£50k - would you convert the loft or update the house

[Leftfelange]

We've been in our house for a few years now. It's a doer upper. Not done a great deal to it before now. We're having to remortgage and we can afford to borrow another £50k without too much of a monthly increase.

DH wants to get the loft done and admittedly it would add value to the house - an extra bedroom, shower room and dressing room. Bedroom would have lovely views. Quotes are coming in at slightly over budget but doable.

I, however, think that we should focus on getting the house in order. The kitchen needs a complete overhaul and a wall moved, the bathroom needs a new suite and everything just needs a bit of updating - it's all quite tired.

While I agree with DH that adding a lovely loft room would increase the value of the house, I also think that our priority should be getting the house that we have in order first. To me, adding on a loft bedroom is a "nice to have" once everything else is done. For background it's a 4 bed house although 2 bedrooms are quite small, but totally liveable.

So my question is, if you had 50k to spend, would you sort out the kitchen and bathroom plus general decor or would you convert the loft and do the rest in however many years' time?

Sounds like you don't need the loft conversion at the moment and won't give any real tangible benefit on your day to day life. If the kitchen makes you scowl I would refurbish the house as this will have a bigger impact on your quality of life

Thank you all. I can see DH's point that a loft room would increase the value and I love the idea - it would be us up there - but I agree with those posters who have made points about the house potentially ending up top heavy, particularly if downstairs is dated and scruffy.

In some respects what's making the decision harder is that we know the people who would do our loft - they've worked for us before and are good whereas the other work has more unknowns but I think getting the house that we have in order first would benefit us most on a day-to-day basis.

I would in normal times do rest of house. Currently though we are finding huge delays on some things, like 3 months for a kitchen fitter and multiple projects indoors I would check first what realistic timescales are and then see your options. Plus are the things you want in stock, if you are flexible with items you should be fine but we were finding if you want a certain cooker etc sometimes there are delays and its making sure you won't end up with half a kitchen for 3 months or think you are getting a kitchen next month and reality is 6 months and twice what you thought you would have to pay.

May be worth getting quotes - this can reveal the first issues, can you get people to quote.

It doesn’t sound like you need the extra bedroom from a lack of space/crowding perspective, so I’d redo the rest of the house. Not only is it more useful for you on a daily basis to have a functional living space, it’s also less of a chunk to bite off financially. You can always work incrementally one room at a time, from most important to least important jobs, to make sure you stay in budget. A loft feels a lot riskier to me for 50k; the chances you’d go over budget seem lot higher, and you’ll enjoy the loft a lot less on a day-to-day basis as you presumably spend most of your time in the main house, right?