Has anyone bought a house that their head said no to?

[weedonleg]

Following on from the 'has anyone bought a house they don't love' threads, I'd love to hear experiences from people who have bought houses that on paper aren't right, but that there was something about them that stole their heart.

Because I think I'm about to make an offer on a house in that category!

The house is:
smaller than our current house (about 2/3 of the size)
a semi (currently live detached)
below budget (sounds great in theory, but we were hoping to use this (work relocation) move to 'gear up' on our mortgage)
on a busy road
no hallway
impractical kitchen
would need the bathroom relocating
has rooms sized such we would not be able to fit in some of our furniture

The house obviously has lots of benefits (chocka with period features, very bright, has a lovely 'feel' and truly stunning gardens/paddocks/views) but.....my head is saying NO!

The consensus seems to be it's possible to regret a 'bought with head' purchase, but is it ever possible to regret a 'bought with heart' purchase??

We went heart over head here and have not regretted it so far. We both felt it was like home in about 10s flat when we walked in. We might live to regret it though, for reasons too long and recent to go into (nothing to do with the house, more location.)

We've looked into relocating our bathroom and were quoted between 5 and 6k to do so.

The house we are in now was a heart over head house. Granted mainly DP's heart so I agreed poor thing has been dragged through the ringer of my property addiction for years.

Its a lovely house but the head problems were

1. We paid too much, and then it transpired we paid too much at the very wrong time
2. Its a town house, which is nice and quite quirky, but not very practical for us.

But we are happy enough here, and DP in particular so thats nice, and I am about to start a major 'make it my own' also known as throw good money after bad project since we are stuck here now for at least 5-10 yrs. I can't develop the house which is what I usually do, so I'm just going to chuck a whole load of money at decorating, flooring and new bathroom and kitchen.

I'm shaking my head at myself as I type

Next time we are doing it my way - head buys heart develops it into a home!

The house we are in now was a heart over head decision. It was twice the size we were looking for, needed total renovation, had various 'issues' that were putting off other buyers for good reason (damp, etc) and made my dad go very pale and silent when he first came here. It is also in the wrong location.

Six years on, I am desperate to move. I still love the house. But of all those reasons to not buy it, the one that has turned out to be the real killer is the bad location. The rest was all fine.

What I am trying really, really hard not to do now is to move from what is a great house in a crap location, to another great house in a different crap location, because I so easily fall in love with pretty historic gems and start trying to convince myself the location doesn't matter. But it really, really does and I MUST listen to my head this time.

What age are your kids? Because as they get older space is much more important. We bought a house that was small and it really does become a big factor. Now moving to a bigger house but it has taken 2 years to get to this point.

Yep. Knew I was an idiot about 4 months later. Sigh.

Yes. Two years ago we were in the process of selling our much loved but too small / too impractical / in a not-so-nice-location Victorian semi and bought the house we are now in.
This house is a 1953 semi, 3 decent sized bedrooms, long driveway, garage, backing on to a lock of the local canal, in a desirable village. It was a big step up financially and on paper ticked all our boxes and more. Dh liked it instantly, I was not convinced (even though I had shown him it on rightmove)

The house was firmly stuck in 1970 so needed gutting and we radically altered it, changed the layout, new kitchen, new bathroom etc. I kept hoping that once we had put our stamp on it it would feel like home.
But it doesn't. And I don't understand it. It is a great house in a great location. It was everything I dreamed of when I was in my impractical Victorian listening to the locals stumbling out of the nearby pub and into the nearby takeaways and then come streaming past our house shouting as they went...
But, sigh, I miss that house.

Having said that, living in this house is easy. It is very practical. It is much better for the dc. And I am grateful to live here. But once the dc have grown (currently 12 and 9) we won't be staying here. I will be holding out for a house I love...