What type of house would you never buy?

[PinterandPirandello]

Just looking at a thread where properties are being recommended for £750k. One of the houses was completely open plan downstairs which we would hate as a family. Dh likes to sit at the kitchen table and have the radio on (loudly), dc like to game and I like to watch telly in peace. Plus the dishwasher and washing machine on. So we prefer at least a couple of separate rooms. However, I can see open plan could work with small kids but I’d still want private space.

One of those back gardens that endlessly borders other back gardens with trampolines over every fence.

Tragically this is where I find myself at the moment. It wasn't like this when we moved in, but a couple of drastic changes on either side have ruined my garden vibe.

I'd rather have a little courtyard than something big I have to maintain but that I don't enjoy being in.

Anything all done up. Could 100% guarantee it wouldn’t be my taste, but I’d feel guilty chucking out a perfectly good grey kitchen or bathroom.

Oh, also, on principle I will not look at a house with more toilets than bedrooms.

@Womaninhouse17 Thanks for the heads up!
If I win big on the premiums I shall buy one and sort the heating and glazing out, solar panels, underfloor heating , the works.
I saw a house on Right move once, 60's era , really quirky and it had a decent size indoor swimming pool a couple of steps down from the sitting room.
Could you imagine living there with children!

Or when the upstairs space doesn't match downstairs such as a 5 double bedroom house with two ensuites, and yet downstairs only has a living room and a modestly sized kitchen/diner!

Firm no’s

• No driveway
• No side access to the back garden
• Fully open plan (happy with a kitchen living diner and then a seperate living room)
• Only one toilet

Would Try to avoid

• townhouses (to many stairs)
• semi detached/ terraces (fear of bad neighbours) however it is very dependent eg theres a rural sandstone semi which a friend lives in and the walls are about 1/2 a metre thick therefore noise isn’t an issue
• small garden
• on a main road
• multiple small rooms, i would rather less rooms but larger in size

ideal criteria (i can dream 🤣)

• rural
• good views not over looked so ideally onto woods/farmland
• detached
• parking which doesn’t require one behind the other
• kitchen living diner, seperate living room, downstairs toilet, utility room

My neighbour is a builder and they struggled to shift a refurb they did turning a bungalow into a 6 double bedroomed house with a single open plan space downstairs with a utility.

Four of the bedrooms had ensuites, but only one was a decent size bedroom. The main bathroom was a bit puny. Given the prevalence of WFH, a smaller bedroom upstairs and a snug/office downstairs would have made it so much more liveable! And not so many bloody en suites.

No built-in cupboards would be definite no for me.

Sounds very like my house but an upgrade in terms of bedrooms and space, and exactly what I'd be/ have been looking for if I'd decided on more than 2 kids. Reckon you'll be ok.

😱😱! I could never live anywhere if I couldn’t open the windows!!

A dd once shared a flat where her room had triple glazed but fixed, non- opening windows. She absolutely hated it!

Yes, big mistake to buy one. Insurance is crazy expensive. £1600 min for a three bed detached

I agree. It's like some weird dystopian future. I would feel suffocated!

DD lives in such a house, ditto DS. They don't let it spoil the house, both are in conservation areas. DD has a garage in fact, but it will only hold one car so the other must go on the street, which is a nightmare - has taught me how to parallel park in small spaces (big car).
DSS has a house with room for 4 cars, he still ends up parking on the street and so do visitors - and there is a cricket ground nearby; murder in the summer.
So I would not let parking drive my choice if I liked the house for other reasons because other factors may end with you parking in the street anyway.

Anything all on one level, unless I absolutely had to for health reasons. Sleeping on the ground floor feels wrong and I think going up and down stairs is good for you.

I don't like sleeping on the ground floor.
Bungalow legs too.

Alack a day, you don't know what you are missing. And much of it you can find on YouTube. But horses for courses, of course. I like the Rolling Stones and Velvet Underground as well as Bach. 😃

Semi detached, terraced etc

Also need outdoor space

Bungalow legs is NOT a thing.

@godmum56 , it's not an official health condition but not using stairs can lead to weakening of the muscles that are used when going up and own stairs.

Beams and a spiral staircase, no central heating.

A New build.
any house that was on a street where because house prices in the area are so high everyone on the street has scaffolding around them so they can have a loft extension.

We're currently in a mid terrace with no drive and only on road parking which is a fucking nightmare and yeah, never again. Getting out as soon as mortgage can be renewed in Dec.

How interesting that people are against open plan. All my friends have had their houses ‘knocked through’. Do you think it’s going out of fashion?

not at all. We've had posts how it's out of fashion and nobody likes it since the dawn of MN and it's going nowhere. People are different and there are plenty who love open plan.

I live in a thatched house, can't say spiders have been an issue at all.