To move from a detached house to a terraced house?

[Choccitystoppity]

Bought first home in an acceptable, but not ideal, area. It is a detached house with a garden. However, have come to really like the area and local amenities! Plus now have lovely friends nearby. But, schools are only OK, and that is becoming more of an issue as my kids get older, and the area is a bit deeper in the suburbs than….
….a terraced house that I like that has come up for sale closer to town. Has no garden. Our preferred schools are in the area. Better transport links. Closer to family, but would have to start over again with making local friends.
Both houses are 3 bedrooms and not hugely different in size.
WWYD?

Everyone is different! We have our reasons for being much happier in a detached but it works for us (my daughter is autistic so is outside all the time and struggles with noise). I have lots of friends who live in flats and are equally happy with being more central or having a smaller mortgage etc etc. We also have friends who left the city entirely and live in the middle of nowhere and are delighted with their homes.

We personally use our garden every single day, whatever the weather but you’ve tried it and it isn’t the same for you so maybe you’d be happier with a smaller bbq area and less to deal with.

I think terraced or a semi are both fine ,IF you have good NDN. if not you are in for a whole new world of pain! And having no garden is not great either .We dont use our large garden very much.However it is lovely to look at ,and the dog can just go for a wee /sniff whenever she wants .If you are worried about the schools, then maybe some tutoring would help?We had one for our DS to help with 11 plus He didnt get in ,but it still helped with Maths, and he passed that part just not the English.Has MSC now though so must have helped!

Not a chance. I live in a corner terrace, have done for over 20 years. In that time I’ve had several neighbours. All of them have caused me problems in some way. Usually with parking and loud music (one corner has no garden or off street parking and they usually have 2 cars plus visitors). One was horrific with loud dance music all day every day he was home (so about 18:00 - 01:00ish weekdays, all day weekends), I could hear in every single room of my house. I complained to EH and got a punishment hour every day from 10pm to 11pm after that. This was the guy that would constantly block my drive and when I complained would sit outside my house and rev his engine most mornings to presumably try and either wake me up or just piss me off. Thankfully he moved for a job, and had managed to piss off a few neighbours.
Then there’s the smell of pot and in the summer about 2 or 3 people playing music in the garden (always a joy having to listen to several different songs at once - not) along with the occasional being loud and obnoxious the drunker/more drugged up they get.

Do not under any circumstance downgrade from a detached to a terrace. You are in an envious position to many. As for schools, you can potentially get tutors for certain subjects etc if you feel they are lacking in some way? That is what I would do as there’s no guarantee the”better” schools will always be better or not have a toxic bullying environment etc.

I wouldn't move to a house without a garden.
Even if you don't use your current garden a lot, having it affects the experience of living there, the general ambience and sense of space, light and air around you and how you occupy the place that is your home. And growing children may change and want to use a garden more, for privacy or escape from the house and family or to socialise with friends. Terrace plus no garden risks that hemmed in feeling.

It would be sensible to look for another house nearer to town and family, depending on finances but might be an end of terrace or semi with garden or outside space.

What's the difference in schools? How are you measuring "good"? Do you kids have good friends now that they would be going to school with? Are you just basing it on Ofsted - if so, don't. Ofsted is a load of political nonsense and doesn't actually tell you anything about the school. I say this as a former teacher. I think if your children are happy and settled with good friends then I'd stay put.

I have only had one decent neighbour that was years ago, we're still friends, but she wasn't attached to us. I got sick of music,parties,war games, screaming kids, our last house,we had a terrible job to sell because of the weeds one side and rubbish in the front garden the other side.

If your eldest will be 12 when you theoretically moved, surely you’ve missed the boat for places in local schools? Often they are over subscribed if they are good and there will be no places so he/she would have to go on a waitlist? You could spend all that money and move and NOT get a place at the school which is motivating your decision.

Funnily enough we found our second house harder to compromise on. When you're a FTB you're expecting compromises and for us there was a sense of it only being for a few years. Whereas the next one we were signing up to the compromises long term (and there are always compromises unless you have a stupendous budget.)

