at a bigger house but I can't move. I've always been a "it's just bricks and mortar", non-sentimental type when it's come to houses but this one just feels like home. We're going to have to build an extension unless a bigger house comes up in the village which is very unlikely

No. Don't get me wrong, I love my house. I grew up in it, inherited it from my parents. The problem I have is abusive family members who won't be going away any time in the near future. I dream of being able to move away, it never matters where so long as I'm a good 2 hour (minimum) drive away from them!

I'm not unhappy in this house, but I don't love it either. It's a Victorian semi, with lovely thick walls and fairly decent ceiling height.

Our bedroom is a great size, but the second bedroom and bathroom are both very small. The kitchen needs a complete make-over, as the hob is in the darkest corner so I can't see to cook without all the lights on, and counter space is limited.

The living room is big and comfortable. I don't like the front door opening directly into it, though, and we don't have a front garden, so it's road, tiny bit of pavement and our front door. We also don't have a private parking space, just a free-for-all mini car park behind the house and on-street parking on a narrow one-way road 50 metres away. There are only 5 windows in the entire house, so it feels quite dark.

Mr Twiglets is reluctant to move, just because he doesn't want the hassle. We've had 5 years here. Do I spend money on improvements like doing the kitchen re-design or getting planning permission to put in a parking space in the yard, which will solve some of the problems, but not all of them? Or just look for somewhere which has more natural light, a parking space, a hallway, a bath I can fit my knees and my shoulders in the water at the same time... :)

I might need to call in Phil and Kirstie to Love It or List It.

Only just moved into my house last week, definitely love it but want a few things to be done once we're allowed to have workmen in and we can go to a sofa shop

Nope, I'm beginning to hate where I live. Currently in a rented 2 bed semi. But it might be due to the fact we were planning on purchasing our first home this year and with C19 forcing lockdown our plans are now on hold, plus we're expecting in October so wanted to be moved by September.

I wasn't that keen on my house (1930s former council house) when we bought it, and I assumed we'd end up moving to a bigger, possibly older, house after a few years. But I ended up loving the convenience of the area, and the local schools and community, so we decided to stay put and build an extension. And seeing the beautiful solidity of the house when the extension was being build made me love it properly. It still needs a lot of work, and the bathroom is minuscule, but now I can see all the things i want to change as enhancing a good thing, rather than trying to make the best of something small and ugly.

Ask me on two seperate days and you will get three different answers😁

There are two of us rattling around in a ridiculously large house and garden, so we decided it was time to downsize.
Problem is, we are both struggling with what downsizing really means😐
I still want my own bathroom. DH still wants his study. I want a room (currently a bedroom here) to have all my crafts set up in, DH likes his workshop.
We like having a big kitchen/family room and seperate lounge for the evenings.

So, we will no doubt stay here. But it is too big. And so the arguments rage on in my mind the fact that we can live quite happily for weeks on end in a motorhome is besides the point 😂

I think I like our house, we moved in January mainly to be nearer to family/friends and work but obviously we didn’t have very long to enjoy that before lockdown. I have lots of decorating plans and just putting our own stamp on the house which we just can’t do at the minute as we need help/workmen.
I just want to put my beautiful lights up in the living room and ditch the hideous blue bulb abattoir lighting they had! I also desperately need to rip out some sliding mirror wardrobe doors and a fish pond! Then I think I will love it here

We are here 18 years (the past weekend was the anniversary of our moving in, in fact!).

It has felt differently at different times over that period. The first night we were here, I literally cried as it poured rain, we had boxes piled everywhere after a nightmare moving (problems with truck, new owners of our old house arriving early, keys being released late by estate agents, promised help not materialising, doing too much ourselves, and then arriving in to find things we had said we did not want (so would not pay extra for) were still here - like the non-working fridge, piles of junk around the house etc, - and other things removed like bathroom fittings literally pulled off the walls leaving huge holes.....and then in the pouring rain in a filthy house with no proper place to sit due to everything piled high, we ended up having horrible takeaway (hadn't found the nice ones yet) and not able to turn on the heat so we were freezing). I really wondered that night if we had done the right thing in moving from a bright, airy, finished 2 year old standard 3bed semi-d well out from city to a grubby and dark 20 year old (then) standard 3-bed semi-d in the suburbs and adding 5 years and €100k to our mortgage. The difference in standards included some levels of finishing being better (so the new one didn't have wind whistling through the walls! and had double glazing throughout rather than rotten pine windows with single glazing) and the kitchen was larger extended out into the garden, but the internal layout was pretty similar.

