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Original poster

Did you love the house you bought when you viewed it?

88 replies

cooperbug · 05/10/2020 20:50

We viewed a house tonight which my husband really likes and to be honest I thought I would really like it too. I don’t love it though. Should I love it?

Every other house that we have offered in and the one we live in now I have loved and start imaging where I would put my Christmas tree that type of thing!

This one has many nice things about it and in the area we want to be in but I’m just not sure. Am I being too fussy?

OP posts:
EnidMatilda · 05/10/2020 20:52

Personally, I think you should love it or know that it's got the potential for you to love it, e.g. After renovations/ extension.

Original poster
cooperbug · 05/10/2020 20:52

I should add to this that we had an offer accepted on a house that we both fell in love about 7 weeks ago and they took it off the market after 6 days!

Haven’t viewed anything else since then so maybe that’s it. I’m finding it hard to move on from that one

OP posts:
JoJoSM2 · 05/10/2020 20:56

I’ve never loved a house. I’m just a head over heart person and love interior design so just make a place ‘mine’ as long as it ticks my practical boxes.

Original poster
cooperbug · 05/10/2020 20:56

It doesn’t need any extension or a lot of renovation work. The garden is east facing. I don’t particularly like the look of it from the outside but on the inside it’s nice

OP posts:
TK1930 · 05/10/2020 20:56

Personally no. It was a huge project. Great location & scope to renovate etc. But I definitely didn’t walk through the door with the ‘wow I love this place’ factor.
Having gone through the list of what we wanted, it fulfilled nearly all of what we were looking for. We also knew that we’d never be able to afford this house of it was ‘done’.
Five years on it’s a great home for us and DCs

Elderflower14 · 05/10/2020 20:56

When we came to look at this house we arrived early... My Dad was with us... My late DH leaned on the brick gate post which moved alarmingly... My Dad looked at DH and remarked dryly that he hoped the house was more secure than the gatepost!! 🤣 🤣 🤣

PurplePansy05 · 05/10/2020 20:58

I loved what I could make of it. It's beautiful now but certainly wasn't when we first saw it!

Asdf12345 · 05/10/2020 20:58

Neither of us did but it was clear it had the right potential.

Gazelda · 05/10/2020 20:59

Our current house, yes. I loved it the second I walked through the door.

I didn't fall in love with previous houses I've bought, but something about them has niggled in the back of my mind to prompt me to go back for a second look. At which point I've seen the potential.

I've been happy in every home I've lived, but my current home is the only one I've loved.

ThrawnCow · 05/10/2020 21:00

No but I loved the location.

LadyMonicaBaddingham · 05/10/2020 21:01

I could see what it could be... It was a bit of a bin at the time, to be honest, but with work it has become a wonderful family home!!

Merename · 05/10/2020 21:04

Sounds like you need a second viewing. Your niggles could turn into a veto or you may see more positives than you saw. We are shortly to move into a house that I didn’t love first time but second viewing I imagined us there and saw potential.

BeautifulandWilfulandDead · 05/10/2020 21:05

Absolutely - I've loved each of the houses I've bought.

Alarae · 05/10/2020 21:07

Our very first house no, it was very much a rational purchase because it was extremely good value.

Our current home (and realistically our 'forever' home) I stepped foot in it and it just felt like home.

It always bugged my OH that with our first house, I always called it our house but it didn't feel like my home. It was bricks and mortar which I had no emotional attachment to.

This one? Emotions in droves. My OH loves this house even more because of that.

wondering7777 · 05/10/2020 21:07

Yes - the place we live in now had a really lovely "feel" to it when we walked in the door. I knew it was the one!

Greenhairbrush · 05/10/2020 21:08

Not this one. I liked what it could become. We’re extending next year and hoping I’m happy with it once it’s all finished. My last house, it felt like home instantly even with its very dated decor.

MillieEpple · 05/10/2020 21:08

It was horrible - it smelled and had a hoarder in it so i coukdnt get a feel for it. But it was exactly where we wanted and had the things we were aiming for (2 bed, detatched, parking and a garden) nothing else in our price bracket had all those things.

happytodayhappytomorrow · 05/10/2020 21:08

When DH and I viewed the house we are in now, we both came out saying “oh my gosh”.

Me because I thought it was so awful.
DH because he thought it was perfect.

We were both correct; it was awful but with some planning permission and a lovelybteam of builders, we made it nearly perfect.

So, I guess what I’m saying is, do you need to immediately love it? Maybe it’s enough to like it and then change certain things so that you then love it.

Good luck whatever you do.

notso · 05/10/2020 21:09

First house no, but I was never meant to live in it.
Second house yes.
Current house no, in fact I came away disappointed from the first viewing, although I loved the garden.

amieejust · 05/10/2020 21:10

Yes, we knew straight away, as soon as we walked in through the front door and into the hallway Smile

mommybear1 · 05/10/2020 21:10

Yes with both of my houses. Both were renovation projects and I could see the potential in both. However the second house has had a f**kton lot of problems with it due to poor builders completing the project which have very nearly made me want to sell but I do still love the house DH less so now Grin.

Yesterdayforgotten · 05/10/2020 21:11

Yes loved our house when we bought it but after moving in I think the rose coloured spectacles come off and lots of faults begin to show!

woodlandwalker · 05/10/2020 21:11

I've bought four properties. The first one was what we could afford.
The second one - we saw several very similar houses close to each other and all would have been good but there was something about that one that I loved - it was light and airy but warm. I regret moving out when I did.
The third house was chosen by head, not heart. It was the only one in the right location at the right price on the market but it took years to do up and it never really had that feel for me.
My house now I had a good feeling for, not as special as house 2 but enough. The test was feeling happy after my first night there.

Honeyandapple · 05/10/2020 21:14

No. I haven't loved either of the houses I have bought at the initial viewing stage.
They have ticked boxes and been nice enough with potential to improve.

Scarby9 · 05/10/2020 21:14

Yes, and it was the second house I had fallen in love with.

The owners of the first house pulled out of the sale with days to go and I literally wept and mourned that house. I just couldn't do the same to the people buying my house so I ended up renting for 12 months, viewing houses almost every weekend and not seeing anything I liked as much as the house I had loved and lost.

I viewed the house I now live in on the basis of a tiny advert in the local paper (pre-internet) saying only 'Two bedroom cottage in X village' and a phone number. Having arranged a viewing, I pulled up outside and recognized it as a house I had rejected previously as not having the extra room I was moving for, and having far too big a garden.

But when I stepped into the entrance hall, I began to fall in love with it, and the love grew every room I went into. The bathroom floor clinched it. It was definitely a case of heart over head.

I am now a keen gardener, and have completely remodelled the house over the 25 years I have lived here so that is now praxtical as well as still retaining all the charm it had when we first met! I still love it.

I am a very logical person, and liked by first house but bought it because it was the sensible, practical option. I never expected to fall in love with a house, never mind one that matched almost none of the essential criteria I had for the move.

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