What, if anything, did you compromise on when you moved?

[Horriblewoman]

We're in the early stages of selling our first house and have been told it will sell quickly due to nothing else being comparable in the market in our area.

If we could extend out or up we wouldn't be moving but it's not an option and we're increasingly tight for space.

However nothing is coming on the market that we've seen that tempts us at all in our area. Or would have significant compromise on some of the things we take for granted (off street parking and a garage in London, close to the overground).

If you compromised was it worth it?! Do you still miss bits of your old places?

We compromised on parking, never ever ever again will I buy a house without a driveway.

Dragging kids and shopping bags half way down the street is shit.

But we got on the ladder and it’s given us equity so I would still do the same again if I had to do it over I suppose😂🥴

I know someone who compromised on having no upstairs bathroom.
They are glad they did that, but wouldnt do it again!

No upstairs bathroom (or second toilet). It's not ideal but we manage OK. In fact with only one bathroom it's better that it's downstairs, especially as we have no utility room either.

Parking was not something I was prepared to compromise on this time, enough space for two cars side by side was a must-have.

Small garden. I would love a bigger garden.

Road noise. We live on the edge of an estate next to a pretty busy road. The noise is irritating and I've never quite got used to it. The houses further in were around £50K more expensive which we wouldn't have been able to afford. The house is lovely and the house prices have rocketed around here, so it may not be forever.

Garage. It would be handy, but we do have a car port.
Spare bedroom
Extra toilet.

But we have good transport links, good school, and bigger garden. And will be mortgage free early forties...

4th bedroom upstairs. We do have a study downstairs though, it has never been a problem.
We did not compromise on location / overlooked-ness which were key and unchangeable.

Location. We moved 60 miles out of London but in doing so we have ticked every box with this house. We're so happy here - it's just a bugger of a commute twice a week!

We're on a main road. We wouldn't be able to afford the house if it was on a leafy side road.

No utility room, no driveway. Don’t have children at home so parking in the street is OK. Washing machine is fine in the kitchen. Upside, lovely quiet neighbourhood & sense of community.

Parking / garage too. It doesn’t really bother me tbh, we get food delivered and walk / cycle to school and work so I don’t have a daily ‘find a space’ moment. Abs like someone else said, the equity MORE than makes up for that!

Over 12 years we’ve extended (loft, side return) and slowly got everything exactly right for us.

Curb appeal and size of kitchen.
Got the garden, space and vaguely the right location.

Area and garden direction. Both have turned out fine, even better than expected

First house: no upstairs bathroom - but we did have three big double bedrooms.

Current house - north facing garden. I really want a S/SW-facing garden next time.

We had three wishes. A third bedroom, side access and off-street parking. We got the first two - we moved from a two bed terraced to a three bed detached, but we have to park on the street.

Fortunately parking right outside is really easy.

Actually I wanted S/SW too but got NW and it is fabulous! Possibly more NWW and wide so that's probably why.

Location, and I massively regret it.

A 3rd bedroom! We were looking for a 3 bed but found a beautiful period property with 2 beds, great area, good price and space and potential to extend. Dont regret it (yet haha) but want to extend in the next 18 months

Taking on a septic tank and all the responsibility that comes along with it. Ie not putting anything down the loo, ever, and making sure visitors don’t flush tampons, not using certain washing powders and putting anything down the sink that could compromise the delicate biodiversity. Oh and it smells in the summer! The house and grounds are idyllic. The pong, not so much. And it’s quite new and we have it serviced regularly, yet it still stinks. One of the joys of rural living 🤷🏻‍♀️

Virtually no front garden. Boring, characterless, modern house.

No regrets

Yes to side access, our last house was a mid terrace with no access to the back garden apart from through the house which was a total PITA, especially as the kitchen was at the front so no outside tap at the back and had to carry watering cans through the house, also the lawnmower to do the front garden. Wouldn't compromise on that again.

The age/look of the property. I’ve always massively preferred older houses and wanted a larger Victorian house, which there are plenty in our town, but in the end we’ve not long moved into a place that’s only 16 years old. But the price, location and size were all right so it seemed stupid to focus on having a nice fireplace over an extra bedroom and a study!

Compromised on having a garage and drive, but we have been able to add both in the end. Also, we ended up going for 3 double bedrooms rather than the 4 we thought we wanted. We found many 4 beds were 2 doubles and 2 singles, which we didn't want. We also have oil heating which I was worried about but has been fine.

Size of driveway/garage - we can only really get one car on the driveway and the garage is too narrow to use, plus we intend to convert part of it to a utility. It would be possible to widen the driveway but not sure the expense will be worth it . We currently only have one car so not an issue but that might change in the future plus we would have liked to have a classic car (either/or, not both of those things). With the way fuel prices are going that might not be a consideration for long anyway!

Apart from that, I guess size but the house is plenty big enough for us, it's just not as big as the ones we could have bought if we'd been able to move sooner.

Location in the sense that there are other parts of the city I would have preferred to live in but this is a perfectly nice area.

We absolutely would not have compromised on detached and off road parking for one car, both of those based on bad experiences previously. Would have moved further out/worse location/even smaller house if we had to.

Also road noise like a pp. We thought we knew the road quite well but one thing we didn't realise was that it would be 'enjoyed' by motorcyclists quite as much as it is.

I can mostly live with it since it's otherwise exactly what we wanted - small, cute and cottage-y with a large, sunny, private back garden - but I do have occasional murderous thoughts to all bikers!