To ask which property you like more?

[PeachFam]

It's a tricky one. Trying to buy our first home after renting. I'm scared and want to make sure we make the right choice. Haven't viewed the houses yet but can't help looking at the listings.
I want your honest opinion and why you like/dislike them.
About us: couple in their late 20s/early 30s. No kids yet but potential start thinking of having kids in the next couple of years. Location wise both houses are perfect. Please MNers I need all the help this is already so bloody stressful :(

I much prefer house 1 size and decor but wouldn't buy a semi so I'd opt for 2 and do it up to my taste

House 1 is great. Retro and not over looked plot wise. The fake tudor frontage on house 2 is utterly cheesy and there’s no privacy in the garden.

Love the grey kitchen

Buy the house with the most room to grow that you can comfortably afford. Moving because you’ve run out of space when you’ve otherwise settled into an area is a bummer. Adjoining garages make for easy conversions into games/family rooms when your family grows.

If I could afford it I'd go detached. Even if the existing neighbours are lovely, they could move! Once you've had awful neighbours you'll happily sacrifice a bit of floor space to not share a wall with another family.

The semi. The space flows better and the bedrooms are better proportioned. You have space for a study or eventually a playroom off the lounge and space to eat, in the kitchen. None of the bedrooms are too small for a single bed plus storage. Massive garden, compared with the other. Far more future proof.

No kids yet but thinking about it in the next few years, get a detached 3 bed!

In your situation there's no way I'd choose a 4 bed semi over a 3 bed detached. (You may be able to tell I'm still recovering from my last shitty neighbours!)

Number 1 depending upon survey - mostimportant thing you can spend money on is the most detailed survey you can get, then find approx costs of any work the survey brings to light. Really.

I think House 1 flows better than House 2. I get more of an idea about how a house works from looking at the floor plans and imagining walking in and what I would do then. What a guest would do walking into the house, too. How the children would use the house. Look at the floor plans and imagine walking through it and how you would get from front door to garden and so on.

Good luck. House hunting is quite fun, I hope you find somewhere lovely.

Number 1. Much nicer finish

Aw that sucks that the one I found is on a busy road. Didn't realise don't know the area. Nah not good with kids.

number 2, but mainly because i don't like number 1's kitchen.

If you’re thinking of starting a family, consider local schools, childcare providers and a playground in walking distance.

House 2 is closest to a school with poor Ofsted grade and two others, one of which is oversubscribed.
Don’t underestimate the pain of school runs in the near future!

Nice flat garden, dropped kerb and parking for two vehicles all good.

Just don’t do what the neighbours have done with their house front round the corner! (See photo attached).

As for house 1, it’s opposite a large green area ideal for building new housing on...

I don’t know much though, been renting forever. I’m nearly 50 now and will never afford a home to buy. I’m amazed that ‘starter’ homes are over a quarter of a million now.

Not read whole thread. But house 2. It's properly separated from the street with decent space at the front, so it's much easier to get deliveries left in a safe place. This sort of thing makes such a difference to convenience and time whereas the other differences are largely cosmetic.

Schools' status can change remarkably over the course of 5 or 6 years. OP doesn't have kids yet. You might move near to an outstanding school but it deteriorates. (One in an area I used to live, a well to do area too, has gone downhill massively in recent years to the extent that it was in headlines of local news.)

1 is much better overall rooms, sizes etc but the exterior isn’t as nice.

I think if you can afford a detached house, you should buy one. They will increase in value and you won't have the worry of nuisance neighbours in the way you would if your houses were attached.

No 1 is lovely. Don’t like the outside but inside it really nice

House two all the way!

Wouldn’t cost much to sort the garden out, I’d go for the space in 1 and factor in a couple of grand to sort it once children start walking.

The council would never give planning permission to build on that green space, Green. The owners of the existing houses would all go apeshit at the very mention of it.

house number 1 fronting a main road but quite far back wouldn't bother me, as by the looks of it you would mainly use the back for coming and going, and there is a nice looking cul-de-sac for the community feel.

and the pin in the map is on the wrong house BTW.

Property number 1 is the oldest, has awful concrete tiles on the outside, dose not have drive in access or parking from the front and is on the village rat-run. If it were anywhere else on the estate and detached I'd say it was the better house, but the garden is tiny and I hate a shared carpark.

Property number 2 is on a less busy road but is near the end of it and is very close to the roadside. The garden is very small (as typical for this age of house). It does have off road parking for one car.

Property no 3 is very close to the primary so you'll have people parking outside your house twice a day in termtime. It does not have an ensuite. It is detached and there is potential to extend over the garage into a nice 4-bed with an ensuite. The rooms are a decent size and it has a utility room. Ensuites are good but a family home with a separate space for laundry is such a nice thing to have. It also has off-road parking for two cars (check that the kerb has been dropped all the way across). I'd go for house 3 on paper only because of the potential.
You won't know until you visit them all.

House 2 because it is detached.

Oops, I'd got the numbers the wrong way round. Was voting for house 1 but hopefully the reasons made it fairly clear

Hard choice, I like the inside of house 1 and the garden but not keen on the look of the outside (front), love the kitchen.

I like the outside of number 2 but it looks smaller inside and the garden looks tiny.

I would probably chose number one for the space and the kitchen.