Which of these houses would you pick for your Forever Home?

[TisapityshesaGeordie]

I should start by saying we haven't offered on either yet, so there's a good chance we'll get neither!

We currently live in a small city outside London, and we love it here. DH commutes in daily - train journey is under 30 mins. I'm a SAHM, DD is 5 and at an Outstanding primary school that she (and we) love. DS is 3 and at an Outstanding nursery down the road from DD's school, at which he's pretty much guaranteed a place next year thanks to the sibling rule. We've accepted an offer on our current house, and our chain is complete - they're just waiting for us.

House A is on the outskirts of a different town, about 5 miles away from where we are now. It's huge - 1000 sq feet more than we have now, and their asking price is £15k under our maximum budget. I absolutely love it - it's pretty much my dream house, or as close as I'll get to it in this part of the world with a limited budget. It's on a quiet street near a river and a nature reserve.

However. It's at least a 20 min walk to the station - which is a stop further down the line then we are now. DH's train journey would be closet to 40 mins, and with that and the longer walk he'd never see the kids before bed - which he loves to do. He leaves very early in the morning so is gone before they're up - he'd have an even earlier start if we move here.

The local primaries are fine, so we could move DD - but if we decided not to (because her current school really is amazing), I'd be driving the school run at peak times on a busy commuting road every day - 6 times a day for the first year while DS is at nursery.

The local secondary is Outstanding, and less than half mile away.

A smaller factor to all this is that I'm very active in our local theatre which currently a 20 minute walk away. Moving here would make this much more problematic as DH wouldn't be home in time to let me get away. Other things like play dates and nights out (we don't have many but enjoy them when we do) would be more problematic - although there are plenty of kids activities and bars and restaurants in the nearby town; it's not like we'd be moving to the middle of nowhere.

Have I mentioned it's my dream house?

The other house, House B, is round the corner from where we are now. It's handy for school, the station and the city centre. It's a nice house - very nice - and is about 400 sq feet bigger than we have now, so big enough, but not huge. It doesn't put us in the right place for the best secondarys in the area, but the nearest ones are still good. You'd have to work hard to find a bad school round here tbh.

Downsides are it's right on a busy main road - and round the corner from the hospital, so you'll have siren noise at all hours; has only on street parking (which is always tight round here), and I don't love it. Can't imagine spending the rest of my life in it. DH likes it more though. Its asking price is right at the top of our budget.

Well done if you got through all that! What do you think?

Ugh. I think we're going to end up bloody renting at this rate.

I would sell your house and rent as the market is looking dodgy because of Brexit and you might find prices drop over the next yr or so.

I bet the problems in the street of house c explain why it was marketed in a somewhat unfinished state.

The other houses around are the first thing I look at. There will always be the odd house needing tlc or looking like a work in progress, but if there's a lot of unloved looking houses then the chances are that a lot are rented out or empty and no one is particularly invested in keeping everything pristine because either they don't own the house or don't live in the house. I walk through an estate on the school run and the difference between the ha homes and private lets is quite stark. The ha ones are all freshly repointed with roofs that have obviously had cracked tiles replaced, guttering maintained and so on. A lot have wonderfully maintained front gardens. A lot of the private lets are rotting and overgrown with weeds in the guttering.

No, I understand and sympathise - it is very stressful.

You have absolutely no chance of getting into Sandringham from Francis Avenue I'm afraid.

If you are set on Sandingham for secondary (but league tables change and you haven't even viewed it yet), buy the house on Beech Road.

My husband thinks that's the best one out of my 3, he reminded me of our friends who lived on that road - boy and 2 girls, they all went to Bernards Heath just up the road and then onto Bernards Heath Juniors and then girls went to STAGS and boy Sandringham. You could also probably get Verulam boys from there too.

DH said quite rightly, the gardens are huge and there is Beech Bottom Dyke behind the houses on that side - protected woodland which will never be built on. He said the houses on Sheppards Close are smaller, a bit packed in and less scope for extension and on a hill - that may or not bother you.

