Garden gardens a bonus when selling or do they put of FTBs?

[Smudge2201]

When we moved into our house the back garden was paved from fence to fence along the whole length. There wasn’t one plant in it, just a broken bench and a few plastic pots with nothing in it.

it became my project to transform it, and it’s become my little tranquil space to relax in after a long day at work.

We’re now selling. In your experience do you think it is an asset / helps a property sell, or as it’s a FTB house, would it scare them off thinking about having to look after it? OH and I have wildly differing views - not that there’s much we can do about it!

It's beautiful!

I think since Covid, many people have realised how lovely it is to have a bit of garden. I work in a plant nursery and you would not believe how many people come in telling us they've taken up paving/gravel/decking and have been making a garden.

Definitely a selling point ….

I would only buy a house with a garden and mature trees! None of that paved plastic grass shite.

Thanks, I can imagine! Hopefully I’ve saved the next person to live here a job 😊

I think it's lovely OP - great job. And I don't think many people expect a garden garden in houses like that - so many people think 'it's too small to have a proper lawn - we'll just pave and have pots'. Understandable, given many people's time constraints, but a shame.

Hope you get a buyer who appreciates it - and if you do, that'll be one of the main reasons they buy it.

It's really lovely, an asset.

I wonder about this. Ours is a family home but I’ve spent a lot of money on the garden. It was just lawn, mow it’s greenhouse, trees and cottage garden.

I think buyers are going to think bloody hell….but imagine it won’t put them off…but it’ll be back to lawn within a month and the front garden ripped out for parking. .

When we were FTBs in our early 30s (5yrs ago) we specifically wanted a garden like this! Somewhere that if we had a child or a dog, they could play on a lawn. We were fed up of rentals with no garden or just a balcony etc.

That's my fear about ours too. When we bought this house the EA said someone else who'd viewed had suggested they'd tarmac the whole 0.5 acre if they purchased!

I do think some people find gardens - especially larger ones like ours - intimidating or overwhelming, although that goes back to my earlier point of why consider somewhere with a huge outside space if you're not into gardening (even if you have to employ a gardener, it's better than tarmacing the lot!).....

We've spent well in excess of £10k doing less than half the garden (the remainder is currently as wild/overgrown as the whole was when we first viewed in Jan 2018 - what the EA termed "magical" 🙄) and it would have cost way more if we'd got trades in rather than DIYing everything. I'd hate a future buyer to undo all that hard work - but at the end of the day it's their choice and like @BarrelOfOtters I don't think it would prevent someone from buying.

It's an interesting question, OP, so thanks for asking it!

I have a garden that is so different to the blank gardens surrounding me (i.e. a "garden garden"). I've often wondered if it would put off potential buyers, who might be expecting more of a paved/turf right up to the fence kind of garden.

I think it’s an asset. When we were FTBs 4 years ago we wrote off houses where the garden had been concreted over (slabs we could lift would have been doable but not something we’d actively have looked for) because sitting in a green garden is just nicer than in a concrete yard! Your garden looks perfect - a little idyll and not too high maintenance with the ferns and shrubs.

And @LibertyLily I see it so often on Facebook - landscaping companies with proud before and after shots where the after is acres of concrete or hard paving. My heart sinks.

And the houses round us where the front gardens are being dug up for parking. Especially the ones a few doors up where there is loads of on street parking.

But yes, I do sometimes wonder if the garden will put people off...but I really don't think it will. Just the artificial grass company will be round by week 2 of them moving in.

My friend sold her house to a lady who fell in love with her garden, and I seriously think she wouldn't have sold to someone who said they'd pave it over. The seller has now had to go into a home and I imagine the buyers will just rip it all out.