AIBU to rip out a beautiful garden in potential house?

[Mum2HC]

Looking at new house - only one we like. Owner is an older couple who have spent years creating a garden worthy of an National Trust property!! The issue is we do not enjoy gardening and do not want to have to pay a gardener to keep all the flowers in check. Would it be awful to take out half the gardens flowers and replace with grass? It is 0.8 acre so a very big garden and our children would much prefer all turf to play football etc. It would feel almost criminal to do it but we don't want the upkeep - they also have a large rose garden which we would rather take out and have a vegetable garden. Is this all just too much?! It is the only house we like in our ideal location. It must be a full time job to look after it!!

Well if you buy it it’s your house and can do what you want with the garden

It's your house so you do what suits you but personally I couldn't sleep at night if I did that! Something so beautiful deserves to be treasured, not to mention all the wildlife that lives in it.

It’s not the house for you.

So you don't have time to keep a mature flower/rose/presumably shrubs garden in check, and you don't enjoy gardening, but you want a vegetable garden?

Where are the older couple going? You could offer them the rose bushes and some flowers to take with them

If you put an offer in I would say to the sellers please take any plants you would like for your new home. Tbh it sounds like you’re taking a lot out but if it doesn’t work for you it doesn’t work I guess. I would also maybe get someone to dig the plants out and you could offer them to free outside your home so they could try and be re established. I had some little shrubs I hated and did free to take and were gone so fast. I would check if any wildlife is nesting etc as I think that’s the most debatable thing is disrupting a habitat

It’ll be your house so you can do as you wish but don’t tell the current owners - they’re likely to be devastated.

It’s absolutely not what I would do.

Just buy a different house.

I did this, OP. The garden was stunning in our house and I swear we tried but with two full time working parents and two kids even one weekend missed and it felt like a big job. Eventually it started to look awful (our dog also killed a few plants) so we had the garden remodelled. It works for us as a family now, so so much better, we don’t regret it at all!

Why not just take your time if you buy it? It may be easier to maintain than you think. Give it a full year as is and see how you go. As others have pointed out a veg garden isn't easy to maintain either

Oh please don’t 😢

Thanks everyone, I am not joking when I say it is like a national trust garden. All the beds are 4-6+m deep with just endless plants, flowers, hedges. We just do not have time to keep up with it and cannot afford a gardner. I absolutely wish there was another house but nothing is coming on the market in this area. Ahhh what to do. The current owner have a part time gardener. We cannot afford this. The house isn't massive, just the grounds and gardens are big

Don't tell them that or they won't sell to you!

The garden needs to be liveable for your family so do what you have to do I'd say.
Extend the lawn area to make it more useable, and keep the flowers where possible?

We inherited some thing similar (though smaller!) from our home's previous owners, had to remove the fish pond as we moved in with toddlers😬

We didn't change any of the planting though and I've just run a survival of the fittest policy where the high maintenance plants have died back and the low maintenance ones taken over. Just don't let it all creep over the lawn, keep the brambles in check, and you're golden!

Fabulous gardens look wonderful but they are a lot of work! And if you don’t like gardening it will be a constant irritation. I think replacing half with grass is absolutely fine as long as it’s proper grass and not Astro turf or concrete.

also, an established rose garden is a lot less work than a vegetable garden which is a huge amount of work!

Sacrilege. Find a different house and garden that suits your needs and leave this one for someone who will cherish it.

When you buy it you can do what you want with it - what you could do is ask the other couple whether they want to take any plants with them when they go.

Not everybody wants a fancy garden.

Last Summer we sold our house of 20 years. My dh loves gardening and we thought our garden was one of its main selling points.
New owners moved in and as we are not too far away we soon noticed one of those machine that grind everything up and trees, shrubs etc were all thrown in. It was a bit of a shock but totally their business. They obviously preferred bare lawn and nothing else.
The advice is usually to live through each season first but it's totally up to you.
One thing l will say, in my experience, growing vegetables is hard work and not as easy as it looks. If you haven't done this before l would start with a small patch before l ripped out too much.
Also if l had known our buyers would pull everything up l would have liked to uproot some stuff and plant in our new garden as we were moving to a brand new site. I don't know if offering would upset the sellers too much.
But genuinely it's your garden do what you want.

OP, my last house had a garden like that. It was beautiful but, tbh, I couldn't keep up with it. My NDN did too and were retired.

I'd leave for work in the morning and they'd be in the garden and get home in the evening and they'd still be working in the garden!

Even with a gardener, I couldn't fully keep on top of it because u couldn't afford to pay someone for the number of hours it would have taken.

I still kept some borders but replaced where necessary with lower maintenance plants. But god, that garden was beautiful!

Upsetaboutparents sadly, they're never easier to maintain than you think. If anything, the opposite is true 😞

Yes, it would be ‘almost criminal’.

Fashions and needs change in gardening. You are not taking anything away from the previous owners who were able to create a garden to their own liking.

I have a beautiful garden but it might not suit any new owners. Particularly if they have children. Take it up and make it suitable for your needs.

If you are set on doing this i'd offer the plants on Facebook market place or to the neighbours....Or see if you can find a gardening group who will come and take them.

What i wpuld say is mature gardens often need surprisingly little work and I think ypur approach is too binary (ie all or nothing)

You might find a compromise where you keep half or so.... you dont need 0.8 acres to kick a ball.

Additionally cost / work of removal of 0.8 acres will be ££££££ a gardener to maintain might be cheaper...

I'd get a garden landscaper to have a look and give you some opinions on half way solutions

Edit: if you dont like gardening I'd think twice
... then think again... about the veg garden.

It is a tough one. Can you get a landscaper or horticulturist out before you buy to give you some advice? There is likely to be a middle ground where you retain some of the loveliness, while also making it more practical. The garden is likely to be a haven for wildlife but more naturalistic planting would be lower maintenance and have the same effect. Lawns are great and practical but well stocked beds around the lawned area (keeping what you can) would be even more beautiful. I would also price into your offer the cost of the work to do it properly.

What I would urge is don't do anything until nesting season is over. Wild birds and bees need all the help they can get right now.

I do t think anyone is implying it’s anything to do with the current owners! For me, it’s to do with biodiversity and habitat.

We moved into a house a couple of years ago with a big garden that was very well stocked, the previous occupants were really keen gardeners. We haven't got the knowledge or time so have done very little in the way of upkeep and it still looks good. I would buy it and see how it looks with low maintenance. You might be able to reach a compromise.

It’s a shame but you’re not being unreasonable, it would be your house!