Their place is much smarter than ours.

[Diditopknot]

Said by dc after going to a classmates to play.
Aged 8.
It’s the first time at a classmates house.

Our house needs modernisation, painting, carpets and new flooring.

We have had a new bathroom this year, our old one was 20 years old.
Also shelled out £7k for essential outside work in October.
So that’s it for this year. It took me 3 years to save for that work.

Feel so sad that my child thinks this and feels a bit like there’s shame in what our house looks like.

DH wfh, he doesn’t clean much (keeps on top of the washing, does all clubs with kids every weekend) does all school runs and he comes from a poor home ( think Jim & Barbara Royal family house ) growing up so anything is posh to him.
I work 50 hours a week night shifts & day shifts as I’m saving for next year’s inside work.

School friends house is a huge detached house with 2 very expensive cars on the drive. Dh collect dc.
Feels shit to be honest.

It doesn't sound as though your DS views your house with shame; his comment was descriptive rather than value-laden. In general, I think children notice the things that are different from their experience e.g. in my case, it was the chocolate drawer and arctic roll for dessert at my best friend's house but I know my DCs have been impressed by bunkbeds and kitchen Islands in their friends' homes.

For years, we were doing work on our home so friends had to navigate around holes in the floors, unplastered walls and the like but it was never something that stopped them coming over. We've got friends who've been renovating their home for years and my DC seem to be blind to the piles of building materials and tools everywhere, it's a complete non-issue for them. The DCs also have friends with homes (often multiple homes) where the footprint of our entire house would fit into the friend's garage or where our garden is the size of their patio. Both DCs will make an occasional comment but even at 12 and 17 it's descriptive e.g. "the X family have a wood at the end of their garden!". Meanwhile, some of the 17-yr-olds we have over are very kind and say nice things about our home (Victorian style, mid-terrace) even though they have massive homes in conservation areas, with gym/movie rooms,