I agree with PP, I rate ORP very highly. But location location location also important. What you've given us are tangible disbenefits if moving Vs somewhat intangible benefits which is not really a fair fight from a distance. But for you living it, it's different.

Re secondary schools they should all have open days in the summer. Go to them all and make your own mind up. Schools can turn round very quickly and what suits one child doesn't suit another. Data can be deceptive, eg lower attendance figures can be a mark of how they manage to keep struggling students and support them, rather than a trusting problem.

I grew up in a terrace and it’s fine. I like a bit of street life though. Where I live now, deep in the burbs, sometimes it’s like post zombie apocalypse and I’d love a bit of normal human noise!
OP I think location is paramount. If I could go back I would have bought a smaller house/ garden in a more interesting neighbourhood.
And schools are so important.

I'm in an end terrace , 3 bed high ceilings good sized yard but I would still prefer detached. No problems with the one neighbour I have but would be nicer not to have any attached..also high ceilings make heating bills very expensive. I wouldn't move from detached with garden just for supposedly better schools - no guarantee your children would get in, and no guarantee that they would fair better there than any other school

We moved from a detached house with big garden to mid - terrace house with tiny garden (no lawn, all planted so no outdoor space to play,). No problems with it because kids didn't use to play in big garden. We have a big park near our house and we prefer to go out to play. No issues with noise in mid -terrace either. Mainly because detached was very old house and current terraced house is about 20 year old and has much better indoor space.

So neither lack of garden or terraced is necessarily worse if area is better and house is nice and it works for you.

I live in London & would take a terrace in a good location vs a detached in an area with bad schools & further out. I would also always prioritise schools.

would struggle without a garden though

In general for me personally, a terraced house with no garden would be my absolute last choice. I don’t like the thought of being hemmed in on both sides, and we love our garden, we have a dog and a daughter who both use it daily to play, plus we like to potter out there, have bbq’s, sit out when we have good weather etc.

There is only one set of terraced houses I’ve ever seen that I would potentially move to and those are a little way away from us, beautiful houses, they do have a small yard but they are opposite a large field/nature reserve, so I could put up with no garden as I’d have that literally on my door step but even then it wouldn’t be my first choice.

Exactly what we had and we only had one adjoining neighbour!

So I should have probably stated a few more things from the outset (but was trying to avoid boring everyone with too much detail) but I now realise that these factors are important to the discussion:

• We live overseas so housing stock and parking situation is a quite bit different from UK.
• Current detached house is older (renovated), but has no garage. Has parking off the street, but no covered parking.
• Terraced house is newer build (about 25 years old) with double garage. Apart from the garage, the house itself is about the same size as our current home, but we would gain a large garage by moving to the terrace.
• Being newer, terraced house is well sound proofed (as much as a terrace house can realistically be).
• Older home has character (with its associated pros and cons), obviously newer home does not (also with associated pros and cons).

Given they don't play in the garden & the new house would have enough outdoor discs to sit out, then yes, I'd sacrifice detached £ garden for better schools UF they will (as you say) definitely get in. Plus for the teenage years being somewhere walkable/with good public transport is so good for them.

Dont get me wrong. I wouldn't want to jive up the garden or bring detached. But what was best for the children would be my priority.

We moved from a mid-terraced house with a small garden near the town centre, to a semi with a very large garden a bit further out, and then to an end terrace with 2 parking spaces at the front and an even tinier garden at the back but with room to sit out, closer to the town centre. Our fences are high enough that we are not aware of our neighbours when in the garden.

We were happy with every move, and as our children get older it’s good that they can walk into school and into town. We’ve always had quiet neighbours, though.

In your position, to a soundproofed house with fewer maintenance issues, I would move.

I moved from a large detached to terrace and have nicer neighbours and noise is not an issue. I moved for school (sixth form, and we don’t live near the school -45 by tube - but we lived 70 miles away before).
Location trumps house but I would want a garden.