Which things would put you off a house most?

[blinkowl]

If you were a family looking to buy?

• kitchen needing redoing pretty much immediately
• no shower
• drive not very attractive (OLD!)
• carpets rather than floorboards
• woodchip in kitchen & front room (but not the dining room or anywhere else)

Trying to decide where to spend a bit of money before selling!

The house will attract families - it's a solidly build 1930s ex-council 3 bed semi, near decent state primaries & secondary. Possibly those with not a lot of spare cash as it's in the cheaper part of town!

Our water pressure isn't great, but we've fitted electric showers with a built in pump. They need hot and cold water feed, but they give out a good pressure. We even bought ours on eBay second hand!!

Hard to say... we preferred non-refurbished as we wanted to do that by ourselves, especially the kitchen. What would make a very good impression on me would be wooden floorings. Carpets make the rooms seem smaller and cheaper.

I'm in two minds about the floors. What we have now is stripped but unvarnished floors! We're deciding what to do about them.

The issue downstairs is that one board is broken in the hallway, there's a noticeable hole where there should be floorboard. So if we do the hall, that needs fixing to a good standard. If we just replace the board, it'll be a different colour to all the rest.

Does it look odd if you carpet the hall and stairs but not the front room, dining room and kitchen that run off it?

Having just bought my first home, I actually actively looked for houses with kitchens in a bit of a state as I have v specific taste and when they "weren't that bad" I was disappointed as it wouldn't justify me spending money immediately to make it to my standard/ taste. so maybe just making it as neutral as possible for those on the fence.

Bathroom is somewhere no one really spends alot of time so I always think it just needs to be functional so maybe the addition of a shower would make it more attractive. Such a boring but expensive room!!

Carpets are something I think people expect to replace anyway so I wouldn't bother spending there unless they are really offensive - maybe just a good clean with a rug doctor or equiv?

Woodchip gets a bad wrap, I'd definitely get rid of that. Everyone knows its a bad head to shift so might get put off by the work involved.

Drive is neither here nor there to me, the fact that there is one at all is a mega selling point to alot of people. However, there is alot to be said for kerb appeal.

@blinkowl depending on how thick the wood chip is, you might be able to get away with thick lining paper - either painted if it's covered enough, or papered with a pattern to hide it.

Nothing would put me off as long as the property was discounted to justify the cost of fixing whatever needs doing. I'd prefer a discount and choose my own kitchen - if a brand new but cheap/horrible kitchen was fitted I'd rip it out anyway. Carpets wouldn't bother me either - I'd prefer not to have the crappy laminate that people tend to put down and call "floorboards".

As a general rule I would prefer a property priced to reflect the work that needed doing and to do that work myself. However, whilst I could live without many things a shower would not be one of them. I agree with pp and would suggest installing an electric power shower over the bath.