A rant about how shit houses are

[TheGreatIndoors]

Hello

I don't think I'm looking for anything outrageous but every house I look at has one of these deal breakers:

• No toilet upstairs
• No toilet downstairs
• Not enough space for dishwasher AND washing machine in kitchen (Yes I am British!)
• Bedrooms you couldn't swing a cat in (am I the only person who wants to fit some fucking furniture in there as well as the bed itself?!)
• No parking

This goes for both new/old properties, ones in town and more suburban.

All I bloody want is 2+ big bedrooms (4x4m), living room, kitchen, garden and parking. Having a bungalow would solve the toilet issue but there aren't many round here.

And that's before we get onto things like:

• no space for a proper table to eat at
• garden has been concreted-over
• no window in the kitchen
• open plan kitchen door - I prefer to close the door on mess and smell
• Living room is just a box with no focal point apart from TV hanging on wall
• place is a massive do-er upper or has some hideous damp/roof issue

It doesn't even seem to be a question of budget. Even very expensive houses with way more bedrooms than I need have the same issues.

In many ways, my current flat is actually better. 2 large bedrooms, living room, kitchen (not open plan and has window). The trouble is I have only a shared garden, no parking and obviously stairs to climb.

Fed up.

I'd never buy a new build. Some of the layouts are appalling. I do not want a kitchen/diner/living area all in one room thank you. I want more than one cupboard! I want rooms I can comfortably walk around a double bed in.

All the two beds near me have two toilets, one in the bathroom and one downsrairs with a hand-wash basin - the houses were built around 20 years ago.

Washing machine in the bathroom? 😳

2 or 3 bed.

I want a toilet on both floors to avoid going upstairs during the day/in the middle of the night.

They will have to think more about this stuff as our population gets elderly and is more likely to live alone!

If the poster didn’t want comments positive or negative they shouldn’t have posted a picture, I will say what I like within talk guidelines thanks very much.

Yes. Apparently that's standard in Europe.

I only bought a house once. It was at a time of my life when a lot of my friends were settling down and buying their first properties. The biggest mistake we made was looking for all the boxes to be ticked in one house. In retrospect, the ones who've made the best purchases have been the ones who bought a house with an excellent location and adequate space (indoor and outdoor), and parking where that mattered to them. Pretty much anything else can be altered. I was fixated on having a proper shower rather than a shower over the bath. Turns out it would have been far more sensible to buy the house in a nice location and just put a shower in! I had been renting for so many years that I kind of overlooked the fact that when you own, you can change things like loos and showers and gardens. I could even have saved money that way, because the houses I discounted for not having some of my 'must haves' were cheaper by a margin that would still have made them cheaper even with work having to be done.

I'm in a 1930s semi and it ticks all your boxes.

I also have a yappy, ratty little dog, a baby AND a toddler. Pray for my neighbours!

@hoonicorn I used to have my washing machine in the bathroom when I lived abroad, I cannot explain how joyous it was. It was also a wet room, all bathrooms were, so you could just rinse the bathroom floor everyday. Everything was so clean! (Dw, the washing machine was raised up a couple of inches).

I feel you @TheGreatIndoors about space. We used to live in a large 1 bed flat and now live in a good size 3 proper double bed house (2 4x4 and 1 3x3). We wanted to move to a 4 bed (ah, children) but even if we spent another £200k the house would be the same size or smaller than our current home, apparently that's what an extra bedroom costs round here (no, not SE).

That said we don't have a downstairs loo atm but we are looking to extend we won't get an extra bedroom but it will give us more family space. We have a utility room (it's TINY) but no tumble dryer for a family of 4. (Actually we have one, and can't bring ourselves to get rid "just in case" but we don't use it.)

Hope you find something!

They are not all solid. The 1930s semi I lived in had paper thin walls between the houses and the plaster walls were crumbly.

Yes washing machines in the kitchen are a bad idea. Probably laziness of architects and the need to add extra water supply with decent pressure upstairs.
A lot of British housing is lazily designed and for maximum profit.

My parents' 60s council house has a downstairs loo, huge pantry and cupboard. Lovely big rooms too.

Newsflash: some people decorate their homes the way they like, not to fit whatever the current "fashion" is. We aren't all sheep!

I also think that there is a lack of 2 bedroomed detached houses that aren't bungalows.

There are more people living on their own these days but don't want to experience the noise of neighbours.

Definitely a gap in the market!

Plumbing I guess and tradition! Boring architects.

Yes awful set up! I actually put a wall in between my open plan living/dining room and it's so much better.

We bought our house without a lot of those things. After living in it for 7 years we were able to afford to add quite a big extension and create all the things we wanted.

Sometimes you need some short term and some long term goals. Not everything can be achieved at once if you don't have huge amounts of funds.

Very modern houses have a surfeit of bathrooms but not much else. Could you buy one with an extra bedroom to fit drying in? Or could you look further away

My eldest DD is looking for a house. First time buyer and also finding it hard. Where we are a lot of affordable houses are 1970’s built with stairs in the lounge, which is a nope for her.

A lot of victorian 2 beds are street door straight into the living room. Another nope.

Downstairs bathrooms, not keen.

Must have parking.

Must have a garden for the the dog. Also not a corner plot. We live on a corner and the number of people who chuck their rubbish over our fence is incredible. Big issue because our dog has a sensitive stomach.

Unsure when the building regs changed but new build houses must have a down stairs toilet. So potentially a new 2 bed property will have a downstairs toilet, a family bathroom and an en-suite. Thats a lot of porcelain to clean.

I think it's very unusual to get a 2 bed house with upstairs bathroom and downstairs loo unless it's a newbuild. And 2 bed newbuilds tend to have small rooms.

Basically, I think you're looking for a starter home size with the facilities of a large family home. I suspect the only way you're going to get what you want is to look at an older 2 bed (or 2 plus box) that's been extended to add a downstairs loo.

The lack of space for a dining table and no storage space/wardrobes always frustrates me. And tiny hallways where everyone ends up bunched up and banging into eachother when trying to take off shoes and coats (with nowhere to put them).

Ex-council houses from 1930s-1950s are the way to go.

I've seen a 3 bed lower flat for sale online, built 1950s so big rooms and all on one level...BUT it's all been done up like a new build inside (panelling on the walls, fireplaces removed) which has added about 30k onto the price! Grrr. It's been on a while tho so might go and see it anyway.

I've also seen a terraced cottage which is really pretty with a great garden. Only onstreet parking but again, will go and have a look.

I may end up buying a semi/end of terrace which is 2 up, 2 down and either been extended or just doing the extension myself in due course. (So I have a downstairs toilet)

On street parking only can be fine, depends a lot on the area. It wouldn't put me off at all. Are you more worried about safety or not getting a space? For both, a drive around the area at a few different times should give you an idea what it's like.

A conversion to add a downstairs lavatory in to an existing house sounds like a great idea.

Are you sure it isn’t budget? Because the expensive houses around here have all of that. Or maybe location, DM’s house also has all of that, but is in a village so no space restrictions.

What about buying and extending? That’s what we plan to do, because our living room is small and there’s no downstairs toilet. The rest of the house and the location are perfect for us, you are never going to get an absolute dream house I don’t think.

Sitting in my 1930's house thinking it has all those things and more.