AIBU to buy the horrible house next door

[thegreenlight]

We live in a lovely (but small 3 bed semi with no scope to extend) next door has just come on the market - it’s horrible having been rented out by the guy across the road for years and he did the work himself. Our house has an extension, downstairs bathroom and utility. Next door has none of this but massive scope to extend to the back and side. We have never done a renovation before! Do we offer to buy directly from the owner and pay asking (it has been put on sale this morning through a local agent) what should I do? We LOVE our area but can’t afford a ready renovated house. It would mean a real dip in living standards while we do the work. Any advice? Am I being stupid!?

Good luck

Do it! Yes, it’s a pain living on a building site, but it’s so worth it in the end to have it exactly how you want it and, with the right builder, it will cost less than buying a ready renovated house. With the right contract in place and decisions made BEFORE WORK STARTS (cannot tell you how important that is!) there is no need to go massively over budget. But if you decide to go for it, start another thread on how to find a decent builder. Lots of people on here can help with that.

Don't know the layout, so not sur eif this would work but could you look into buying some of the land from the neighbour house to extend your current property?

@thegreenlight

We’ve been told by the EA that our house is worth more than we thought - he’s saying £320k. We’ve said that we will sell through them and they’re coming to view today. He said he has 12 viewings booked today for the other house and it only went up for sale at 7 this morning .

All those people will be interested in your lovely done up house too in same location.

I voted YANBU but that’s before I read that you weren’t combining the houses. It sounds like way more hassle (and cost) than it’s worth so would just look to upsize properly if you can.

The costs of this extension/renovation would mean that if you can’t afford an already done house, you can’t afford this either and would have a huge amount of hassle too.

I'd approach the owner to find out if, now that you both know the value of the property, whether they would be willing to sell to you without the involvement at this point of the estate agents.
If you could manage to stay living in your current house while the renovations would happen, then that would be best and then when your new home is ready for occupation, you could sell the current house.

Would that be possible? You would have to ask the seller to accept your offer and remove the house from the market immediately, without letting the other potential buyers view the property.

@thegreenlight
Will you have to sell your house first before buying next door ?

You might still have a chance Op.

A lot of people might be put off by the work that needs doing..

Best of luck to you.

Yes those people looking at the house will probably look at yours too (you can pick your neighbours!).

I’d definitely do it, but I’ve lived in a half renovated house for years! It depends if you are the type of person that can cope with things not being perfect for a while!

And jeeze the start of the thread was hard work with people not reading the posts!!

It’s livable currently but has a tiny kitchen. I’m concerned what we would do for cooking when the whole back of the house gets knocked out!

Having done just this a few years ago you use your microwave and wash up in the bath! It's doable and so worth it in the end.

Another experienced renovator here.

You think before you start that the very polite and tidy builders will do one or two rooms at a time and you can live in the rest of the house whilst you make them cups of tea.

The reality is that the entire house will be turned upside down, dust and mess everywhere. Not one room will be nice. Most will be barely habitable. The gas, electricity and water will need to be off, sometimes for hours/days at a time. Even if your builders are gems, they will be stomping around your house singing and whistling along to their obligatory radio turned up to max volume.

You will have no kitchen for months and will be camped out in another room cooking in a microwave and washing plates in the bath.

It will cost you double your worst estimate.

I'd do it again, but I'm weird in that I enjoy it.
Oh and you have young kids! OMG!
Very best of luck!

If your local property market is anything like ours, this probably won’t even be an option. They will only let proceedable viewers view, it will go to best and final offers and sell 10% above asking price to someone with no chain.

I think having read your updates, you might be better saving the moving, buying, contingency fees and waiting for a 'done' house to come on the market. Unless you've got somewhere you can go during the worst bits, friends in the trade and a good contingency.

We lost the use of the back garden for a year and that was hard. We spent a lot of last year with plywood tacked over the back of the house, constant trekking in of dust and sand, losing electricity and water randomly... and we kept the original kitchen in use till almost the end - so only had a few days with no kitchen.

With two small children? Absolutely NOT.

Do your due diligence before you commit.
Do any public services cross the property? We discovered a public sewer (the pipe had a massive diameter and was for the school behind us and due to the lie of the land ran under our garden and perpendicular to the street rather than under the middle of the street).

Go for it!

I thought this was a crazy plan. Too much uncertainty and your pockets don't sound deep enough for the project not to drag on for some time. Now you mention your oldest has autism I think the plan is even crazier. Too much disruption and uncertainty for an unspecified length of time.

Having lived in a house with young children through several major building works, I'd say it's not undoable BUT I wouldn't do it again in a hurry.

If you have £100, 000 equity, why not look to buy a better house in the same area, maybe adding more to your mortgage as well? Or have you already looked at that?

Ok so the max price difference between your house and the one for sale is 320-285 is 35k.

Some of that would be swallowed in fees etc so you are left with 25k. Are you planning on taking out a mortgage because the equity you have will be going surely into buying the house next door.

In order to get what you want I think you need at least another 75k - which (having just borrowed it) is another 500 a month on top of what you have already.

Do you have that?

@thegreenlight

We are two 30s semis. It would be selling ours which is decorated to a lovely standard and buying the one next door and living in it while we renovate with a 4 and 9 year old! Is that insane?

Omg don’t do it

Also I'd grieve the old house so wouldn't want to see it everytime I went out! We moved to a much nicer house 10 or so years ago but only 10 minutes walk from our old one. DH walked past and saw them ripping out and changing stuff we had proudly put in - we had to avoid that street for a while.

We have done it. Make an offer and get some quotes for work. It’s not nice living in a building site. Timing wise do as much as possible over summer months.

Bear in mind if you don’t buy it you will be living next to a building site.

We've done it 4 times and 2 of those were with a young baby. Yes it's stressful but you get a home how you want it at the end of it.

I know someone who bought the house next door , go for it