AIBU to say no to dh dream house?

[BakerBear]

We are first time buyers. We currently rent and have viewed a house today.

Its £300,00 and needs around £60,000 spending on it.

Its a lot of money even though we could afford it. Dh really wants it as its been his dream to renovate his own home rather than buy a home thats already been renovated to someone elses tastes.

I feel that as first time buyers buying a house needing £60,000 on it is out of our depth.

I dont want to live in a bomb site whilst things are getting done and also once you start renovating you can find all sorts of hidden problems.

Dh wants to do some of the work himself but i feel hes too busy with work and then it wont get done but he assures me he will find time.

We will have to get trades people to do some of the work.

There is nothing in the area that needs work doing that is such a big house.

The area if great with very good local schools etc

AIBU?

He could put his own taste on a house without needing to buy one that needs £60,000 (or more?) of work on it.
eg, a house that needs no major building/plumbing/electrical work, but that has tired, dated wallpaper and paint, an overgrown garden, and a kitchen or bathroom in need of a refurb at some point (but that ideally still has a kitchen and bathroom in a useable state for the short term).

As ftb, you could probably add a lot of value onto a house and spend a lot less by looking for a house that needs only cosmetic updates rather than one which needs serious work.

It's ok if you do the full works in one go a la Homes under the Hammer style. It's when people say they'll do it a bit at a time, they tend to lose enthusiasm.
I've just moved into a show room condition flat and said I was going to buy a few bits and make some changes. I've done most but after a while I've just settled in and thought 'I'll do the rest later!'

If you can afford it, and you’re very clear what you’re getting in to, then it’s a no brainer. Do it!

Possibly YABU, but depends on level of work - if it's liveable as is, but needs improving, then live in it for a year while planning the changes.

Yes, this is good advice. (Although we saved up then blitzed it all at once... can make sense to do that if you need e.g. all electricals or plastering done.

Impossible for us to say without lots more information.

Does your dh have any DIY skills or experience (or someone like an enthusiatic, energetic, retired Dad to guide him) ?
How 'affordable' does 'we can afford it' mean'?
Is it a house that, once the work is done, will actually be worth £420000 - £450000 ?
Do you have children or is it just the 2 of you that would be living round the works?
How many hours does he work now - is there time in the week he can feasibly do all this work ?
Does is "need" things before you can live in it.... eg big hole in the roof... or are you really talking about kitchen / bathroom maybe being what might be considered 'old fashioned'?

etc

We did this. 20 years ago. big old house and £10,000 to spend on it. So far we are around £100,000 down and it's still not finished. Yes, you read that right: 20 years!

Just saying.

I think yabu. It sounds like a great opportunity do some research and have a full survey, I bet it will be brilliant if you have a little faith in your DH

How many rooms do you have Gladys!

I know friends whose house has been a work in progress for years, but they were painters, or decorators etc.. so couldn't be bothered to do their own home after spending the week doing other people's.

The big questions are

• is it this actual house that is his dream or any house that needs doing up
• how have you arrived at the figure of £60k
• how much contingency have you got in your budget
• how much do you like dust

In my experience any house renovations cost double what you think initially. Stupid things like taps or door handles cost a fortune and really mount up but you rarely factor them in to start with.

Living in a dusty mess really is dismal.

YANBU. A project like this needs both of you to be fully engaged and determined with no room for doubts. It can be very rewarding but it's also hard, dirty and demoralizing as things do and will go wrong or be more serious than suspected.
Tradesmen, the good ones, are very busy and cannot often commit until months ahead. It takes skill to negotiate and arrange everything and it always takes at least twice as long as you first thought.

You don't mention children or if this is a future plan which will affect your incomes and time. I say this as someone who had a toddler and a week old newborn and we were sealed into the front-room with black bin bags as there was building dust everywhere and not as single room finished. The midwife's face was an absolute picture. If it is winter and cold as well as dirty it's the most depressing experience.

If you do go for it, make sure you have one room that is finished that you can go to for relief. Preferably the bedroom as you can sleep. Depends on the state of the house.

Good luck!

needs around £60,000 spending on it

Who has calculated that figure?

Realistically, if it's old property, you need much much more than any rough estimate.

Often, to do the job you want to do which seems simple and straightforward to you, there are 10 others you have to complete first, that's where all the hidden costs lie and you rarely have the satisfaction of seeing where the money has gone as it's on the parts of the job underneath the finished product. I have 5 layers of building products that cost quite a lot underneath my kitchen floor which will never be visible to the naked eye. You have to be prepared for a lot of jobs like that.

Don't even think about buying it until you have a full structural survey done by someone with an FRICS qualification and have a chat with them about your proposed improvements, ask what is and what is not feasible.

If it's a listed property, any work is subject to lots of rules and regs and you may not be allowed to have what you want.

Renovations have a tendency to take a lot longer than planned and go massively over budget. I'd be cautious.

I am with GladysKnight

We had previously bought 2 properties that had both had big extensions and remodelling. All fine- basically rebuilding.

Then bought a house that just needed renovating

Spent about £60k when we moved in- kitchen- rewiring-decoration- removing 1960s fires etc

10 years later. Still not done- money pit. Now needs new central heating and the windows are ongoing- another £40k to finish them etc.

