What’s it like to have a new car/kitchen/bathroom?

[Pinkypantspurple]

I just wondered. What is it like to have a new car ? A new bathroom? A new kitchen? Built in wardrobe?

It feels like we have scraped to get married ( tiny wedding ) get out car ( 2013 model). I’m honestly just wondering what does it feel like to be able to get a new bathroom? It’s my dream but I think it would be 10 years on minimum.

We have a 2 and 3 year old. Nursery fees are finally down to £700 for both. We know we can’t afford a 3 bed where we are. So we have a 2. We are lucky as we get buy every month and manage to save £250 .We have no debts . We go on a cheap all inclusive all year and we are happy and healthy

I just wonder what does it feel like to have something new ? Or design it ! I dream
of designing a kitchen.

I think I’m seeing far too many kitchens on instagram and dream! We currently have an undercounter fridge which has been going 10 years. I dream of a big fridge !!

AIBU to dream of having some ‘new’ things which I have picked !!! Oh to dream !

I'm in my late 60s, been married for 45 years. For the 1st time in my whole life, I've now got a new bedroom with fitted wardrobes. It took many years of struggling to pay bills/mortgage, having children, being in debt, before having the money to do things. Kitchen (bought on a credit card) and bathroom are 25 years old.

Get off Instagram

I've never had anything new. Never got to design my own kitchen/bathroom/bedroom. Never had a brand new car. I only really miss it when I'm reading through those homestyle magazines where everyone seems to talk about their remodelling or renovating their houses.

I'm just almightily glad that I have a house and I work around its eccentricities.

I find it quite stressful to be honest - as grateful as I am for the new things I have had in the past.

With building projects there’s always something that isn’t quite right, or not quite how you imagined, or something gets chipped way too soon.

With a new car, the first time another car door gets whacked into it or you scrape it on something is painful.

It's fantastic. I got a council house and they were doing a complete refurbishment programme. I got a new kitchen and bathroom. I later had my own home and fitted a shower room. It's the new skirting boards/window ledge and how clean it all is. It's absolutely horrible to live through though. I was having chimney breasts knocked out and everywhere re-plastered. I got a UTI because of the dust. I'm now moving into a new build.

We're in the middle of having a new bathroom put in now, I'm mid-50s and it's the first new one I've had! I'm very excited by the thought of it, the old bathroom was a hideous dated 80s one so well overdue a replacement. We are very slowly working our way through the house updating things, we've lived here 10 years and have a few more bits that need doing. It feels perennially unfinished!

We bought a fixer-upper because we wanted to be able to afford to do these things. Our house was about £80k less than more nicely decorated houses on our street.

The kitchen had condemned elements and no running water. Parts of the bathroom was 1890s original and the room was riddled with mould.

Designing was fun but also stressful as I’m no expert and there was a lot of project managing and endless emails while trying to do my day job. And they all needed to be read with a fine tooth comb, as randomly things would change when a design came back. (At one point we had a backsplash on top of a backsplash in the kitchen designs…)

Having them both fitted was uncomfortable and probably made worse by the state of the property (plumbing particularly). I think if, for some reason, we ripped out this kitchen it would be much easier to replace than what we started with.

It is really nice to have now though! I think the immediate feeling was utter relief! Especially after living with a kitchen without water and condemned appliances and a bathroom covered in mould. It is also really nice that the design works specifically for us and how we use the rooms.

The process of having a new bathroom or kitchen fitted is an absolute pain in the arse - no toilet other than a portaloo, having to eat microwaved batch cooked meals for a week... I love it when it's done but I hate the building work.

So 25 years ago did you have a brand new kitchen?

I've just had a new en suite & main bathroom fitted - it was stressful, I hated the millions of decisions, it was hard having plumbers/builders in and I'm not 100% happy with the job, small things but they take away the joy...

Never had a new kitchen fitted.

New car - never again. I was so paranoid about denting/scratching it.

TBH when your hard saved for “new” rooms are spoiled by your DC not being careful/mindful it’s very depressing/upsetting.

I has an inheritance, Babylon needed kitchen and bathroom, long after I moved in, upheaval yes.
That was 8. Years ago, they were unfit, love ‘em

We bought a house in an terrible state and did it up . Everything was new and I absolutely love it. It took a massive sacrifice to do it up. We didn't have endless money and so my DH did a lot of the work on the house himself over the weekends whilst I was having a bad pregnancy and so it took its toll but now we live in our dream house (although not quite finished).

I’ve had a new kitchen - bought by a housing association so cheapest if the cheap and fitted by the lowest tender from contractors:it’s a piece of shit. The kitchen in my oarents 1970’s hoise tgat was already there when they bought it in 1972 was better. And no, we bought the house off the housing association.

New car - waste of money IMO

New bathroom - nice but not life changing, unless your old one was truly grim

New kitchen with a good layout, decent appliances and proper storage - bloody amazing

Never had a new car and don’t think I ever will, they seem like a waste of money to me.

