Do you live in a really old house?

[Cocogreen]

I live in Australia and our oldest houses are largely from the end of the nineteenth century. In another thread someone mentioned their house was from the 16th century ( I think?, can't actually remember the century).
I'm fascinated by this and wonder if any of you live in a property with a long history? Any drawbacks to living in such old buildings?

Chocolatier There is the listed property owners club lpoc.co.uk though we just contact the conservation officer and check online when we need things doing. And for thatch we asked thatcher.

@Silkiescatz, thank you. I’ll look up the website. I keep wondering if I ought to be stripping the walls of their “ordinary” paint and using lime wash and stuff like that

Mine is around 1750 and was a barn, converted in the 1960's so not all open plan and double height ceilings. It still has some original features you can see. The worst is when you speak to an insurance company (I've not been able to do online as stone construction) and hold your breath to see if they ask whether it has foundations - the answer being nope.

I happily answer Q's re nearby water courses, large trees etc 😄

This is one of our outbuilding finds!
This is pre renovation, the roof has now been strengthened (the modern looking bits holding it up were just temporary.)

@ApplesinmyPocket and @LookToTreblesGoingTreblesGone I think you are both describing my house and I honestly feel so much better knowing that our 16thc farmhouse (farm land long gone sadly) is not alone with its wonky ceilings, walls and floors, horsehair plaster and lathe that crumbles away if you dare look at it, leaky stone roof (also defeated several roofers - currently trying to source someone else daring enough to look at it), random damp patches, spiders, moths, never ending dust (where does it all come from??!), mice, squirrels, armies of wood lice!!!!
Just when we get one thing fixed something else goes wrong/rotten/starts leaking/making a funny noise/smelling damp.
BUT... it is very beautiful and we have some genuine 18th century tradesman's graffiti in the attic from when the "new" extension was built 🤣. And it is deliciously cool in the summer, we never have sleepless nights being too hot! Our local council historians did a study of the house which was absolutely fascinating so I know a lot about its history and past inhabitants. I've always loved old houses but do sometimes often wish I'd resisted the urge and bought a more sensible newer house.
One of the worst parts is the battle with the planners/listed building officers just to get the smallest jobs done that would allow the house to evolve and move forward for the future (just as it evolved over the previous 400 years before Listing & planning came in to effect). We had (and still have a couple of) awful rusty metal crittle windows but in in the 1950s (I'm guessing). All draughty, rusty, broken and look absolutely terrible but they too have "listed" status so getting the permission to have them replaced with oak frames to match the rest of the windows in the house nearly sent me to an early grave and I'm going to have to go through the whole process again soon

@Eaumyword

This is one of our outbuilding finds! This is pre renovation, the roof has now been strengthened (the modern looking bits holding it up were just temporary.)

Are you planning to restore that? If you are stuck for "experts" it might be worth talking to Ironart in Bath. They have been restoring some Georgian cast iron loos (Lottery Grant). They have done a fabulous job. They will be my "go to" when I restore 3 of the fires in my rooms.

ironart.co.uk/restoration/

They might be able to recommend someone local.

Fabulous @Madcats thank you.
Loads of other jobs to do before this one but that is really helpful thanks so much, will bear that in mind. It deserves a full sympathetic restoration!

@SummerSazz

Mine is around 1750 and was a barn, converted in the 1960's so not all open plan and double height ceilings. It still has some original features you can see. The worst is when you speak to an insurance company (I've not been able to do online as stone construction) and hold your breath to see if they ask whether it has foundations - the answer being nope.

I happily answer Q's re nearby water courses, large trees etc 😄

Same here but it was converted in the 80s/90s. Insurance is a headache as 1850 seems to be the standard cutting off point. Also as a barn the history is not always as well documented as houses so the age can be a bit vague. There is a local history Facebook group who unearth some really interesting old photos including one with a major fire here with fire engines in the 1920s. This finally explained the scorched beams in what is now the garage !

I love these kind of posts. Loved reading all the replies.

I live in a 1780s Weavers Cottage. It's on 3 floors, the top floor would have been the loom shop, accessed by a stone staircase at the side of the house. The steps are still there but they just lead to the bathroom window now. A good fire escape! 1/3 of the top floor hangs over my neighbour's house, his two up two down cottage was part of the whole Weaver's cottage once.

@TheDogsMother

Agreed. You need to be at peace with beasties. We are constantly sweeping up wood lice to put outside and the spiders are often of epic proportions (for the UK). We live in a rural location and can get very dusty especially at harvest time. The walls are a foot thick and absolutely nothing is straight but we do love it. One of my favourite things is the huge wooden shutters on the front (it's an old barn) which are folded back from the windows. When it's windy or there's a storm these creak constantly but it's so comforting and we feel cosy inside.

I have always had a fear of spiders. I lived in London for years and hated the buggers. Then I moved fairly rurally. Another 10 years down the line and I still hate them - and I wasn’t prepared for how big they get out here! But, I’m not as freaked out as when I first moved in. Cat is useless, he ignores them.

I have learnt to ignore and be ok with the cellar spiders. Was told that they are very handy to have in a timber-framed property, so I let them have their little nooks and crannies around the place - and apologise if I disturb them and they start frantically spinning!

My biggest bugbear are the blooming thrips. They just get everywhere, impossible to stop them coming in. Last summer I hardly noticed any, but this year has been awful for them. Have also noticed this year loads more moths than usual, plus lots more butterflies.

@MasterGland

My house is mainly 16th century, I believe. It has three foot thick stone walls, low ceilings, huge beams, and stone mullions. Some parts are thought to be 15th century, looted during the reformation. It is small and cosy and I plan on being here forever.

