How does level of spec affect price of a London house?

[samosamo]

I ask because there's often lots of comments about houses with disappointing low spec bathrooms / kitchens etc.

I'm in the process of buying a house in London. I'll be doing the kitchen abd bathrooms. I will likely move in 5 years for DCs secondary school. I'm wondering what kind if spec I can get away with without impacting price.

I've looked at properties worth way more than the one im buying (I'mbuying fir £1m and after renovations all things being similar to today it could be marketed at £1.5m ) and honestly I'm not impressed by the spec. If I'm right, they're not great. For example:

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/73759926#/

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/101604056#/media?id=media11

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/83326099#/

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/88258873#/media?id=media11

So I'm just wondering whether the price points at which spec comes into play is far higher for London? Say gosh I don't even know, London house prices are so eye-watering. I mean, this is a £5m house!!! Literally the first i clichéd on in my search www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/85798354#/

With a higher spec would these already expensive properties be worth much more?

Would be great to get some opinions on how much spec impacts the price of a London hiuse.

I think the reason these are so expensive is down to location and size. The £5 million house is huge.

So perhaps improvements that add considerably to size - an extension and basement conversion - could add significantly to the price. And problems such as rotten beams/huge amount of damp could reduce it.

But I don't think new bathrooms and kitchen will add that high a percentage to top end places, because if the new owner can afford £5 million, they can afford to rip out everything and start from scratch. Also, even if the previous owner has installed a beautiful Smallbone kitchen, what if the buyer wants a super modern German kitchen instead?

I think the price point at which a posh kitchen or bathroom could make a small difference is actually lower. Because like you say, London prices are eye-watering, and £1 million is the price point for a three-bedroom period home in a quite nice area of Zone 2. And the family buying that house could be buying it with a big mortgage, so not have the money left over afterwards to redecorate and replace everything.

So at that lower price point, a higher spec could help. But I'd be very surprised if a new bathroom and kitchen increased a £1 million home to £1.5 million? That's a 50% increase! For that kind of increase, surely you would have to be doing some kind of structural work?

The 2nd house looks like a rental property given the fire extinguisher and fire blanket in the kitchen(s) so wouldn’t expect anything high spec in there.

The £5m property looks like a project anyway, needs quite a lot of work all over.

But I get what you’re saying. London prices are really high and I guess what it comes down to is you don’t get that much for your money. Your paying for the house not the spec.
The last house isn’t being marketed as “done”, would be interesting to see what it was worth once it was.

You’re not Your!

A good spec will enable you to charge a premium- in London anyway.

Those properties reflect location and not spec. Whoever buys them is likely an investor or purchasing for speculative reasons. Most ordinary people do not have 2m to spend + renovation costs

Yes, for clarity, i'm doing a loft extension and side return.

I'm really just wondering whether I'd make back the money for a mid to high spec fit because if not I'd go lower end abd throw know a few nice things. Developing it is already costly. Of course, on the other hand I don't want to pull back on those gains with a spec that's too low.

I'm just trying to pitch it correctly and it's really hard to tell!

Throw in a few nice things

I think if you’re moving in 5 years then whatever you’re putting in will be showing its age slightly by then anyway, both in terms of wear and tear and fashionability. Go for what you want and don’t second guess yourself trying to work out how the market will pan out down the line, five years is a long time and you’ll be living with it.

@samosamo

Yes, for clarity, i'm doing a loft extension and side return.

I'm really just wondering whether I'd make back the money for a mid to high spec fit because if not I'd go lower end abd throw know a few nice things. Developing it is already costly. Of course, on the other hand I don't want to pull back on those gains with a spec that's too low.

I'm just trying to pitch it correctly and it's really hard to tell!

I wouldn't be looking at what is on the market but at what has sold to get a sense of how much you need to spend to achieve the same. London house prices may or may not not hold their value in 5 years. The city has been hollowed out by home working

I always remember a friend (who was looking in a higher price bracket than I ever have) being sniffy about a developed £2m house (this is about 12 years ago) having AEG appliances! If you are in a top price band and selling as "done" then you'd really need Miele or similar.

If you would be selling at the top end of the local market (which arguably £1.5m wouldn't be in many parts of London) then yes upgrade the spec. If not I wouldn't bother. Will it be the difference between someone offering on your house or not? At £1.5m would the buyer be bothered about spending £5k on new appliances if they wanted to?

And if you buy top of the range Miele now then by 2025 your buyers will probably turn their noses up at anything which doesn’t cook your food using lasers.

I agree with PP, stop worrying about what might happen 5 years down the road and put in a kitchen/bathroom that you like.
when you do come to sell, take the advice of your EA, and if shelling out £100k will put £120k on the price, it's up to you to decide if all the hassle and disruption is worth an extra 2% on the potential sale.

I think you need to speak to some local estate agents rrgarding your target market. Maybe having a higher spec already done property appeals to some overseas buyers who don't want the hassle of renovating, other buyers however might prefer it in its original state. It will depend on the location and type of property you are trying to sell.

I wouldn't worry about it too much.
Spec definitely influences the 1m mark but it's not necessarily a huge margin so you need to be careful. Where I am people make money on kitchen extensions, nice spec but not so much on lofts. Maybe because it's harder to lower costs on lofts.

