Pool in my garden

[BettyAndVeronica]

Since we saved a few thousand last year with our long haul holiday getting cancelled we have a bit in the pot.
And won't be going away this year, even though we budget each month for our 'holiday fund'. Domestic breaks don't thrill me - would rather stay at home.

I am considering using this for a small built in swimming pool for the kids. Our garden is big enough. I am conscious that the ongoing costs might become a pain in the arse.

Anyone have one and can advise whether it's great to have or hardly used and a bit of a faff to maintain. Any insight appreciated.

By "built in" do you mean a permanent one?

If so they can reduce the value of your property apparently

I would have thought it would cost more than the cost of two foreign family holidays.

But sure if you can a)afford to build it b) afford to maintain it (time and money) c) can afford to fence it. Go for it. I would but sadly of those options I could prob only stretch to c)!

I wouldn’t. Maintenance is really costly - we have friends with an indoor one who reckon it costs them about £5k a year just for basic maintenance, let alone repairs or replacing major pumps etc. And as previous poster says, they can reduce the value of your home or make it more difficult to sell due to the upkeep cost and hassle and because families will be unable to let their children use the garden unsupervised for safety reasons, which is a huge drawback for a family house.

I have a pool although I don't live in the UK,.

Cost wise you will have to factor in electricity for running the pump each day, and chemicals. Tbh the chemicals aren't that expensive. Then maintenance wise you will have to set aside some time each week, but it's really not unmanageable and you get into a routine.

Hee it adds value to a property.

You will have to have it fenced in or covered up with a net. I had a net but don't use it now unless we have visitors, as my DC are older teens.

We do swim quite a lot in summer, in winter I plan to get a cover, which I have been meaning to do for some time now. So then you filter it less and it uses hardly any chemicals.

Here we have a few different options, like marbelite or fibre glass but what you choose will depend on the soil type you have and if there is grond water below.

OH and if you do go ahead, get and automatic cleaner. It's will just whizz around keeping the bottom and sides clean. You will need to brush down manually from time to time though.

@ComtesseDeSpair

I wouldn’t. Maintenance is really costly - we have friends with an indoor one who reckon it costs them about £5k a year just for basic maintenance, let alone repairs or replacing major pumps etc. And as previous poster says, they can reduce the value of your home or make it more difficult to sell due to the upkeep cost and hassle and because families will be unable to let their children use the garden unsupervised for safety reasons, which is a huge drawback for a family house.

Children can still use the garden, the pool just needs to be secured off properly.

Most houses here have pools and the kids spend a lot of time outdoors in gardens.

You can get above ground one for 2k . Heating will be your main cost

I don’t disagree in principle. But I think that if you live somewhere where swimming pools are commonplace and every other house has one, the cultural sense of their risk becomes different to in the U.K. where they are pretty rare, and therefore people risk assess differently and are generally very reluctant to view them as safe enough to have children near unsupervised even if secured.

But this is by the by to your question OP, sorry for derailing. I still say I wouldn’t based on the cost and the short outdoor swimming weather season most years.

A friend has a reasonably small pool- I takes maybe 7 stokes to do a length, it is heated and has an electronic cover.

Cost around 100K

I have an enclosed outdoor inground pool. It has not reduced the value of my property and i think it will only increase it as climate warms up and people holiday more at home because air travel will become more expensive to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Maintenance costs is just under £1,000. My pool is 40ft x 20ft. I have a very very long and wide garden.

We put one in three years ago. It has a safety cover so it's perfectly safe for kids and pet but that was the biggest cost circa 25k of the build. Total build cost was 70k for a standard size pool but ours is tiled which is the more expensive option. It's bloody amazing in the summer and we have an air source heat pump which saves on electric but still it ain't cheap but it's worth every penny.
It will only reduce the value of your home if it takes up a large part of the garden or doesn't suit the house.