Beech Road has the parade of shops at the top, is a lovely tree lined road and you could walk up Harpenden Road to Maple in 15 mins, 10 mins you'd be at the top of St Peters Street so your husband could still walk easily to the station - probably same time difference as now if you are near Normandy Road. You have Bernards Heath and park for the kids too. I know it's a project but look at the positive that it's liveable and you can put your own stamp on it, but if you can't get your head around a fixer upper then fair enough.

The thing is the ideal house - walking distance to Maple, near(ish) to the station and in catchment for good secondaries just doesn't exist.

If you want to get yourself into catchment only for mixed secondaries then you need to change your search and look for houses with a chance of getting Sandringham or Beamount, but it will be tough with your budget. You then have the 'problem' of being miles away from Maple and the station so everyday life at this stage will be rather difficult.

It's difficult to know what to do - renting is dead money, but no one knows what will happen with the market and Brexit and you're probably spending roughly 2k a month on rent so over a couple of years that's 'wasting' nearly 50k.

Even if the market does tank St Albans is still a good investment and it will pick up again, but even in a recession you will still have a family home in one of the prime places in the SE in (hopefully) catchment for your desired schools.

I think you need to redefine what you want a little clearer and then go from there.

Going on what other people are saying, I think you're going too much on this "forever home" shit. Take B as a for 5 years home, and then look for a forever home after that. You can transfer a mortgage, and if you get a good deal now, Brexit may make plenty of houses more affordable in a few years' time...

I don't know why it's "shit" to want to buy a house and live in it. We know there are houses out there that would suit us, as we had an offer accepted on one. Sadly that fell through for reasons beyond our control but I'm not prepared to give up just yet.

It's maybe a case of bad timing now, not only the market conditions, but that the house for you isn't up for sale at the moment.

My comments aren't as helpful as others' because I don't know the area, but what you should think about is that it's very hard to find a house for life. Schools change over time as personnel come and go and finances maybe alter. Your requirements change too as your children grow: the little ones who love a playroom change into teens who want to spend their time in their rooms.

It's a shame if your most recent find isn't in the best of areas. Do local people not think this might change over say the next 3-5 years or so? It sounds like the housing stock is limited and very catchment driven, which might move things along in the upgrading stakes?

Other than that are you relying on property portals or are you actually going in and chatting to Estate Agents? We found one house by virtue of the fact an Agent had got to know us and pretty well handpicked us for it when it was coming on the market.

Tackle it
From a different angle - is your DH able to work from home at all in the week? Perhaps one or two days?

Having just moved to a house on a busy main road I would say don't buy B. I'm sure we'll get used to it in time, but it has made what would be our forever house not and we'll be looking to move again once the kids have finished school.

@cardinalsin I know what you're saying- we expect a house to be perfect enough to live there forever, not just to suit our needs for the next 10 years. BUT stamp duty alone will be 25k for OP, so it really makes sense for her to plan not to move again.

User149blahnumbers gives some very good advice. If you are set on Sandringham make sure you are up to date with their catchment area because I know it's shifted/contracted this year.

Not set on Sandringham. Secondary schools are one of many factors, and not a deciding one.

House A and a bike, maybe a Brompton. A 20 min walk is a 5 min cycle.

It's not shit to want to buy a house to live in but to think of a forever house when your children are still so young and you're in a rush because you may lose your buyer is a bit mad.

Sure it would be nice to never move again but you don't know how your priorities may change in the next 20 years.

I live on a street in the middle of a small town and those people who don't have off street parking have a nightmare. So I'd discount anything without parking.

And if you're thinking of a house for the longer term, you really do need to think about secondaries now - there's no point in buying a house which is nowhere near any schools you'd want to send your children to.

You'd have to work quite hard to find a bad secondary here.

Oh okay. Not what a PP said but whatever. You don't seem to want advice particularly so I'll leave you to it. Hope you find a house that ticks most of your boxes

I asked for opinions on two different houses, then a third, not on our decisions on our future in general. Also, I'm not sure why you're so sure the PP necessarily knows more about the schools here than I do?