AIBU to think my small family doesn't need a bigger house?

[Izzasaurus]

I'm annoyed with myself for even posting this in a way because I shouldn't need to ask. I know plenty of parents who seem to give their children wonderful childhoods, despite not having much money and living in small flats or houses. I also know from personal experience that growing up in a big house with a big garden is zero guarantee of turning into a confident and mentally well-adjusted individual! (although the garden was very fun).

DH, toddler DD, DDog and I live in a small 2-bedroomed terraced house with a little grassy garden. We like it. We are also mortgage-free.

We've thought about moving somewhere bigger because we both got promoted at work recently and suddenly find we are in the incredible position of having a lot of spare income. Our own house wouldn't sell for much (possibly not much over £110,000) but we could upsize a lot without too much pain.

On the other hand... we're settled here. We like the area. We have enough room to entertain the local family and friends who we care about. We could put some of the extra money into upgrading our house and making it nicer, and have a lot to spare.

Ok, DD will never be able to have a double bed, an en suite or a big trampoline and climbing frame, but does she really need these things? Wouldn't she rather have a good university fund / house ladder fund for the future, and the chance to have lots of cool holidays and experiences? Parents who can afford to cut down our working hours a bit soon so that one of us can be fully present with her after school each day? Plus there are lots of lovely play parks nearby and we go a lot.

I have a few friends and family members who reckon DD will be embarrassed by our house one day and will want more space. They act like I'm depriving my DD of a better future by staying put. I also suspect they look down on where I live. (Quote from one: 'I couldn't live like that'.)

Equally, I very much hope not to raise an entitled brat who judges value by house size, and I don't like the idea of buying into a sort of competitive house-upgrading culture now just because I can when I've never been interested before when I couldn't.

We have a sofa bed in the lounge for guests and I don't get why a family of 3 people need a bunch of spare rooms.

YABU - get a bigger house

YANBU - stay put

There is a middle ground - you don’t need a massive house with many spare rooms but perhaps a size upgrade from where you are for the future might work well.

Not for impressing anyone but yes, as they get older they want peace, my girls want double beds, they want a social space away from their parents (and you away from a bunch of cackling teenage girls!).

We also both found the best flexibility for being there after school meant working from home and you need space to do that (two spaces in diff rooms for us as we’re both on the phone all day).

I don’t give a shite about what others think of my house but do care about it being functionally big enough for my family. And from what you’ve said it isn’t a choice between a slightly bigger home and e.g. holidays or university.

You came to the wrong place to ask. Here, everyone will tell you that if you live in anything bigger than a garden shed, you’re rolling in it and are ungrateful for wanting more space. You’ll get their backs up for having spare money.

Kids don't care about stuff like this i had a tiny box room as a teen and loads of my friends did to its amazing how many people you can fit into one it never effected any of my friendships

It’s amazing how much space people think they need these days, we have a childless couple who’ve just had their forever home built and it must be 5000- 10000 sq ft. It’s absolutely massive. I can’t get my head around why two humans need that much space.

Enjoying a simple life is my goal!

When i see big houses all i think is i really wouldn't want to clean that or how much that must cost to heat or id be scared to be alone in it.

I like having a cramped house as it's a great excuse to say "sorry we don't have room to have X over". It works the other way....mortgage free too.

I enjoy the space all to myself with 4DC and DH.

Everyone has different priorities. I’m in a small house with 2 older kids and quite happy. They do accumulate more stuff as they get older though and wish we had more storage space. That said, if staying as you are means you can travel, give dd a house deposit and just enjoy life, that would trump having more space for me too.

I am in the same situation.
We have a lot of disposable income and our morgage is under 500 per month. We go on amazing holidays about 4 time a year plus UK breaks.
We decided we need to move to a big house so our son could have a big room, we put a lot of effort into prepping our house to move and now we are hesitating big time, it's up for sale but the thought of doubling our mortgage payments, more gas and electric, council tax....is it really worth it....not really.

My son has sleep overs, friends over camp outs in the garden (we have a big lovely garden thankfully) and all his friends like us so they don't really hide out in his room much. Also when he has someone stay over we take them out for the evening to jump360, out for tea etc so they aren't 'cooped up'. We do this because we have the spare money to do it which we wouldn't have if we had a bigger house.

Our house is pretty clean and clutter free to I think that helps a lot, anyway if you don't want to move then absolutely don't, life is for living, not sitting in a big house with no money to spend.

I'm still undecided if we will move or not, it bothers me slightly that people might think we don't have much money but we travel all over the world so I think they can easily see we have money and where its being spent!
Great quote-
"Buy the £20 purse to hold £2000 rather than the £2000 purse with only £20 in!"

