Advice about buying and living in a doer upper

[PurpleLeopard]

We have seen a house which we love, but it's fairly close to the top of our budget and will need quite a lot of work. But it could be our forever house so we're very torn about what to do. It's in an ideal location and it has a beautiful big garden too.

So I suppose I'm looking for words of wisdom from people who've been there. What's it like to live in a doer upper before you can afford to actually do it up? Is it awful or do you get used to it? How much of a money pit is a Victorian semi likely to be?

We have. I don’t care about 50’s wallpaper or an 80’s kitchen though. I know the long game and after a while you don’t notice. Not sure I’d do it if we weren’t both very practical and ‘handy’ though.

Oh gosh, I think it’s a money pit and not a good idea with no money. It’s bad enough with what things you know you have to spend on, but I suspect you’ll get a lot of surprises and you’ll really struggle if you needed a new boiler and couldn’t afford it, for example

How bad is bad? Does it need to be rewired/ new windows / new roof etc or is it just that an old lady lived in it and died so just needs new carpets / redecoration / new kitchen and bathroom?

DH is handy but time strapped. I have arthritis which means I may well struggle to do much myself. That's definitely something to think about!

I've seen several relationships destroyed by exactly this scenario. It's not worth it.

How much is ‘quite A lot of work’?! We bought a house that seemed fine on the surface but what lurked beneath told a different story. We got the house rewired (so much dust!) and lived at my Dad’s for a couple of weeks. Organised to get the kitchen done while we were on holiday (but we have a guy who we trust implicitly do the work). It’s hard to live in a house being redecorated. Always assume it’ll cost more than you expected, it will be messier and cost more than planned!

When we moved I told him that I was okay to buy a house that needed redecorating but I wouldn’t get another ‘project’, bare in mind out last place was structurally sound. I just couldn’t do it again.

Shirley the current owner has lived there for around 30 years and to my untrained eye I can't see any major urgent issues.

But he's a heavy smoker which means we wouldn't be able to smell damp and will also need to rip out all carpets and repaint all walls immediately. (We can afford to do this.)

I suspect that the roof will need attention in the fairly near future and so will the windows. The boiler will need replacing. I don't know about wiring but I'd assume that will need to be redone in the medium term as well.

The big projects would be a new kitchen/extension into side return etc, and a loft extension as well. We're not imagining that we'd have the money to do the kitchen for around 5 years.

Have you had a survey?

I wouldn't take on more than redecoration and new kitchen and bathroom idc. What is the scale of the project?

My house is a fixer upper, I've lived here for 6 years.

Basically I would never have been able to afford anything if I didn't go for this one, and while it's still in decoratively poor condition I've managed to do a decent enough job on the kitchen and bathroom and it's warm dry and comfortable.

I had a rough year or two at the start though, having just exited an 8 year relationship and having no spare cash. Living in a small room with the house in bits... It was stressful beyond belief.

We are still in the process of doing this and it’s been about a year and we are almost finished thank god. It was hard at points, not having a working shower or a kitchen for about 3 months was really awkward but you just deal with it. Ours had to be completely gutted from top to bottom, we pretty much lived i n one room for months as it’s just easier and quicker for everyone if most rooms are empty. We did manage to keep most boxes and furniture in the garage until recently which really helped. Don’t quite know what I’m going to do when it’s finished and I actually have spare time again, knowing us probably move and do it all over again. Just beware everything costs more than you would expect, and those little daily diy shop trips really add up

Sounds very like my house! It needs an extension and new kitchen and the whole house gutted.

Currently sitting staring at a massive hole in my wall from where we ripped the fireplace out, there’s also holes all over the place from having the electrics redone, walls are half stripped etc.

You do stop noticing it after a while but then on a down day you look round and think fuck this. We can’t have anyone over or when someone like a parent/sibling comes round you can see them looking round wondering how we live like this. I feel awful for my kids because they can’t have friends round and we really need to watch finances because of everything we want to do.

BUT in the end we will have much more house than we could ever have afforded without doing it this way, our mortgage will still be very small for what we will have and it’ll all be done exactly how we want it so it should HOPEFULLY all be worth it.

I have been looking at other houses though and could be tempted to move if the right thing came up.

We lived for six months in our project house before builder started- we did a lot of deconstructing ourselves, eg wallpaper stripping, removing horrible carpets and rubbing back paintwork. The more we had got done, the more unpleasant it was in a way as it got more and more dusty and building site like. I think we could have happily lived in the house not done up for a year before doing work but we were lucky we could start work sooner than that. I’d say it’s very dependent on what sTate the house is in nd what you can put up with, how long it will take to raise funds for work to be done and how much you can do yourself.

I’d done it and its tough but rewarding.

It helps if you

Know what you are doing
Can do some yourself to save time and money
Have the cash to do things up front and in the right order

I’m not sure if that’s you ( sorry if this offends ).

I’ve done it too many times (and will probably do it again soon). Is the house big enough to only live in part of it whilst other parts are being renovated?
Where will you keep all your possessions as everything will get covered in dust
How strong is your relationship and are you good at team work and putting everything (all spare time and money) into the project?
If the boiler breaks in the first winter would you be prepared to do without because you’re not ready to put the new pipe runs in for the radiators yet?
If the wiring has not been touched for 30 years it might be a fairly urgent job.
The living in it before the work starts is easy, it’s when your living in it and doing the work it gets very difficult unless it’s a big house

OP I love the house and would go for it.

Ours was about 6% the cost of yours

We’ve done it and now about to do it again but even bigger this time.
I have my reservations, mainly because we have a young child now.
It could be a brilliant home for us though and I didn’t want to regret not taking this opportunity.

Mine has sucked up 8 years of my life so far, that’s 8 years of trying to juggle diy (dp does most of it) with kids activities and family fun. We have only ever had a couple of family holidays and mostly camped, it frustrates me on a daily basis that stuff isn’t finished. And I feel like we’ve plonked the kids in front of computers and tellies while we’ve slaved away on the house and I’ve missed so much of their childhood.
Would I do it again - yes if I were younger with a more motivated husband (he hates diy!) without kids. or if the kids were older and independent.
But there are many days where I bitterly regret taking this on, as we had no money to do anything and have racked up loads of debt. And it’s only a 3 bed semi!

In that state, do it.

It's basically beautiful and cosmetic stuff can be done over time.

Ours is a massive state, and I go back and forwards between 'think of the long game' and wanting to sell it and live in a new build!!!

Just seen the photos and it looks perfectly liveable. Just check if there’s an rcd in the consumer unit as if there is the electrics are probably ok. If there isn’t get an electrician to check them and fit and rcd
I usually buy houses with water running down the inside walls so that one looks fine

Oh there’s nothing wrong with that! You can chop the kitchen about to get a better oven if needed, but that’s fine.

Oh you're all talking me into it. I did LOVE it.

But we've never taken on a project house before - it's only ever been kitchen/bathroom and redecoration in the past.

Op that house looks like the kitchen isn’t where you would eventually want to site it, which means you have a working kitchen available throughout the renovation - that would make a massive difference! If you could put loads into storage and work top down - start with the roof, boiler and plumbing and electrics so the bones are sorted - and then decorate top down as you go, I’d say it’s doable, it’s big enough to camp out on the bottom floor while the top is done and then switch.

I think it's lovely and i wouldn't do a great deal to it. Just the kitchen idc and decorating. Presumably the bathroom needs updating.

That is hardly a fixer upper.