Townhouse - Yes or No?

[Simplelifecoming]

I'm looking for my first home as a single (divorced) person after nearly 30 years of marriage. I'm looking for at least 3 bedrooms as I have two DCs at university who need somewhere as a base outside term time. I've looked at a few houses and been outbid on one but a townhouse has caught my eye.

I've never lived in a townhouse before so it would be great to hear other people's experiences. This one has a kitchen/diner, utility room and WC on the ground floor, living room, study and bedroom on the first floor and 3 other bedrooms (master with en-suite) and bathroom on the top floor. It has a carport, garage and nice sized garden.

It's on a development that is about 20 years old and has the usual narrow streets but the location is good for my work and for walking to the nearby town centre and it seems quiet and peaceful.

Am I being terribly naïve? I've been living in a detached house so being sandwiched between two other houses is a concern, as is the many stairs.

Any pros and cons of town house living would be really welcome.

We live in an old terraced town house with my one young adult DC. I also have two step DC, one of whom uses it as their base during uni. There’s a definite advantage to having different floors for privacy and sound reasons when you have older kids. We all appreciate the privacy aspect of it. My DS has the basement bedroom which is ideal, and the loft conversion is for uni DC when she’s home. We’re on the first floor. During lockdown this layout was a godsend as we could all escape to our different floors when necessary (which was often ).

The disadvantages of town house living for me are:

• Not enough ground floor space for everyone, although it sounds as if your house is bigger than ours so shouldn’t be too much of a problem for you
• lots of stairs as you say! Makes lugging hoovers around more difficult so we’ve now got a portable, light one which is ideal. Depending on how fit you are the stairs can either be a pain or a bonus! They keep me fit but I do spend a lot of wasted time going up and down them if I’ve forgotten something (we have four floors).
• some noise from neighbours, but it’s everyday dog/kids noise and nothing horrendous. On the whole we’ve been very lucky with our neighbours and we help each other out when we need to.

I suppose you have to weigh up what’s really important to you. For us, living within easy walking distance to our town is fantastic, and there’s a lively community with all the neighbours living close together. I do love our house, but as we’re getting older I am dreaming about having a detached house in a beautiful location with a beautiful view and one flight of stairs!!

Good luck with whatever you choose. If the house makes you feel excited I’d say go for it! .

Thanks @DanielleandBobby I'm thinking that being able to get our own space will be important and that's one of the things that attracted me.

I also like the idea of being kept fit by the stairs (I need it after lockdown) and realistically I'm only planning to stay for about 6 or 7 years then rethink as I'll be in my early 60s by then.

The house did make me feel excited, it felt 'right' and I could picture myself living there. I really like the location and couldn't afford a detached there so I'll probably have neighbours through the wall whatever I do.

I'll have a a hard think today then arrange a second viewing, although the way the housing market is at the moment I may lose out as people are making offers on one viewing

I moved to a townhouse after divorce. It gas worked really well, like the one you have seen location is perfect. My DD was 12 when we moved so I put her on the top floor in the en-suite.

I didn't consider those with a kitchen on the first floor due to carrying shopping up and down the stairs.
It has worked really well and it is only now 6 years later with a new husband that it is time to move.

Really like the town house we are currently living in. We are due a relocation and I am looking for another as they fir our lifestyle so well

It sounds perfect for you. I am a big believer in a house feeling right as when you’re actually living in it, if your heart is there, it will compensate for the things which inevitably piss you off about it. Privacy with young adult children is a bonus. There is less maintenance on a townhouse which will cut down the bills. Does the garden suit you? Does it feel an easy house to live in? And location is so important. We’re buying a house in the middle of a charming village and we’ve had to compromise on a few things, like size of house and garden-but every time we’ve been to look at it, it lightens me up inside so it’s the right house for us. However, if neighbour noise would annoy you, maybe it’s not the right one.

Thanks for the replies, it's so good to hear other people's experiences.

@Lonecatwithkitten I think the location is one of the big positives. When I thought about my wish list for my home, being near the town centre and being able to walk to work were top of my list. This house is perfect for both.

@Subbaxeo I agree, you can't buy a house just with your head, heart is really important.

In answer to your questions, the garden is just about a perfect size and is quite private. It feels like it would be easy to live in and I grew up in a small mid-terrace house with neighbours who sometimes fought so I will be OK with normal noise.

I suppose noise is always a risk but I'm in a detached house on a sizeable plot at the moment and my neighbours blast out music in their garden in the summer and have loud parties into the night.

After viewing it I drove around and drove past it again and really grinned when I saw it - I suppose that says a lot

Yes it does. Good luck and hopefully you will go for it.

@Simplelifecoming My lovely late DM always used to ask me “Does it make your heart sing?” if I was having difficulty making a decision about something. I’ve kind of lived by that mantra ever since, and it seems to work for me.
I would say though that in this crazy market I wouldn’t hang around! Good luck .

You could also turn the first floor bedroom into a snug if there are three more on the top floor. Really useful when all of you are at home for gaming, having friends round etc.

@DanielleandBobby it does make my heart sing! My dilemma is do I just make an offer or do I ask for another viewing first? Ideally I'd like to see it again but as you say, this market...

@Subbaxeo that's a great idea and I've been sitting here daydreaming about how I could make the kitchen layout better too.

I'll sleep on it and talk to the estate agent tomorrow.

