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.

A ‘grand designs’ house all open plan ‘spaces’ and loads of glass.
I can’t imagine we’d ever buy a little cottage with low ceiling and beams as my husband and sons are over 6 foot.
I probably wouldn’t choose a four storey house again although I didn’t hate living in one when we did. I didn’t like having the main living area upstairs though.
A McMansion just because they’re ugly.

Anywhere very rural where you have to drive everywhere, there’s no public transport and taxis cost a fortune. We very nearly did this but being able to walk home on a night out and the DC having the freedom to get themselves to where they want to go is too hard to give up.

Having said all of the above I always said I wouldn’t live on an estate but we moved to one and I mostly love it although I think my house is ugly on the outside.

A house where the only bathroom is downstairs. DS and DDIL have this in their house…going to the loo in the middle of the night is a chilly affair and you have to make sure you properly wake up to go otherwise you risk falling down the stairs! I prefer slipping into the en-suite or bathroom along the landing half asleep so I can quickly
return to my sleep when I get back.

A town house. Or a thatched cottage (but as I have no desire to move to the countryside having grown up in a very small town that's never going to be a possibility 😁)

It’s so funny reading these, one persons hell is another persons heaven.

I forgot to add that I would never buy a house with an open fire or stove etc. I want ease, I want to flick a switch and be warm.

I used to want one until my mum told me that the spiders that live in the thatched roofs are the biggest she’s ever seen. Put me right off.

Anything thats not in walking distance of a decent high street or town centre. I like to go for a walk around town, people spotting a noseying around charity shops.

Also wouldn't buy a new build, a town house or anything on a main road.

A house where the third bedroom is a “box room”

I don't like open plan rooms either. I don't mind open plan from kitchen to dining room but nothing else. I wouldn't buy a property that has a shared driveway or a private access point (that's not maintained by the council) or a flat roof (they need replacing approximately every 10 years and are prone to leaking). I wouldn't want to buy a property where there's lots of overhanging or large trees adjacent or at the back/front of the property (from experience people don't maintain them and they become a nuisance!). My husband would say he wouldn't buy a house, that didn't at the very least, have a downstairs cloakroom, as well as a full bathroom upstairs!

You'd have to be a millionaire to get a house like this in many places though!

Any house in the middle of nowhere or the suburbs.

Terraced.
Front door straight onto street - need a front garden even a small one.
Townhouse.
Open plan.
No parking.
Steps up to front door.
Only one toilet/bathroom.
No toilet downstairs.
Work needing doing except for basic redecorating.
Badly planned layout.
Near a pub.
Not in a city/large town needs to be semi rural.
No utility room.

Open plan. We bought a house last year and EVERYONE asked if we were going to open it up. We're all ND FFS! Smells and sounds need to be kept where they are!

Busy road or near speed bumps.

A new build, particularly on an estate.

Im not keen on ex LA, especially flats or estates. Not because I’m a snob, but because there can be issues if the council decides to repair or demolish the whole estate, with leaseholders taking a financial hit. Plus my political views are they shouldn’t have been sold in the first place!

Having been bitten once before with my old flat, any leasehold property.

Another who would turn down a listed property.

Like others not keen on open plan.

The awful new build estates that litter the country along A roads or on the outskirts of towns.

Ugly, cookie cutter, mean houses, usually poorly built, narrow pavements, no thought given to safe road crossings, no trees, no birds, no wildlife and barely any plants, no public transport, no cafes/shop/pubs/actual sense of place, no culture. The sort of place people astroturf their gardens.

I'd rather live in central London. I might be in a small flat but I am surrounded by mature trees, bushes and can hear the sparrows making a racket right now. Plus public transport, cafes, pubs,.culture, sport, etc.

We live in a townhouse with great insulation and sound proofing so never hear our neighbours. For us if we had to move, I’d never consider an old house with high bills, no off road parking and no garage would be my deal breaker.

When we first started looking for a house, we lived very near a primary school which was hell on earth twice a day so the first and biggest criteria was nowhere with a school within half a mile at least. New builds were off the list until we looked at this one. It’s bigger on the inside than it looks from the outside, has good parking, bloody good insulation, quiet neighbours, two loos, nice big rooms all round and a garden at least 3 times bigger than the house. We haven’t had any major problems and certainly nothing minor that couldn’t be sorted. It’s a 5 minute drive from our old house yet feels like miles away

Yes, i would definitely say that we got lucky with this house!

Townhouses. I actively loathe them. And I've yet to see one with any kind of character.

Also not keen on dark beams.

Finally I'd rather live in a one-bed Wimpy starter home than live in a flat again. Not because I don't like flats per se, but I hate all the crap that goes with them (looking at you management companies 😠).

Other than that...

When we first started looking for a house, we lived very near a primary school which was hell on earth twice a day so the first and biggest criteria was nowhere with a school within half a mile at least.

Funnily enough I can see the primary school on my road from my sofa but, although there is an entrance on our road, fortunately the main entrance is on the next road and no one ever comes down here to park or drop off.

anything on a newish estate
thatched cottage
no parking (or permit parking, or anywhere where it’ll clearly be very restricted)
one huge open plan downstairs so you have people trying to watch telly/cook/read/chill all in one space

couldn’t live in any of the above

A house or flat with stairs.
My son sadly got poorly & left disabled at age 15. Our bungalow gives him his independence back.
If it was just me I'd love a period property with steps up/down to different rooms, quirky features & little nooks.

A house where the only lav is on the ground floor. It's vanishingly rare for me not to need to pee during the night, and it would be a complete pain in the arse. My next move will be to a bungalow or flat, though, so not likely to be an issue.

Also nothing on a main road. In my youth, I lived in a flat on the main road between Croydon and London, and the traffic noise was unbelievable. You couldn't have the windows open, and it was the scorching summer of 1976...

Any new build.

Those new builds houses that are three storeys so tall and thin and tiny garden. And they are 'detached' by being 5cm away from the houses on either side.

Anything that wasn't within walking distance of a train station and a shop that stayed open til at least 11pm.

A 90s mock Tudor 'cottage' which is just a normal red brick new build with fake beams on the front.

A flat with a really high service charge and ground rent and loads of extras you can't avoid paying and then you don't even own the freehold.

Somewhere next door to a premiership football stadium.

Really open plan (seen some on Rightmove recently where the living room, dining room AND kitchen are all one giant L-shaped space which I'd hate)

New build bar a couple of developers

Listed building

Parking at the back, unless it's not a giant faff (I used to have to unlock the stiff damp back gate to get to my old house's back door, which was in the cellar, so a massive annoyance for shopping OR walk 600m round to the end of the terrace to my front door).

Somewhere with a second living room/dining room that's a 'through' room. We had this and it just became a huge, useless corridor we never sat in. Kitchen & diner in one preferably, but if there's a separate dining room then it needs to be its own space and not have doors at either end.

Preferably not with an en suite. I know they're popular now but there's 2 of us, we aren't having kids and we almost never have guests, I don't want another bathroom to clean and it's a waste of space for us.

If I was being really fussy, any semi-detatched where it's not a hall-to-hall layout. Ours has the stairs on the outsides of the house for no obvious reason and it's stupid and noisy.

Those beautiful glass skylight/side return things you sometimes see, like half-conservatory things people do off old houses. They look absolutely gorgeous but I know a few people with them and they're always absolutely filthy on the glass outside and they tend to be in spots that would probably be a pain for a window cleaner and I won't be cleaning them, so no to that.

Small yard garden, main road, victorian terrace. All no from me.