In many ways, having the house has changed my approach to life. There is very little room for all the trappings of modern life, and so my focus on what is important has gradually shifted. We gather round the inglenook on a winter's evening, roast chestnuts and play boardgames. In the summer we tend the small vegetable garden.

My cats take care of the spiders and I generally embrace the dust!

@MasterGland I've always been fascinated by how few possessions people must have had in earlier centuries. I'm not talking royalty or nobility, but ordinary people. Here in Melbourne there are still thousands of "workers cottages" from the 19th century (our oldest houses), rows of narrow single story houses with 2 bedrooms, tiny living room, kitchen and were built with a loo down in the back fence. The originals had NO storage, maybe a shelf or two in the kitchen. Since the 1970s when they started getting gentrified, they're extended to the boundaries , second stories put on etc. To think that families with half a dozen children lived in those 3 rooms! People just didn't own the clothes, gadgets, sheer volume of stuff ( because they were poor) and repaired things.

I agree on the cellar spider front. I'm absolutely utterly phobic about the big scary hairy ones but since letting the cellar spiders free range, there are hardly any of them around any more.
They do sterling work trapping and mummifying the scaries!
What are thrips?

@Eaumyword - thrips (also known as thunder bugs) are teeny tiny little bugs.

To my naked eye, they basically look like tiny little black hyphens. I can’t see wings, feet or anything like that. Though if you google them you get to see more detail. I had a couple of days around a month ago where they covered the kitchen - doors, fridge, oven. Gross! They are harmless, but they make me do the shudder dance 🤣

Am in Singapore in a house built in 1950s, which is already considered extremely old by local standard. Here only new buildings command premium, the newer the more expensive.

Recently bought in Scotland a Grade B/II listed townhouse that goes back to 1860-1870. Listed are often considered higher risk by insurers so the premium is relatively high. I would like to procure another listed building for a small restoration project when I stop working.

I live in a 1840s cottage with a stream running through and around the garden. it’s known as the ‘pretty cottage’ in the village where the cottages as very spaced out, lots of rural country side and very large garden. i agree with all the pros and cons that Sagegreenvelvet mentions. but i absolutely love it and anyone who comes to stay are in awe of it. One just needs layers of jumpers in the winter months.

@cocogreen. Yes, storage was not really a consideration when these houses were built! My house was originally for tanners, apparently. There has obviously been some internal rearrangement over the years, particularly with the advent of the idea of "a kitchen"! A very small kitchen has been squeezed in, but it is obvious that the fireplace was originally the centre of life in the house.
I gave away my sofa and chairs when I moved here as they were just too big for the house. They would not have fit through the doorways, either.
I sourced a few "new" chairs from antique shops. They are primarily Victorian. It's amazing how the dimensions of furniture have changed over the centuries.

Some of these houses sound amazing!

Mine is 1790. It appears to have been poorly looked after so our already slow renovations are going to take forever.

When we viewed it we assumed the large rooms with large windows would be very practical but they're not. We brought a lot of furniture with us and in hindsight, smaller rooms but more of them would have suited us better.

Also, despite having thick walls we can hear the neighbour's tv ridiculously loudly, even in parts of the house that are above their roofline. It drives me mad.

I'm surprised how few enormous spiders we've seen, but I'm expecting that to change come spider season. We have millions of small ones though, they seem to plaster everything in webs and I've never seen so many egg sacks .

It's a very dark house so am expecting our first winter to require the lights on all day. It's also very cold so will cost a fortune in LPG to heat it. There seems to be an issue with damp in quite a few rooms too. It's also previously been flooded.

The boundaries are very odd and part of the extension is on what I'd have expected to be the neighbour's land. Sadly we have no deeds, so no exciting finds in the records. Nothing exciting in the census' either.

Chocolatier9 Our walls are also ordinary paint and beams and think its fine to leave as is but you can put them back if you prefer. Our walls are like tgis, sorry away atm and only photo is with our cat who is very elderly and lives in dining room.

My house is 1907, and most of the villagers refer to our row of cottages as the newer houses 🤣 much prefer older homes. Built by real tradespeople

Thank you again @Silkiescatz . I might think about it some more then.

Now it’s later in the year the critters are a revelation. I’m fast overcoming my fear of spiders, living here is a form of radical exposure therapy.

We also have lots of spiders, if younger the cat would have been in heaven with so many cat toys around. I am OK with them other than twice they have made webs down from the ceiling to me then I scream and then feel silly. Dd screams at every one. Dh offers a lot of spider rescue services.

I used to live in a medieval hall house way back in the eighties. Unfortunately I don't have any photos as my boxes of photos are in storage. There were a lot of spiders but they don't worry me at all. I don't remember it being cold or draughty. We did have the log burner on a lot. I have lived in a lot of old houses but that was the oldest.

I'm also from Melbourne and have just bought our dream house in Kent. We have a house which in part was built in late 1400's, original beams in that part of the house, with the rest of the house built in 1700's. High gorgeous ceilings in most of it, and some amazing original finds (newspaper cuttings from 1800's used under wallpaper). A fireplace in all the rooms, differing according to the era that part of the house was built, original solid wood internal shutters on most of the ground floor windows. None of the walls are perfectly straight, the skirting boards are Huge (50cm). It is a large house (6/7 bedrooms and 4 living areas) but it feels warm and homely. We feel we are caretakers of our home, it has lasted many generations and we will keep it safe for the future. So different from my 1920's Melbourne bungalow!