We live in a town house and I love it - or layout is slightly different with kitchen and living room on the middle floor, bedrooms at the top and garage and what we call the ‘room of requirement’, and a full bathroom on the ground floor. It’s brilliant, separation for visitors who have their own space (if your DC come back from Uni and are on the top
Floor that works really well in the layout you describe). It’s liveable, easy and we have so many bathrooms which is brilliant! It sounds like you will be really happy there

There is a fantastic townhouse on Rightmove (marked sold) right now. It’s in Chester. If we weren’t buying our new home in a nearby village, we would have wanted to see it. They’ve done an extension into the garden and it’s lovely.
Can’t seem to post the link sorry £425k

Another advantage is that because the plot is usually smaller for a similar sized 2 storey house. Lots of people buy them because they couldn’t afford the same number of bedrooms or overall floor size in a standard house.

They also often gave smallish gardens. That’s a downside for some, but for those not very interested in gardening or wanting easy maintenance it can be a positive.

One thing I haven’t liked about some is whenthe parking is in a compound somewhere away from the house and not directly outside. That’s a bit of a pain and often results in people parking where they aren’t meant to and makes the narrow streets more tricky to get round.

I’d choose one if I had multiple children and needed several bedrooms and bathrooms and might not be able to get them for the same money in a 2 storey house. I’m not sure it would be my choice as a single person with holidaying teens/young adults, unless you really feel you need lots of space....but then again, having a bit more space for bigger kids isn’t a bad thing anyway, so it could well be perfect for you.

They're not for me as I don't like the layouts but if it felt right it sounds perfect! Friends who have these did make me aware when we were looking that sofas and big furniture can be tricky to get up the stairs but I suspect if you know about that potential issue then you can easily plan around it. Good luck!

I like mine, the only downside seems to be that the bedrooms on the top get quite hot. Much more so than the ground floor bedroom (I have living area and kitchen in the middle).

We've been in one for 5 years. When we bought it the layout was ground floor: garage + kitchen, 1st floor: living room + 1st bedroom + bathroom, 2nd floor: 2 bedrooms.

We renovated and got rid of the garage so the ground floor became an open plan kitchen/dining/living room and the first floor living room became the main bedroom. Over time and with the arrival of 2 children we've changed the room functions a number of times, what was the first floor main bedroom became an office/TV room.

We're selling ours because the we need a more joined up living area due to having small kids. The ground floor open plan area just isn't big enough and we can't let them wander into the upstairs rooms without supervision so the first floor TV room isn't used as it should be. If the kids were older it would be great as it gives them a private place to hangout. Also our garden just isn't big enough.

So I'm happy with the house and in the situation of older or grown up children it would function really well, but doesn't quite work for us at this stage of our lives with small children.

I think it sounds ideal for you.

My 3 children and I have just moved to a (end) townhouse from a detached, after separating from my husband.

I LOVE it. It absolutely makes my heart sing!

I have a kitchen/diner and a living room on the ground floor, then two bedrooms on each of the first and second floors. Garden is on the small side but it’s low maintenance and sunny.

I couldn’t have afforded at 4 bed otherwise. This house was meant to be mine.

I'm recently separated and now live in a terrace with my two teenagers - I love love love it! There's enough privacy for everyone and the kitchen is so far away (ground level, no other rooms there) that there is no temptation to snack all day lol. Neighbours don't bother me at all, in fact the presence of the neighbours made me feel less lonely and vulnerable somehow in the beginning when I was still adjusting / settling in.

We rented one for 6 months before we bought our current home. It was lovely but the stairs were a bit of a pain and as many have said, the garden was very small. We could hear the neighbours on one side more than the other but it was better than I expected as we've always been detached except once (which turned into a nightmare when new people moved next door but that's another story). Bought a detached but smaller property which I personally prefer but if a townhouse gets you the size of property you need and you don't have an issue with stairs then it sounds a great choice.

Thanks all for your comments, it's great to hear so many positive experiences. @SecretOfChange there is definitely something in what you say about feeling safe with people around, that's really important to me as I'll be living alone (mostly) for the first time in 30 years.

I'm planning to ask for a second viewing and if I still feel as good about it I'll make an offer. That's if it doesn't sell today of course, crazy housing market

Hi @Simplelifecoming

I lived in a town house that had a very similar lay out to yours. I think they can be incredibly flexible especially once your children are older when there's less running after them.

We converted half our garage and made it into kitchen diner family room and opened up the back to the garden. It left us with a great family space but also with a lovely more formal living room on the first floor that also contained a sofa bed for occasional guests. In our last house we had a loft conversion which also meant we had a lot of stairs to get to our bedroom but no one ever thought twice about it.

We're now in a more traditional detached house with all bedrooms on the same floor and dh is missing the separation between us and the kids especially from 21 year old ds who keeps very different hours to us!

Sounds like a brilliant buy.

I bought somewhere flat for my aged dog - he couldn't handle steps. It's in a complex of 17 villas and there's been once in 10 years that I heard a neighbours party. It's eminently preferable to the hell of nuisance barking dogs that I had before moving here (I was in a detached house there).

My test of whether a place is right is when I'm looking and I start planning where my furniture will go. Once I do that, I know it's the right fit. Funnily enough, I looked at a different unit in the same complex and didn't feel the way I did about where I bought.

Let us know what happens!