I’m all for financial stability, but this does sound needlessly small. If your daughter can never have a double bed, her room must be incredibly small. That means no sleepovers, when she’s grown and comes back to visit, no partners could comfortably come.
I think there may be some compromise in your thinking.

This kind of makes sense if house prices don't increase that much - but I bought a house in a high growth area of London for slightly lower than market value. In two years the price has increased by £100k. My equity in investments would've made a max of around £20k. So it's very area dependent

We have two children, so a bit different, but we moved from a very small 3 bed terrace that we’d paid off to a larger house and an additional £180k mortgage. For me it was important that my kids had space to be creative - we have lots of art and craft materials, musical instruments, books etc. We have space for DC’s friends to come over and play, sleepovers, a dining table for big family Christmases and birthdays.
Having said all that, those things are my priority. I would rather have a crowd of people around a Christmas table than a holiday. I would rather DD has space for her drum kit than a new car.
We still have enough left each month to save for university, that was factored into our calculations, after that we will be saving to help DCs with housing deposits.

There are many many positives to being mortgage free, especially once you are in your 50s+ and it gives you a lot of freedom from having to work relentlessly until pensions kick in. However, I would say (also as a 3 person family) that once your child becomes a teen they will naturally want a bit of their own space. In small houses this has to be their bedroom. Which means they are sort of hidden away. With somewhere a bit bigger you have room to be together but not on top of each other which I think works well with a teen. Its more sociable IMO once there are 3 adult sized people around. Also means you can maintain no tech/phones in their bedroom which is healthy.

You have a toddler...you really don't need to be worrying about study desks and sleepovers for another 10+ years. It works for you now...stay put if you are happy. Bigger houses = most costs, more time spent cleaning etc.

Our bedrooms are small and if our teen has friends over, they have the choice of taking over the sitting room or the kitchen/living room. We leave them to it.

You can always move in 10 years time.

I would love a garden room tho...

Could you stay there but extend? Maybe a garden room?

No way - we own our home, a tiny 2 bed end of terrace with a sloping but lovely garden (sucks for pools, trampolines etc). My daughter (7) has a lovely room but it’s also 2x2m. We think about moving occasionally but she’s happy at school, has great holidays, we can afford it very comfortably (although do have a small mortgage), and she invites her friends around all the time. Lots of her friends are in rentals, some in big blocks of flats. It’s not the kids who are embarrassed it’s the parents (wrongly might I also add!)

I thinks it’s very sensible not to upsize just because you can but I would be considering your dd’s situation when friends come round when she’s older. My kids were really appreciative of the fact there was enough space for them when friends were around, especially in their teenage years.

There’s no rush so stay until it’s more obvious if you need to move.

Nobody really know though how big this 2 bed house is.

There are 2 bed houses and there are 2 bed houses.

A 2 bed with decent sized kitchen, separate toilet and bathroom and large garden >>> one with micro bedrooms, a combined toilet and bathroom, galley kitchen and a yard not big enough to swing a cat in.

Your home is my ideal dream (currently trying to sell my small flat!) and its price even dreamier

Personally I would move or go into the loft if possible to provide your daughter with a bigger room as she gets older.
We had a 3 bed, with 3 children and pets etc when everyone was small it was perfectly fine and seemed like although 2 kids were sharing there was enough space for everyone.
Now they are older, want friends around and physically take up more space we did a loft conversion and put an en-suite bedroom up there for ourselves and then allocated the rooms based on age.
The relief of not having 4-5 13 year olds under foot when the eldest has his mates around is great, until they descend for food and then I love to have them all around the table.
We did look at moving but it was far more economical to extend upwards, by the time the youngest gets tired of being on the box room, the eldest will probably be living independently so we’ll reshuffle the room allocation.

I don’t think I’d move. Your current situation sounds pretty perfect to me.

Only move for better school catchment and larger garden… but if you are happy there, don’t move.

Neither choice would be a bad one tbh

But that’s irrelevant- you clearly want to stay put, so I think you should do that.

It's not as though you couldn’t change your mind later if you wanted to.

You can’t understand that people like and want different things to you? How boring life would be if we all aspired to be the same.
Our house is vast, you definitely wouldn’t approve, but it’s where we choose to spend the majority of our time and our money. It’s fantastic for entertaining, the entire family and our friends can all come and stay, it makes me happy just being in it.
l have lived in extremely cramped housing. Given the choice, it’s not for me.
But, if where you live works for you and your priorities, why would you move op?

Stay where you are and you can spend the money on nice holidays and you can do some home improvements aswel, thats what I would do anyway