I did move into a new build so the kitchen and bathroom were new, been here ten years and kitchen is already falling apart 🙄

Saved up for a long time for a new bathroom and utility room. Cost a fortune, felt so much dismay seeing the money leave my account. Whole thing took 6 weeks, had to shower at the local leisure centre. First week uncovered so many horrors that it blew the budget. Luckily the builders were great, me and DP kept our cool and our sense of humour and we got through it. Absolutely love it! It’s perfect, but it makes my kitchen look a mess. The bathroom and kitchen were new-ish when I moved in 20 years ago. Unfortunately some unforeseen circumstances have committed any savings I can build again for the foreseeable future and I’m not keen on borrowing so will have to live with the kitchen, flooring and garden that I want to redo for a while longer. I too spend too much time on social media looking at the gorgeous houses everyone else seems to have. Maybe they borrow the money 🤷‍♀️

A bit like @ElfAndSafetyBored - you go through a process of designing something and often find you get fixated on something small that doesn't quite work / caused difficulty in the build. I remember having huge days of stress over how to hang a particular bedroom door and whether it was ok to shave x off the top but only y off the bottom and would it look dreadful etc etc - it's been two years and I would never notice the tops and bottom of doors in day to day life but at the time I went down some odd rabbithole and it seemed incredibly important. Pocket doors was another few weeks of my life. The colour of the bathroom grout another. Plus decision fatigue where by the time you need to choose doorknobs etc you can't see straight.

And I am NEVER as comfortable in a new car as I am in a more worn-in one.

But - I loved choosing an expensive tile / bathroom design / plant for the garden when we had the garden designed and landscaped and basically not looking at the price. I liked it, we bought it. I realise that we are very fortunate and I enjoyed that and didn't take it for granted.

We had a new kitchen 28 years ago when we bought the house, the kitchen it had was at least 40 years old. I'm in the thinking stage of another new kitchen so we may get one in a few years. DH just changed the sink and toilet himself and tiled the bathroom, we kept the old bath as it was good and sturdy. We usually buy cars that are about 2-3 years old, never had a new one. Our house is a bit rough around the edges anyway so would never look Instagrammable however many new kitchens and bathrooms we had.

I’ll be honest and tell you it’s absolutely amazing. I could cry with happiness daily. My house is brand new, new kitchen, new bathrooms, new walk in wardrobe, new everything and it’s just so refreshing. I’ve always been super organised and tidy, having a new house makes everything easier too. We also have a brand new car and an 11 yr old car for good measure 😅

Thanks all for sharing! I think a car from 2020 compared to my 2013 would be new enough ! But while mine runs I will keep it going.

I am fortunate that whilst dated our kitchen and bathroom are clean and do the job!
I will possibly give myself a goal of having a new kitchen by 2033!!!!!!!!!! New bathroom by 2035!!!

I might just bloody by myself a new ‘big’ fridge next year ! I’m sure that will keep me happy until I get the new kitchen .

You can get a bigger fridge for about £250 - £400 and have quite a lot of choice if you have somewhere to stand it.

I dont know what to tell you other than youve prioritised the right things (your 2 children!!!)

I would never be arsed with a new car so cant comment..

My new "dream" kitchen actually makes me slightly angry...for various reasons.

It started small and kept going.. in the end it went 50% over the "final" budget.
You also have to make about one million decisions. Not joking which tap, which sink, which way does it open, how high, knob or handle? Arghhhhh

These in and of themselves were so stressful..
our kitchen is perfectly nice but very bland as I ran out of steam so its all quite greige which isnt very me...

Anyway beyond that.... Many of the decisions are inconsequential and one "bad choice" doesnt matter much overall.... but unfortunately for me two decisions i made overlapped and I made 2 x bad choices and that lead to bad outcome and that leads to the anger.

Due to costs spiralling we put in cheaper flooring. I had similar lvl in a previous place and I tested the sample I liked... it was strong in knew the floor would wear well it was cheaper... tick tick tick! I felt good about the floor.
Cool.

The builders asked me did I want it under the units or not. My mum jumps in and says oh no its soooo much better under the units. Okay fine.
Builders say okay and fuck all else until its laid AND the kitchen is on top then say - that's normally only recommended for fully tiled floors not lvl like you have. Whatever. Floor is new it'll be good for years.

6 months on the floor is clearly crap. It looks 10 years old. Honestly...Like utter crap. Damaged warping, the texture holds dirt...
I am cleaning it weekly with a toothbrush

Psychologically i make my peace with buy cheap buy twice...and start saving another 3-4k to sort the floor.

i go get quotes...
But as it LVL flooring UNDER my units and quartz worktop no one will touch it. They are nit confident they wont effect the units.

So now I have a niceish brand new kitchen with fucking garbage floors that look dirty even when clean and used almost every penny of our savings at the time....we are talking over 45k
Gaaaaaah!

Tldr the stress of new and perfect is often more hassle than its worth.
You have 2 beautiful children you dont need a new kitchen that makes your eye twitch!

Edit: Get the big fridge. I had never had one before and WOW!!!! mine really DOES make me happy/ spark joy...!

New car - had once and was mortified at how much depreciation had affected it in 5 years (about £11k) Only nice while it still smelled new. Never again.
New kitchen post divorce move - so nice.
Orher than that I’ve enjoyed buying stuff on Facebook Marketplace and up cycling. I’m a furniture addict and adore looking at all the things people are selling. I did invest in an expensive wardrobe/toy cupboard/pantry about 20 years ago was was painted off white then, with a little key with a lock. I adores it as much then, as I do now, having just moved into my final home for life. So for 25years. If something makes you REALLY happy to look at, and is well made, and you can alter or change the colour of it, invest in it. Good luck OP, your day will come 😊

I put up with our mouldy, decrepit bathroom for the best part of 20 years 😂
Can't deny the new one is pretty sweet.