We immediately had to change the windows at the back of the house for double glazed uPVC, and change the (only) bathroom suite and fix up the walls and tile the room. The rest we did slowly over the years, some ourselves (like sewing interlined curtains for the north facing sitting room with single glazing and very large windows! and a lot of initial painting), and some done by professionals (like building an extension to the kitchen eventually including a downstairs bathroom, and extending into the attic).

Lots of days, I still have things I would like to do to it, and things I would prefer in another house (like a decent sized garden, and a proper crafts room). But it is nice, suits us now, and we generally make it all work around what we need. And the neighbours are great, the local area is good, there are good services and amenities around us here, and it is not a bad commute to work anymore (I can do public transport a few different ways, and reliably, or drive if necessary, not like the old place where I was stuck with a really rubbish and unreliable commute).

I should have added:
We have a nice bright bedroom facing south, which we now have in a lovely colour that suits us. And we finally got decent wardrobes in there 2 years ago.

The spare bedroom is a calm and peaceful blue, which we had re-done a few years ago too. It is currently being used as a spare office space, as we have a "guest" single bed - the 2nd guest bed slides underneath it when not needed so there is space in the room. (Which was very handy when we had au pairs for about 4 years - they had a desk, small armchair, and space to relax away from us, as well as joining us a lot).

DD's room has just been done up to change from a little girls' pastel purple to a teen's aqua colour, complete with decent desk, chair and shelves for secondary school books/work, and a comfy corner to relax in.

The study is compact, but is used a lot for both work and storing craft materials.

We have made the sitting room cosy over the years, getting double glazing, insulating the roof space so the room is warm, putting in a wood burning stove and replacing the internal doors with ones that have a lot of glass to let light through. And we got a carpenter to make proper bookcases built into the spaces beside the fireplace a few years ago, which made a huge difference to the space.

The kitchen is very functional, and work lighting has improved over the years. We now have a small utility "cupboard" housing the washing machine, tumble dryer, hoover and ironing board etc out of sight, and a separate downstairs bathroom including a decent shower. The dining space is comfortable (even if the table is somewhat of a dumping ground), and we have a 2nd sitting space in the extension opening into the garden.

And while that garden is small, we paved the part near the house so it's very usable, I can grow a lot of veg in containers and 1 bed, and we replaced the tiny lawn with gravel a few years ago so it's very functional. There is space around the side to hide the gas bbq when we're not using it, and we concreted in the foot for the pole for the circular clothesline in the gravel which is very practical, but we can cover that foot with the table when we want to take out the line and just enjoy the space. But we also planted a weeping tree near the 12 foot back wall, and allowed ivy to grow up that wall, a number of years ago, so although it is in deep shade, it is a feature in itself and helps the garden feel longer and a lot more lush.

Not really. We sold our house with a plan to briefly move in with an unwell family member, then get their house up to scratch, sell it and buy something together so we could care for them. Family member died the week our house sold so we ended up in their house without them. Not only is being in this house a constant reminder of the loss, we've had to do loads more to it than we realised and now can't put it up for sale. We're trapped until the property market reopens.

I can't get used to the constant noise of traffic, and living in a modern featureless house with no view is very strange. It's also odd because there isn't much point getting involved in anything (pre or post covid) as we're just passing through really. The weight of having no real idea where to live next now we are 'free' is much harder than I thought it would be.

Yes I love my house. It feels airy and spacious because it's sort of open plan, and it's nice and light because it has quite a few velux windows. It's nothing fancy inside, because we can't afford to spend lots on decor, plus I'm always fighting a losing battle against dog and cat hair! It really could do with a new kitchen and bathroom, but it does have beautiful views across the estuary to the Lake District fells.

No. Practical house but I don't like it. Won't invest any money in it. Moving back to my old place that I love when the kids grow up.
l

No, but then we are in the process of moving 🤞

It was our first owned house and we very much bought with our heads. Good price, near station and good school, but it's utterly soulless. The area has zero sense of community, with one or two d heads dotted around. The house itself is just too small and every day I have a few cross words with it Then I give my head a wobble and be thankful that we actually have a home.

But I'll still be doing a little celebration dance when we're in our new house 💃🤸‍♀️

No. I've been keeping an eye on the market ever since we moved in 3 years ago, and as soon as lockdown is over, I'm planning on viewing a few of the lovely homes I've seen.

