Tell me i am utterly barking for wanting this house

[EdgarAllanPond]

oh you beautiful thing

it is 1) at the top of our current budget for purchase, and to afford the renovations we'd have to sell my parents house and live on site with my parents until sufficiently good to mortgage

2) a listed building so not cheap or easy to do (even given potential funding)

3) no second property, even if you got permission to convert the barn (haha, listed building permission and planning permission) then my folks would be living in the yard....not the 'two clearly separate houses' we were hoping for (have been living in parents house 8 months now...gngngn)

4) i think the walls are allowing damp to blow through, and the brickwork is part of the listing....house opposite was rendered prior to listing for probs this reason - roof will also need felting at least, presuming the timbers are ok..

5) DH would have to quit his job to renovate it, living by himself on site (until we sold parents house) then get another job in order to re-finance with a mortgage once reasonably complete....

6) chance of getting planning for running small van site/ glamping site (to fund me being a SAHM) near to virtually nil even given the pleasant 5 acres attached

basically i need Mumsnet to tell me all the woes of listed buildings, planning, and that actually it isn't that nice.....and we'd probably enjoy ourselves more in a leaky shack burning money to keep warm....

or one of you should buy it so it stops tempting me :)

(off out to shop, back in an hour or five)

[Retroformica]

There will be other properties. Where do you work? How far can you travel?

[onedogandababy]

Ah, it's not a 'major' road, but it is very straight and is a 60 limit, so quite a bit of overtaking and quite a lot of speeding...

[MoonlightandRoses]

You could always homeschool...

[EdgarAllanPond]

"Gorgeous spot but BIG movement. "

aha, well that saves me checking that one out then. wher eit says coyly 'signs of historic movement' i imagine cracked ceilings and marginal leaning that can be corrected (or may not even need that) - but actual subsidence is somewhat scarier.

[EdgarAllanPond]

"if it looks like a Reno project and it's for sale to the genral public - it means it was too much of a PITA project for a pro to take on"

last year plots were coming back on the market (i saw a good few part-complete projects, or land with planning) to fund cash flow for developers, this year they may be seeing things pick up hence higher prices on plots and fewer cropping up than last year..

i think owner-occupiers can apply a different logic as if you intend to live in it long enough you don't have to think too much about problems in selling it on - timber frame property is no less nice to live in, but as it's not mortgageable developers always have to think of demolish and rebuild as only option... the brick place with subsidence on the other hand you'd probably be 100% right about though....

[EdgarAllanPond]

that Bridgewater one is amazing - checks loads of boxes - local school looks a bit pants.... >sentto DH

[EdgarAllanPond]

onedog aha, that's the kind of local knowledge i like, i don't want a house that near a major road if possible.

[bluelighthouse]

It looks beautiful, but you clearly can't afford to do
It without putting your family under strain.

[CelticPromise]

It's beautiful and it looks like it could be amazing. I've got no experience of renovation so can't comment on that. But DH and I did choose between two houses that really was a head or heart choice, and after a big wobble at first neither of us have regretted choosing head. It's made so many other aspects of life easier.

[TheWookiesWife]

the key to any property is if it looks like a Reno project and it's for sale to the genral public - it means it was too much of a PITA project for a pro to take on ... so you'd need to be Donald Trump to take it on -ie minted !!! and you would spend more than the end value. ie loose money on it !

IMO there's more of these properties about on the market at the moment - as developers are taking less risks now as the market has changed somewhat .

[SoupDragon]

usually plots of land with planning permission around the 1 acre plus size are almost as much as one of the renovation projects listed above....

Realistically, the "renovation project" with the boarded up subsiding farm house is probably just a plot of land with demolition costs.

[SoupDragon]

I thought of this last night as I watched last week's Renovation House. They had a complete nightmare - caused because they didn't have a full structural survey to be fair. Every time thy stripped off blown plaster, they came across some other problem. IIRC, their budget tripled. And it was over £200k to start with. For a 3 bed semi.

[flow4]

Goodness, the EA hasn't pulled any punches, eh? All its problems are revealed in glorious technicolor in those photos.

Except that's bollux, isn't it? When did you ever, ever know an EA advertise a house honestly, warts and all? If it looks this bad, just think of all the problems it will have that you can't even see!!

[racingheart]

That house is the stuff of my nightmares. It will snorkel up your money and leave you constantly cold, feeling grubby, with stiff necks and chills from the drafts and in filthy tempers with each other because you are tired and unrelaxed and wretchedly poor and see no end to the renovation.

And it's in a windswept exposed area with a ruler straight road that cars will roar down. So DC can't roam wild and free while you replaster and rewire because they might wander onto the road.

Please step away. Buy somewhere welcoming to live and live in it.

[onedogandababy]

Op, I drive past this all the time, it's right on the road, maybe set back by 20 feet. It's a long straight road and traffic will be going past at 70mph. No pavement, no verge to walk along either.

It is lovely though. If I was richer & it was off the road and wasn't listed, I'd have it!

[watchingout]

I went to look at the Mere one (limpers Hill) yesterday Gorgeous spot but BIG movement. There was a privy leaning in towards the house, while the back of the house was falling off towards the privy. Like there was a big sink pit underneath

Also a line being drawn in posts across the plot implied the owner was going to keep a bit for another development next door.

[MoonlightandRoses]

I'm in the 'let someone else deal with the heartbreak camp'. How about this one?. Yes, 50k over but looks as though less renovation, not listed, closer to civilisation of some sort going by the map and on 11 acres...

[EdgarAllanPond]

" Maybe they would take a reasonable offer?"

I was wondering that. but then i was wondering about the whole reality of what would be reasonable, and what we'd be taking on.

the comments on here seem to indicate 'nightmare money pit with ghost problem'

[EdgarAllanPond]

Why don't you buy a plot of land and build your own?

usually plots of land with planning permission around the 1 acre plus size are almost as much as one of the renovation projects listed above....

certainly in sussex they are. Wiltshire/ dorset is new search area arisen from the drunken realisation that with our house sold, We Can Live Anywhere (Warm).

what i was hoping for with the timber-frame bungalows with land is to get planning for an additional house on them (in which case we get two houses to our own spec at much lower cost) obviously you can't be sure of getting planning, which is why I'm looking for one with a house on them already, and at a low enough price to still have the option of buying the second house elsewhere....finding houses with 1 acre+ in the £325k bracket is hard work. rare as hens teeth.

[pingulingo]

I've seen that house (and the state of the attic room) before, so has def been on the market a while. Maybe they would take a reasonable offer?

[EdgarAllanPond]

mumaemma that's a nice one >sends to DH<

though they've had a weird rising of optimism in upping the price by 25k, and have an uplift clause on the garden...

[EdgarAllanPond]

clara the timber frame ones are cash buyer only too, however i do wonder with brick built houses where the line lies on that...

[Ilanthe]

Edgar, with the best will in the world what you describe as good quality bodging isn't good enough for a listed building which I think you realise. Plenty of people don't realise and that's when problems start. You need the right people as well. I live in a bog standard 30s semi and turned down one roofer who gave us a look when we said we wanted clay tiles (like for like) rather than concrete. Imagine that 100 times over as you try and find someone who works with lime, handmade bricks, etc etc etc.

That last one is a demolition and rebuild job. You'd only get 30% extra floor space granted, not enough for your needs I don't think, let alone any accommodation for your parents. Plus if the movement is due to underground shafts or something like that (probably not, looks like dodgy foundations to me) you'd never get your investment back.

[Crumbledwalnuts]

Why don't you buy a plot of land and build your own?

[noddyholder]

Bodging it won't do it!