A couple of those properties are in areas which have only become very fashionable and expensive in the past decade and a half or so: it’s feasible that they’re the family homes of fairly ordinary people who’ve owned them a long time who now happen to own a property worth a couple of million but don’t necessarily have the cash for high spec renovations.

I think a high spec can provide the “wow” factor and give your house an edge against its competition and increase its saleability that way with perhaps a slight uptick in value. I’d be very surprised if high spec decor alone added half a million to the value of a £1million house (which is a fairly ordinary terraced or semi house in many parts of London. Plus as a previous poster said, taste is just as important as spec. My heart would sink at a property with a shaker-style kitchen or very traditional style bathrooms for example, because whether they’d cost the owner £15k or £150k I think they look awful and they’re not my taste and I wouldn’t think they were worth offering over the odds for.

Also where I am (houses about 1.2m) stamp duty has suppressed prices for the last few yrs.

Agree with PPs, a lot of value is down to location location location (and space) at the end of the day...

I’m not London but am in a ‘prime’ residential area in another part of the country which I’m currently having to move out of as to the the one more room downstairs that I want is costing me about a third as much of the entire price of my current property again (fully renovated, high spec, round the corner from the most desirable properties but without the view that makes them so) - for a house requiring full renovation (another 150-200k) and less upstairs space. Location and living space = a premium.

It’s also possible to recreate the look of high end finishes on a budget with different suppliers and a good fitter, of course.... I could easily have spent 5-6x as much as I did on my kitchen if I’d gone straight in with Tom Howley, devol or similar. IMO the premium just isn’t worth it for virtually the same look for the average family home.

(That said, I do actually agree with PP that appliances matter!)

I’d be very surprised if high spec decor alone added half a million to the value of a £1million house (which is a fairly ordinary terraced or semi house in many parts of London.

Same particularly in today's market.

In my experience (naice area zone 2 SE London) there are two main markets - first the people who don't want to do anything so expect it to be pristine and secondly people who want to renovate so will look for something v old/dated at a lower price and redo everything.

In terms of spec, if I was buying a house that's ready to go at £1-2m I'd expect good quality kitchen/bathrooms (but not necessarily a Tom Howley Kitchen for example). I'd want good brands for white goods but Bosch/Miele etc acceptable as opposed to sub zero. As someone mentioned upthread if they'll be 5 years old at the point of sale you might expect to replace them anyway (plus white goods aren't always included).

I remember an estate agent saying to me that there are many £2-3m houses on the nice streets where I live with IKEA kitchens and buyers immediately rip them out. As far as I know IKEA kitchens are pretty good, but if you're spending £2-3m you'd expect more.

If you are renovating with sale in mind I'd go with relatively safe/popular styles. A painted classic kitchen is always good as a buyer can repaint to their taste. Modern kitchens are less easy to makeover but also depends on the style of the house. Always keep/reinstate period features in a Victorian/Edwardian etc property.

I think if you want to make money I think you are better off going for low-mid spec and dressing it nicely (with gorgeous light fittings, rugs and furniture that you can take with you when you move) rather than spending £££ on posh bathroom/kitchens etc. You can dress up an IKEA or Howdens kitchen for example.

The first house you linked to is nicely dressed and fashionable so will attract a premium I would have thought.

Thanks all. I think you've given good advice. I'm not going to put in a plasticky bath and laminate worktop, but neither will I go to town on it. I'll likely have to spruce it up to move whenever we do as it would have lived through 3 primary school children anyway!

And I'm doing a lot of work for the uplift ( wirk I want to do for our family, not just for the value,) not just decor.

Bluntly, after 5 years with kids nothing is going to look immaculate or bang on trend.

The immaculate bang on trend houses do command a premium but for that you need not only a decent spec but also to sell within 1-2 years of the work. Amazing how fast trends change.

An estate agent told me that the houses that sell easily are either the ones just done very nicely, or the “Needs refurbishment” houses.
The ones that struggle to sell are the ones done up 5-10 years ago, where the owner still sees it as “freshly done” (and remember what they spent!) and want a price to match, but the buyers see it as perfectly nice but not their choices, and a little dated and lived in.

In summary if you are looking to sell in 5 yrs then top end spec is probably not worth it. Go for medium spec - so not Ikea level but not Heals/Ligne Roset either. Sort of John Lewis level.

BUT make sure you have good builders as whatever you spend on fixtures and tiles etc it will look shit if the builders don’t care about things being wonky or edges well finished etc!

If you’re doing up a house in a gentrifying area (like the Loftus Road house you linked to), the uplift in price is the result of gentrification and colossal infrastructure projects.

Unless you’re putting in a John Lewis and a new train station, I don’t rate your chances of getting a mega return. I agree with a PP, spend money on things you can take with you if this isn’t your forever home.

I think you are wise and it sounds like you will go for a happy medium! I was put off by a ‘done’ house with a laminate worktop and a plastic bathtub in by amateur developers as I would have felt guilty replacing them straight away. Equally, I wouldn’t want to pay £100K extra for a super swanky kitchen that might not be to my taste.

Not relevant but the price of the Rylett Road house (which is five minutes away from my rather more modestly priced house) is dictated entirely by the size of the garden.

A lawned garden is the ultimate London prize so if you’re going to invest, do it on your garden.