30s house in need of modernisation - worthwhile in current market?

[PeanutbutterAndJelly1]

Have fallen in love with a 30s semi, it is clean and tidy and clearly been well cared for. However, it does definitely need modernising to current standards. Cosmetics aside, it will need a full rewire as an absolute minimum, which presumably will then call for works to be done on floors/ carpets/ walls/ ceilings(?) at the same time.

Looking at sold prices, a house on the same road, which started off with an identical original floor plan, sold for 100k more half a year ago. It was however fully modernised to a high standard, with rear extension (together with wall removal) created a big open plan kitchen diner to the rear. Additionally, it has had a loft extension, which added a huge full height master bedroom with ensuite. The said house also has side access to the garden, which the one we’re looking at lacks, and garden is 2x bigger.

Having trolled through lots of renovation posts, it would appear if we were to get the one we’re looking at up to the same standard (obviously can’t do anything about the plot size) it would cost us much more than the difference between the two houses.

Any advice on how to approach this? Is it worthwhile taking on a big project in the current market? What sort of offer would be sensible in a scenario like this? We’re not looking to sell or make a profit out of this, and definitely wouldn’t want to short change anyone either. It obviously has to work for both parties. But, we are conscious that it’s potentially a falling market right now, and projects like this could become a complete rabbit hole financially once work starts! London based if it makes any difference. Advice, encouragement and words cautions welcomed!

How long are you prepared for the renovations to take?
If you’re not planning to do it up quickly and flip it, then you have much more leeway to renovate and redecorate one room at a time, when you can afford it. Obviously if you need to rewire then you should do that all in one go (although you don’t have to). But actually I’d recommend taking your time over some things. Our house was a fixer-upper and we’re currently working round it to redo some of the things we regret from our two-year push (finished just before DC2 was born).

You offer a price taking into account the extra you need to spend. Obviously they don't have to accept it.

No one can really answer if it's worth it. If you like the house, can see the potential, can afford it, then go for it. If not. Then it's not 'worth it' to you.

No one knows what the housing market will.do, so look at your house as a home, not an investment. That should help.

@NewFriendlyLadybird Yes, I had in mind that we would do one room at a time, not sure we would want to be paying rent and mortgage simultaneously. Just not sure how feasible it is if a full re-wire is needed? Did yours need re-wiring too? How much mess was there when it was done?

DH is also worried that it would cause too much disruptions for the kids, how did you find the process with a little one around the house?

@Ellmau To cover all the costs, I feel the offer will be too low for it to be accepted…

A lot of people are saying that project houses are overpriced based on current reno costs, especially in London.

Do you think they wouldn't accept its renoated value minus reno costs? Is there a reason anybody else would pay more than that (if they knew what they were doing?)

@Seaside3 Agree, definitely worth it from making it a home point of view. However, when I put my pragmatic hat on, I start worrying about falling house prices and issues with re-mortgaging further down the line if we overpay now

@notavillager Could just be estate agent talk I know, but when I raised this, the estate agent said the other house on the same road which they’re also marketing, went for just below asking price at the weekend - it’s in a similar state to the one we’re looking at. I took it as our vendor are expecting around asking price too from that

We did the front half of the house first, including rewiring, connecting gas, new bathroom upstairs etc. Then we built (or had built) an extension at the back: all the wiring and plumbing for that was done at the same time.
It was two years of pure excitement and joy for DS. He was fascinated by everything. We had one week in a short term rental while the first bathroom was put in but otherwise lived in the house. I don’t altogether recommend relying on a microwave in one of the bedrooms while pregnant and suffering from morning sickness, but we can laugh about it now.

@NewFriendlyLadybird O wow, hats off to you for getting through all that whilst pregnant! At least little one was entertained by it all, and I’m hoping my two will be if we do decide to go for it. Thank you so much for sharing ☺️

We are having our 1950s house fully rewired at the moment (as part of a bigger refurb). The cost for that alone was around £11k and didn’t include the “make good” replaster and finish but when I see the extent of work it has taken I can see why it costs so much. And I am very pleased we moved out as it was very messy work. Very pleased we did it…The spaghetti tangle of wires that were pulled out from various random cavities in the walls and ceilings was quite terrifying and the nice tidy structure they have put in place is very satisfying (and I presume infinitely safer!).

but yes it is going to cost you a fortune to refurb…our quotes came back at double our budget and almost the equivalent to what we paid for the house 8 years ago 🙈 <we scaled back plans>.

if you are going to stay there forever, it’s probably worth it but I’m not so sure if it is just going to be a stepping stone home. Good luck!

If its a long term house, go for it. Does it need a rewire straight away or is it liveable? We live in a 30s semi (also in a London suburb) and love it. We’ve done a full refurb and loft conversion since moving in 4 years ago and would have been better off buying a done house…but fell in love with this one!

You can only offer what you genuinely think the house is worth to you.

Make them an opening offer and see what happens. It can help to explain your logic, as then the EA can pass that on to the vendor who may see reason or may prefer to hold out.

I placed a reasonable offer on a house that had been on the market for 1.5 years. They declined, they simply wanted more than the house was worth. In the end they withdrew the house from sale.

I'd look for something in your budget that doesn't need the refurbishment. It's going to work out so expensive if owner won't accept done up price less reno cost. Even if its your forever home you've got to think about how you're using money wisely over your lifetime and personally I couldn't live with spending over the odds on your home.

well you won’t do all that for £100k with todays prices. Both labour and materials are through the roof.

This is what is putting us off moving, every house we find needs a lot of work but the cost of this work is too much to proceed with. Although I don't see how it will ever be much cheaper. Once someone starts charging £500 a day, they are not going to put their day rate less anytime soon.

We've been mulling over a similar situation recently and decided to only look at houses that won't need immediate works/renovations. Of course every house needs something doing to it over time, but we simply can't afford (money, energy, headspace) a fixer-upper.

How practical are you? If you can do some of the work yourselves, say the making good, flooring, decorating, maybe plumbing, it might not be too bad. Re-wiring I wouldn't want to tackle and gas things have to be done by professionals. Is the structure solid, roof, walls, guttering, windows, most of those you would need professionals for.

How much of the work can you do yourselves? If you can do a good proportion of it then it's probably worth it, but if you're relying on trades then it's likely going to be too expensive.

We're in the middle of a renovation and the only things we've paid trades for is a new boiler and heating system (£8k as it was a nightmare job), carpet fitting and we had the kitchen re-plastered.

My DP is doing the rewire but we will need to pay for an electrician to sign it off and also likely to need a new fuse board. DP has also done the rest of the plastering including some lime plastering which we definitely could not afford to pay someone to do or wait for someone to be available. We've fitted the kitchen, bathroom and en-suite ourselves.

We're doing it room by room but found that things just don't run to plan. We had a 1yr old at the time who was walking so thought would be pretty easy to work around, but I got pregnant soon after moving in and that really put us back. Also the kitchen was a million times worse than we thought so had to be ripped out immediately (leaks, mice, rot, dog grease 🤢).
We'd planned that for the second year so had to find the money to pay for a new one, during Covid so we just ordered one online. We definitely made mistakes in the design and really could have done with that extra time to live in it and see what we needed.

It sounds like yours is well cared for so you probably won't find the level of unexpected work that we have (rotting floors and beams etc) which aways come when you don't have funds freely available.
We both work ridiculous hours so it's taking forever to finish - we've been here almost 3 years and we're almost half way.

We paid 10% under asking but to be honest I think we overpaid. It's a niche house and a bit odd so could be difficult to sell and make our money back.