Fallen in love with a house in need of lots of modernisation

[CountFosco]

Help! There are some lovely 1920s 4 bed semis near us that I've had my eye on for an age. One came up for sale so we had a viewing today, no-one else is interested yet (joys of living in the north). It's very competitively price but is currently unliveable and needs a ton of work, there's some damp (a flat roof and some leading round a chimney need replacing and a bit of mildew in a cold pantry) and some cracks which will need some proper investigation plus it needs a new kitchen (unusable at the moment), possibly a rewire (at best some work on tidying up the electrics and adding extra sockets), a new bathroom (and preferably putting in a loo downstairs), and an update to the heating (currently linked to an ancient Rayburn) not to mention a complete redecorate. But it's virtually untouched with regard to all the period features (original parquet flooring in the hallway - sigh!) so with a ton of money thrown at it it could be fabulous. And the others I've seen for sale generally need some work to put things right but at least this one takes that into account with the costings.

So what do we need to do before we put in an offer? A full survey obviously to decide how serious the damp and potential subsidence is, another viewing with a builder to get costs for doing it up and possibly adding a small extention. A chat with architect BIL on best reconfiguration of dining room/kitchen/utility room/downstairs loo. A chat with our mortgage providers to see what we can borrow and how to manage where to live while the work is being done (bridging loan vs renting vs ???). A discussion with an estate agent about putting our own house on the market at a rate that allows us to sell quickly. A chat with a sensible person about throwing all our life savings at a house?

Am I missing anything? How have other managed moving into a 'project' house with 3 primary age kids. We must be crazy right?

It doesn't sound as its as unlivable than in your OP then?

Well having gone round it with a builder it needs more spending on it than Elvis's house so these things are all relative. We've put in an offer of the asking price (builder said he thought it might go for a bit more!) and it's been accepted assuming we can progress quickly enough (they've got another lower offer but I don't know if that will be increased in response to ours). Survey to follow (fingers crossed the damp and cracks aren't worse than we think). We can definitely afford the renovation with our savings (unless we do something daft like put in a £££ kitchen or bathroom) but need to have more discussion about an extension.

Builder's quote was (presumably deliberately) vague about some things that could be a can of worms so a big contingency is necessary, e.g. I told him 'the electrics need checking and tidying up, a lot more plugs, an alarm system and a fire alarm' and he put 'check electrics'. We'll need to specify a lot more on paper before we sign up to any work. I keep flipping between thinking 'we should assume everything should cost double what we think and then add a bit more besides and assume we'll sell our house for way less than we are expecting' which is my work default position and thinking 'it'll be fine and the house will be amazing and I'll put the Christmas tree in this position and I'll have a life like people do off the TV with no work stress, perfectly behaved children and lots of time to entertain friends'. Yeah right. Looking forward to having a big garden, a spare room and a playroom though .

Exciting news CountFosco! Good luck

Best of luck - Just wanted to add my view to other stories, and would echo its been a positive experience for us; we bought a 1940s bungalow that hadn't been touched since the 1940s. We wouldn't have been able to afford the house/area if it hadn't been in such a poor state. We still had to pay an eye watering amount for a small bungalow (we're in the North too!).

We lived with my parents for a while (6 months!) while we re-wired, re-decorated, re-glazed and put in a new bathroom which led to a new boiler being needed also. I'm still living with (and loving) my 1940s kitchen although I've added a massive fridge freezer and rangemaster cooker which I spied on our local facebook page!

One of the posts above mentioned ceiling prices and whilst that can be important for us it was all about finding a home we could be happy in for a very long time (I still say forever!) and we are massively happy. We have grand plans for extensions and the like but need to re-fill the coffers after having spent everything on getting it to where it is at the moment.

Hope it all works out for you

They got another offer from someone who can proceed quicker than us (no chain). Just looked at everything else in our price bracket on RightMove and there's nothing as nice . Our town is a bit rubbish for the combination of 4 bed house house plus garden bizarrely (lots of enormous victorian terraces with a back yard or 1930 3-bed semis with gardens). Lets hope more appear in January.