I grew up on a building site, self build project. Family serial renovators and doer-uppers.

£60k as a guesstimate sounds like too much work for a first project for me. Renovating on that scale takes energy and consistency. It's not something you can just do bits of. Does your partner have any construction or diy experience? Do you?

I echo what others say about living on a building site. It takes a certain kind of approach and a certain set of skills I think. Some people thrive on it.

The project I grew up on was bigger than yours, but it's telling that when as an adult I told my parents how it was inspiring to see what beauty they had created, the thing that they were most proud of was that they were still together & still friends with people they did the project with.

We are not handy, and so when house buying turned down a couple of places I would have loved to bring into life because we didn't have the skills, money or time. Also if a house has been neglected, add on another £5-30k in impact of delayed maintenance that you only discover once you've started knocking stuff down...

However we ended up with a house needing pretty much completely redecorating with some minor structural things. About our speed, but just to illustrate here's what we've spent in the last few years that we thought we'd need to spend:

New bathroom £5kish
New exterior doors front and back £2100
Skim 4 ceilings and hallway to cover artex £1200 (mate did for us)
Redecorating £2k (had to buy tools, includes materials
Carpets and new floors/sorting out subfloor £2k

That's £12300 just in cosmetic type improvement, nothing structural

We also discovered in the course of decorating/improving:

• pinhole leak in water mains under house. Got free repair at first then second repair paid instalments. £800 odd
• ridge tiles hadn't just slipped and we could defer work a bit, actually missing one. Lift and rebed, £1600
• left off when gas works carried out. Reconnection free, our awesome gas guy £200 for associated work

Associated disruption with some of above fairly major: digging up flowerbeds, no cooker for a couple of weeks etc

And that's a house that we assessed as not needing too much doing to. To be fair what we've spent not wildly outside my estimates but I've got a resource of people who can cost stuff fairly accurately for me!

I would consider very carefully...

Could you afford to keep renting for say 6 months and get trades in to do most of it for you? Because I can see that the idea that your DH is going to do it in his spare time just isn't going to be realistic especially when you are living in it.

We did it.

NEVER AGAIN.

Having said that, it really depends how much work it needs to be livable, is there any odour, damp issues etc.

Paint some walls and replace carpets? Fine.

Replaster everything including ceilings, replace kitchen bathroom central heating? NO. DON'T DO IT.

Do you see it as a forever house?

We have done it three times - against my wishes - and (very luckily) sold the properties for a good profit, so we now have a much bigger/larger house than we otherwise would. He did some work himself and managed it all. I still regret it though, as it was a lot of stress, money, time (that I'd have preferred to spend doing other things) and relstionship problems: wouldn't recommend it to anyone if their heart isn't fully in it.

The latest project cost double what DH had guestimated.

I have told DH never, ever again.

The latest project also affected one of our DC badly: the mess, changes and much less time with DH for 6 months or so unsettling and upsetting them.

The fact that you havent had a survey done or know how much one costs really jumped out at me. How do you know £60k will sort all the issues if you havent had a survey done?

If its near great schools and has the potential to be a lovely house i would say go for it - but only if you know exactly what youre doing or it could be a disaster.

Also a bit worrying that he's telling you he'll find time - in my experience this is often not the case, and in the end you just get used to being surrounded by building stuff

Yes and years from now y0u will be on mumsnet complaining that your DH has still not knuckled down to it!!!

"I feel that as first time buyers buying a house needing £60,000 on it is out of our depth"

It isn't if you can afford it and you both like decorating etc.

I've inherited my Mother's house. I haven't got a lot of spare money. You need lists to work out what order to do things.

Word of mouth, I got an electrician (require). I found a good all round handy man, plaster, fill, decorate. So my living room, hallway (I was sick of looking at it) was done.

The bedrooms were sleepable. I'm having help in the garden. If I watch television, I watch garden design shows, Homes under the hammer and Big house, Little House.

Before Christmas I will have Two bedrooms done to a clean blank level. My Bathroom plan has had to be re-budgeted, but will also be done before Christmas. But that's a major point, will your DH be willing to scale back his plans, if necessary and keep an eye on cost?

Next year I'm putting an extension on, so I'm living with a just-about-adequate, cooking space.

Watch Big house, Little House. The point Aidian Keane

THe point Aidan Keane makes is that there has to be a point to the renovation. It either makes you money, or adds quality to your living space.

If you couldn't buy the equivalent house that you will finally have, for the same money, then it will be worth it.

Do you share the same tastes? Is another big question.

Personally, I'd want to know that my 1) bedroom, 2) bathroom, 3) kitchen, 4) sitting room were going to be done within 4 months (a month a room). I'd want reassurance that if they weren't done in a reasonable time I could get tradespeople in without an argument. My oh wanted to paint our house when we moved. Every single room and hall needed to be painted. He works full time and had an active social life and hobbies. I pointed out that if he did a room a month it would take nearly two years versus getting a painter in for a week while we're on holiday for £1000. We did the latter. Treat this like a job proposal and get estimations from him, I. E. Get him to really think it through.

No. You'll be living in chaos for years.