Overpay for dream house or settle for well priced second best?

[hotlycontested]

House 1 was put on the market at 1.1 million a few months ago, clearly overpriced for the local market (current owner paid 900k about 18 months ago, not done much to it, market not really moved). They dropped to 1 million a few weeks later. We viewed after the reduction. It is a beautiful house and could be our dream home with quite a lot of work (which would have to wait as there's no more money in the budget) but as it stands at the moment it's not perfect. Draughty old period house, decently decorated but a couple of weird room arrangements and no storage (and nowhere obvious to put storage without fairly significant work - lots of windows and fireplaces in the way!). We love the bones of the house but think it's still overpriced. We offered a slightly cheeky 875k a few weeks ago, which was rejected. Since then the agent has called us a couple of times to try and convince us to increase our offer, but the vendor isn't prepared to negotiate on price at all. We have now increased our offer to a best and final of 950k, which they are taking their time to think about. Our gut feeling is that they're flakey and even if we did reach agreement on price they might pull out at a later point. We can afford the extra 50k to go to the asking price, just don't really want to pay 10% more than we think it's worth.

House 2 started at 700k, now on at 650k. We don't love this house but it has a lot of advantages - great location, good size, more modern than house 1 so cheaper to run, etc. It's a nice house and we think that it is sensibly priced. We would want to extend it a bit and there is room in the budget to do that. The vendor seems easygoing and our hunch is that this would be a smoother transaction. We could be happy there but it probably won't ever be our dream home.

We're in rented so ready to go, no chain. Should be a good prospect.

What would you do? Just pay the asking price for house 1? Settle for house 2? Keep looking? We were hoping for a bit more of a spring rush but there's not a lot out there at all in our local area and we don't want to just wait and pay rent indefinitely.

You might find one if your DC is happy to have a smaller room, that happened to my friend, her eldest didn't want the largest bedroom. Maybe whoever gets the smallest bedroom can have a complete makeover if that room when you're settled? That'd save configuration of the upstairs.

It sounds like you're having doubts, so you're wise to think it over sensibly.

Ahhhhhh @rainingsnoring . The future of the property market, the key differences between Mumsnet and the financial services industry and now the appropriate use of quotes. Quite the skillset there.

Lighten up pal, this is Mumnset not the Old Bailey.

How could you possibly know this? OP isn't actually asking for a lot, it just seems this particular house isn't really for her as the layout isn't working. It's pretty but not practical. All your comments seem to point to the fact you are rather over invested in OP buying this house for some reason?

OP I'd worry about what else they've tarted up but not fixed and would also begrudge paying for the work they've had done, knowing I had to rip it out anyway. It does seem to me they may be selling so soon as they've realised the house isn't actually practical and they're not keen on throwing any more cash at it, whilst desperately trying to claw back their costs.

I have specifically requested that you don't pay attention to my posts on several occasions, Twigs, but it seems that continue to read and reply. I have no idea why! Fortunately, there are many other regular users and irregular users who are able to engage without being rude.

Indeed fortunately there are many other users who are able to engage without telling others what they can or can't say & do.

Nope. I just don't pretend to have a skill set that I don't possess.

Dream house every time.

I get an instantaneous response to everything I post. I guess you are following avidly! 😂

Don't flatter yourself, you know that isn't true so goodness knows why you feel the need to say it.

So is it the 'look' of house 1 that you love? Is it a period property?

It sounds like house 2 trumps your dream house on every other measure.
I would say location is one of the main aspects to look at.

I have lived in lovely looking houses. I have to say well laid out houses are more important for me. You can always make a house look better

😂

“Windows recently painted too but we noticed that one of them doesn't close properly, which again suggests papering over the cracks.”
Between that and your ‘want to insulate the walls’ comment sounds like it’s a single skin (9”) walled house. Will be freezing in the winter despite the enormous energy costs.
You could ask to see the bills?
Just to insulate and fit double glazing (or double glazed units if even possible) will cost a fortune, only to bring it up to the same basic standard as house 2.
What are the EPC ratings?

House 1 sounds more of a nightmare than a dream in the current climate where building work is insanely expensive and stressful. No storage and weird layout = ££££ to fix. No thanks.

House 2 sounds good to me - youd have money to actually live as well and not just sinking it all into a money pit. If you really can't love house 2, id keep looking for something that you like that's ready to live in and doesn't need extending. There must be something in the middle price wise.

Not house 1. Too expensive to fix and run.

House 1 was put on the market at 1.1 million a few months ago, clearly overpriced for the local market (current owner paid 900k about 18 months ago, not done much to it, market not really moved).

I would be wary of a house being sold again so quickly.

I need storage, and don't want to do renovations, so house #2 would be the choice for me.

Agree with @Leafalotta the dream home thing can break you. Sounds like it would. So many folks end up absolutely miserable in their dream doer upper which turns into an a nightmare money pit. With the way the economy is going it's even more foolhardy.

It's bricks and mortar. Why overpay simply because it's a "dream house" (whatever that might mean)?

Will it still be a dream when you are skint and can't afford the work that you want/needs to be done?

Is there a possibility that with work and time the cheaper one could be made into your own dream home as opposed to someone else's you bought off the shelf?

This is my lived experience!

We offered for a house that needed tons of work, but was in the same road where we already lived and we loved it there. Our offer far exceeded the ceiling for the road and it needed (conservatively) 100k spending on it. They refused our offer and so we looked around.

There were 2 other houses in a location we loved. We offered on one that needed very little work, it fell through.

We had looked at another (closer to the village we wanted to be able to walk into) but I had looked around and not even gone upstairs as it 'wasn't my dream house'.

We sat down and made a list of everything we would need to do to make it our dream house and weighed up all the pros and cons. Some things I wanted my DH wasn't fussed about and vice versa. We also factored in the immovables: location, neighbours, surroundings etc. We made an offer and we now live here.
We have spent close to 150k doing all the changes and it is now my dream house.

Dream house is a modern construct and if you have the money and the will, it can be achieved in a house you might have previously had reservations about. Good luck OP.