3 bed house with yard...v....2 bed house with garden

[oliveoil]

What would you go for? We are sick of just having a concrete yard and living on the main road BUT our house is lovely and big (for a 3 bed terrace lol) with high ceilings and big rooms etc.

However, to move to a better area with garden, we would have to down size to a smaller house.

I think the garden thing is pissing me off as it is nice and sunny at the mo, doesn't really bother me the other 85% of the time when it isn't.

Will I miss my roomy house? Or will my girls want a garden when they get bigger?

could you go to a less expensive area and get both?

Can't you make your yard nicer? like this?

personally i'd go for the smaller house in the better area, but the garden wouldn't be a huge issue, if there was decent green play space close-ish by

Tricky... we're in a similar situation - end of terraced 3 bed house but no garden, just a yard.

I think I'd move to a smaller house to have a garden, but it'd have to be a 3 bed smaller house! I wouldn't sacrifice the third bedroom for the yard, but I'd sacrifice size of rooms, if that makes sense!

bk - not really, I don't like where I live and the nicest bit of it is more expensive and that is where I want to be

www - if my yard was that big I wouldn't be bothered, it's v small! But yes, we could do more with it.

We don't really need 3 beds as the girls could share and we are not planning anymore.....famous last words.

To those of you with gardens, how often do you use them? Am I just like this cos of the sunshine?

i think it's just cos it's sunny. I've got a nice sized garden now having not had one for many years before we bought this house. It's great in this weather but tbh how often is the weather like this? 90% of the time I just look at it through the window. As long as you've got somewhere to sit ie yard, then I'd prefer my indoor space to be my priority.

all year really
football net etc

We have a medium sized, south-facing garden for a house this size, we use it LOADS and LOADS in the summer, out there pretty much all day. In the winter obv we don't use it so much, but it does still get used prob once a week/fortnight if the weather is dodgy

We have just moved from a Victorian 3 bed end terrace with lovely high ceilings and a yard, which we'd prettied up but which wasn't very child friendly. Our new house is a few miles away and not in as sought after area, but the area is very much on the up (I actually prefer it now!) but does have a medium sized garden which we have been in nearly every day for the past few weeks...
Much as I miss our old house and it's huge rooms/sweeping staircase/cellar I don't miss the traffic noise and the new garden is an absolute godsend....OK so a brand new house is pretty featureless but so convenient and easy to maintain when you have small children...

Traffic noise, yes that annoys me as well , I hate my house, have decided. Pah.

Ahem, anyone want to buy a spacious 3 bed terrace with paved outdoor space, centrally located ?

Think I will go and have a look at some houses and see.

remember to call your yard an 'easily maintained garden'. whenever we looked at houses with these they were nearly always yards. sounds nicer tho!

it is very easily maintained, just give it a sweep!

www has got me thinking though about sorting it out and making it better, anyone got any website tips?

I'd definitely go for the garden. My kids use ours all year round, even when its freezing they love being out there all wrapped up.

Or 'Mediterranean style, courtyard garden' bonniej

We've put a couple of garden benches in ours (it's tiny, by the way!) and have done a couple of pots with flowers in and it's looking tons better. We've also got a v. narrow border on one side, so we've planted a few bits and bobs - jasmine and other stuff (dp's the gardener - don't ask me!!). We've also put hung some nuts out and have got tons of birds visiting - I know this sounds silly, but it makes it feel more garden-like, and ds's love watching from the kitchen!

I have moved from a 3 bed semi with a HUGE garden (over 120ft long and wide with it) to a terraced house with a courtyard garden (or yard ) I do think the kids miss the garden a bit but tbh i dont miss all the tending to and mowing etc and it is quite nice because they seem to sit outside and colour (we still have a sandpit and small trampoline and kitchen play thing in the garden, plus a table and chairs and a rabbit hutch)

dunno really, a third bedroom is usually more useful than a big garden

oh i dont know, i am undecided, not much help am I??

any good? I wouldn't swap a bedroom for a garden either.

Message withdrawn

What is a yard?

Can;t you dig up the concrete and turf it? Then plant it. Hey presto, garden

I must say our garden is fairly small but I would never be without one. It is so lovely to look out on greenery and watch the changing seasons. True too that although you may not use it year round it makes such a huge difference in the summer to fling open the doors and eat in the fresh air and when the weather is like this you basically have another living area rather than a bedroom which you only really use for a few hours each night. Only works can put your children in the same room tho. I would definitely opt for the garden.

how small is small? in feet or metres??

it is amazing what you can do with a small space

we have a smallish garden and big house and I wouldn't swap for the other way round ..because I'm not a sun worshiper there's enough room for a paddling pool and sand pit and slide and we're 10 minutes away from 3 parks

Yards are called "patio gardens" around here! We moved from a 3 bed terraced house (originally 2 bed but we converted the attic) with yard last year to a 3 bed semi with a garden. We're about to convert the attic here to make it 4 bed - so much cheaper than buying a "proper" 4 bed house. I must admit I LOVE the garden - we have a small conservatory and when the weather is bad I sit and watch the weather, when it's nice we live outside. I got so sick of having to do the park thing with my children (boys now aged 11 and 6) when they were little, so when I got pregnant again I just couldn't bear the thought of another toddler without a proper garden. DD is now 2 and she spends hours in her playhouse or sandpit, the boys have a climbing frame and a very basic swing on a tree and we sit on the (proper) patio and watch them. Could you go for the 2 bed with garden then maybe convert the attic if you really needed another bedroom as your girls grow?

How big is your yard ? We had an apartment with a small terrace - about 12*6 - while ds was aged between 3 and 6 and until dd was almost 3. Moved to a larger ground floor apartment with garden last summer and it has really made a difference to them as we can have outdoor toys and they can dash around. The garden will be a compromise when we move back to UK as ours there is tiny compared to what they are now used to but it will be higher on the priority list when we decide to move on again. Yes, you will miss your roomy house but think your dd's would benefit. It could be somewhere to invite friends to play as they get older and perhaps you could find somewhere to extend in time to give yourself some more room.

It is small, sort of an L shape...maybe 20 foot at the longest bit? Bit hard to guesstimate, will have to get my tape measure out.

Know what you mean about the park sunnydelight, I hate having to heave the double buggy there.

snort at CD not knowing what a yard is, how the other half live, heh .

We are not thinking of moving till early next year when we have tarted the house up a bit, will see how we feel then. But I think a garden will be on my hit list.