Property purchase- VERY dated decor

[Daisy778]

We are currently going through the process of purchasing a property via probate. The decor is extremely dated and there are some issues with the layout we want to resolve but likely next year and will involve structural works and a new kitchen. Do we live with it in its current state.... dated but serviceable or make some short term improvements? I dont want to feel like were throwing money away only to replace in the (nearish) future. We will be replacing all flooring throughout, but this will need to be done during the renovations but I'm not sure I can live with current prehistoric carpets.?!? Would.it be madness to strip all carpets back to floorboards and wall coverings and cosy up with some rugs for the next year and a coat or 2 of white or shall I make my peace with the 60s/70s decor for the next 12mths and do the improvements only once?

How old are you?
If fairly young I'd rip the carpets up. I did this in my mid 20s. It was a cold winter, no heating upstairs but carpets were gone and rugs were down.
Im nearly 50 now. No way would I go through that now. I can't believe I did it tbh. But in my memories it wasn't that bad.

The whole place smells musty which would have gone into the carpets, even if they're not the cause I expect. The property has been empty for a little while and not aired out. I think I'll strip the walls and replace the curtains and arrange a professional deep clean of the carpets and see how it is then. The kitchen is made of old wood so I expect that's picked up a few odours of the years too, oh dear what have we done lol

Don’t rip up the carpet until you can replace it. We ended up accidentally without carpet for 6 months because we moved somewhere where the previous owners had ripped it out as the pandemic started. I would not recommend it, it’s not like nice wooden floor - hard to clean, noisy, drafty, just not pleasant.

I'm 41 and know what you're saying. We've 'made do' on quite a few occasions in our years of owning a.property which is why I was considering just ripping them out. The property is quite exposed though so thinking its going to feel that chill come winter. Think we may work with them initially rather than instantly regret it when we discover the boiler packs up

I was thinking about the noise too as we have 2 little dogs who can't sit still for long. I can just imagine their nails clicking all over the floorboards for the 12mths !

Another vote for getting your carpets cleaned and if the patterns are too much, putting some neutral rugs on top to get you through the winter. Maybe paint the walls like you suggest to neutralise the worst. When we moved into our house we put a tough foam backed Lino,vinyl flooring on top of the hideous floor tiles in the kitchen. It was great and worked well till we could do our renovations.

You could maybe get some reeded glass film for your glass wall?

It will be freezing. Get under floor insulation before you do it.

We’ve been living with similar for the past 16 months-our building work starts next month.
I’ll not lie, I’m sick to the back teeth of it, but have found stripping walls helps.We haven’t bothered painting what we’ve stripped because we’re going to be spending 10s of thousands on building work because materials are horrifically expensive and we see it as wasting money on paint which could be spent elsewhere.
Its only been the last few weeks that we’ve lifted carpets, for all the reasons other people have said-bare boards are dirty, draughty and cold.
I’ve never worn slippers so much in my life-I’ve managed to not walk barefoot on any carpet since we moved in 😂

Agree. You may dread having to live with it but once you're in it will be fine. You get used to it. Don't waste time and money on interim improvements.

I moved into a 1980's horror! I had all the carpets professionally cleaned, apart from the bedroom and hall which really were too hideous. I also stripped the paper from the bedroom wall as it was too awful to live with.

I bought carpet remnants on line- really great quality but less choice of colour. So I got Kersaint Cobb carpet for the hall and stairs for example for £300.

Live with it. A friend advised me to do that so we could work out how the house functions for us, to go over what we actually wanted to achieve with improvements and to see how the rooms were lit by sunlight throughout the day and across the seasons.

That's a good idea. I'll keep this in mind if I can't get rid of the mustiness or they really do get too much. It's a bungalow with floorboards and after reading on here this morning I really do think stripping back to bare floorboards will be too draughty and cold. Thanks for the recommendation!

Do you know what I would do, buy some new proper dust sheets and completely cover the awful carpets with them until you can replace. You won't be able to see or smell the old carpet, you won't have wasted money cleaning them, the house will be nice and warm come winter and then you can use the dust sheets when you get to decorate!

Live with it, do the bare minimum to make it comfortable and then do each room to your taste as you renovate. We did this and it was fine, and lovely to see it come together. Take lots of photos.

Given that this is August it will anyway take you some time to get things done you could be into wet autumn weather before you really get into it. If you need to buy things and will employ trades-people you might be waiting some time.
We are buying with yr2000 as last redecoration and don't see completion happening until October.

Professionally clean the carpets and have the boiler checked, oven cleaned; then move in. We are going to live with much of it through winter. We shall find a reliable handyman to help us.

I’d get the carpets professionally cleaned (they also may be decent quality carpets as well) and then cover it up with the largest rug you can find - I bought a huge cream rug from Wayfair I think, was cheap too.

Get a carpet cleaner.
After you've vacuumed them with the best vacuum possible.

If they're hideous they're probably really good quality.

Having recently moved into a similar property - I would concur with DON'T rip up the carpets yet! We did in our old house, the floorboards underneath were just boards - don't expect something lovely underneath. And of course, they needed sanding and were drafty...basically we put cheap vinyl down over the top as they made the house really cold.

We replaced our kitchen with a second hand one which has been amazing, I love it. Not quite done yet, but we've saved £££ (the intention was to replace with this one then maybe in a couple of years get a much nicer new one but actually I don't think we will)

If you do get carpet offcuts to cover any migraine-inducing patterns, you can duct tape the edges down to the old carpets if they're a bit small for the room. I may have done this. 😁

I would also think about whether you want to start stripping paper yet - I did this with my 1970s bungalow and the walls were in a terrible state underneath. Crumbling plasterboard, endless holes and sticky residue. Just painting over it would have been a waste of time and money and I ended up bringing the whole renovation much earlier. Should have just left the stuff on there!

This ^

We ripped out the hideous carpet and froze during our first winter in our new home. Combined with the cost of energy I'd try to get them cleaned and live with it.

The other thing I discovered is that it is weirdly more efficient to clean carpet during a rewire than boards. The dust goes down between the boards and just keeps on rising. You won't care about them and can just roll them up and skip them when the wiring and plastering is done.

Thank you for all your experiences, some great advice. Think we'll stick with the vintage beauty's and stay a little warmer over winter. If anything it will prove an incentive to get on. I will have to do the walls though and pray the plaster stays put, maybe I'll end up duct tapping that instead ...hmm

I think you're right to strip the paper early doors. By the time we did ours we had some new flooring, furniture etc in. Honestly we should've just skimmed the whole house but by the time we realised that we didn't have the inclination or budget. And it's such a messy job.

This. It keeps your spirits up.

Stripping walls and painting white is a nice idea but if your house is anything like my reno house every wall will need plastering first. We've had to take several walls back to brick.

Paint over the paper if you want a quick fix!!