Cost of work & borrowing

[slipperfsce]

Was thinking of doing a renovation (loft & extension) which will easily be over 150k with today prices. However with the way the economy is going I'm not sure if I would "get that back" when selling. Plus financing it now would mean having to borrow/remortgage but interest rates have made that far more expensive. What are other people doing?

bump

Gosh, that seems expensive! We needed more space so we put a home office in the garden. DH built it himself, cost £6000 all in. Is that an option for you?

We're extending despite "not getting it back". Extension will cost 70k and house value will increase by 30k. However, extending "saves" us moving costs of 20k. To upgrade by buying would mean extra 120-150k mortgage and the interest on that. But also we are very happy with current location, orientation and neighbours and there's has been nothing wow on the market in the last 5 years. So all in all extending makes sense.

We are borrowing to fund renovation works. All in all, it will cost approx £100k, and although I imagine we would get that back if we sold, it’s hard to know for sure given the unpredictability of the market in the next few years. We don’t imagine we will need or want to sell though (perfect location, coastal, and there’s nowhere we could move that would be better), which makes us more confident in doing the work now even with the risk of not recouping the money. If we did have to sell and didn’t make the £100k back, that would be ok too. We are happy to spend the money to make an almost perfect house perfect for us for whatever time we are here.

We are going ahead with attic conversion and redoing the kitchen. Going to be mind blowing expensive and disruptive but we have accepted that we love this house, location and neighbours and the investment is worth it.

In 6 years I've only see two houses I would have agreed to move to (ie both DH and I agree better than ours and worth the extra money and "done to our taste".) I certainly wouldn't want to move now -with stamp duty and hassle of moving and unknown risk of neighbours and having to redecorate/deal with unanticipated problems with the house.

I'd rather stay put and upgrade our home even though it may not appear financially the most sensible thing to do in terms of capital investment. I could happily stay in our house forever, but if we did move and didnt make our money back I wouldn't regret it because I want to enjoy the house we live in now.

We are holding off for now. Just got our annual tracker mortgage statement and the interest portion has doubled (14 years left). We do have questionable job stability so seems too risky.

I'd be more pro if this was our "forever home" but we plan to move in the next 5 yrs & the stamp duty will be 30k plus

I wouldn't consider 150k reno and the disruption it will cause if I wanted to move within 5 years.

There's a few of the remaining non extended houses getting their lifts done now, and my neighbours are saying they will finado it after getting planning over a year ago.
Unless you plan to sell in the next year or two I'm pretty confident you will get your money back, but you also need to do it for your needs. I just changed my perfectly serviceable bifold doors for crittal style ones at a cost of £10k. Did I need to? No. Will I get it back? Debatable. Do I love it? YES!