I really dislike living on a main road with passing traffic every few seconds. When we offered on this house, we were 1 year into our search, and our list of dealbreakers had diminished somewhat. We didn't realise it would be as bad as it is, and I'd never do it again.

The house itself I enjoy, it's big enough that we all have our own space, which we all appreciate during lockdown, however we'd need to move anyway in the next 5-10 years, as we'd like more bedrooms so everyone has their own, plus a spare for guests.

No we hate it. We rent and have had nothing but problems since the beginning.

Had the viewing, house was completely unfurnished including white goods in the kitchen, which was perfect for us as it meant we could have our own. The space for a free standing cooker was there and there was a gas line (perfect as we hate electric cookers). We were told we can have a gas cooker, we got one. Only to find out that when they did the gas safety they didn't check the gas line and it was dead.
We told them this and the response was "buy an electric cooker". We said no as we'd just got a brand new gas one which we were told would be fine and it's not our fault they didn't do their job right. Eventually after leaving us with no cooker for months, including over Christmas, when we have a young child, they finally installed a gas line.

Also there is no form of heating in the bathroom. (Fair enough we should have noticed). We asked if they could arrange to get a radiator installed, they said no. We then said can we pay to get it done ourselves (professionally of course), still no. Also there is no fan. Therefore we end up with black mould all over the bathroom. And it's freezing in winter, especially for ds. They told us to open the window and a cold bathroom isn't their problem (basically they don't care at all).

There has also been damp issues under the windows which we have sorted ourselves. Anytime we contact them they take forever and don't care about sorting things out (and we don't contact them unless we need to, if we can sort the problem ourselves then we will, even if it costs us.

It was only ever going to be temporary anyway. At the time it was the best of a bad bunch.
My husbands has a mate and he knows someone who has a house to rent. It's 5 minutes away from where we live now, and the owner is currently looking for new tenants. My husbands friend told the house owner we are looking and he's said we can have first refusal. So hopefully we can go and view it ASAP, like it and be able to move. It would be ideal. Though obviously not the best time to move.
And there's no way we can afford to buy in case anyone suggests that.

I am now but it has taken a while, first time buyers and this house was all that we could afford, small Victorian terrace. We had a nightmare of a move and found loads of major problems with the house after we moved in which hadn't been picked up on the survey, it was an awful anxious time and I used to cry thinking we we had made the worst decision ever.
But four years later we have sorted most of the big problems and made it our own, it's not perfect but it's an old house and it's mine.

Very happy. We inherited our home from my mil and its perfect. Much bigger than our previous home, nicer area, closer to ds's school, lovely garden. So many positives. We were in our previous home almost 21 years so we were happy but we alwaus knew we would inherit this house. It's a really lovely home.
We're very fortunate as we this is our home but we still own our other house but we have a Tennant in there now.

I love our house. It‘s big and bright with very flexible living spaces. The garden is small so isn’t too onerous to keep up. It was new when we moved in and we added some touches of our own like a big granite breakfast bar and replacing the unattractive gas fire in the living room with a beautiful red enamel wood burner.

15 years on it’s developed some creaks and leaks that need looking at. When all this is over I’m going to employ a builder to repair those defects, spruce it up and then probably settle down to retire here ....and if we are lucky, one day fill the empty nest bedrooms with visiting grandchildren.

We used to love our house, but over the years (24) , the area has gone downhill, it's not quiet anymore.

I know what you mean. I rented a flat that I really liked for 4 years then had to move. I rented a different flat which was much bigger with some garden space for 2 years but I hated it. I never felt at home there. Can't put my finger on it. I bought my own flat last year. Much smaller than the one I hated but I love it. I feel so happy and at home here.

Yes! We (me, DH, DS1 and DS2) finally moved from our 2 bed city centre Georgian maisonette to a big 5 bed newbuild in the outskirts of the city surrounded by countryside in December. I’m so utterly glad everything went through when it did (we’d lost our first buyer in May) as this would’ve been a total nightmare if we were still there. Our new house has plenty of rooms, including an office which was meant for me as I WFH but I’ve been furloughed and DH now WFH. Our garden isn’t huge but it’s flat and clear so perfect for small children. We’re planning to be here until the children leave home so good job it’s worked out as well as we’d hoped

Ours is only rented but it's the happiest home I've ever had! Thanks to DW getting a big (30%) pay rise two years ago. Before that we lived in a tiny 2 bed ground floor flat for years and I was so unhappy there.

Makes me grateful every day to be in a big, beautiful, light and airy home.