We are buying our first home, and have narrowed it down to two - which are next door to each other.
They’re new builds, it’s a small development and they’re coming to the end of the build so both are already built. The houses are at the end of a cul-de-sac, and are facing a line of trees so feel private and tucked away which we like.
House 1 is 100 square foot bigger, and has a study, and an extra ‘family room’ section of the kitchen/diner. It’s 4 bedrooms, all decent sizes. DP works from home 4 days a week, and we’ve got two children. So we’d probably use the study as a playroom or the family room, and use an upstairs bedroom as an office. But we’d have room to grow, could have a third child/or use a bedroom as a spare room if we used the study as a study. There is a garage with two parking spaces but they are behind one another. The garage is attached to another houses garage, so the driveway is effectively shared, and they have two parking spaces behind each other too.
House 2 is the corner plot - 100sq ft smaller. Very similar upstairs to house 1, but downstairs has a bigger lounge, no study and no family room bit in the kitchen/diner. 4 bedrooms again, so we’d use one of those as a study. But it feels very private considering it’s on a new build estate - facing mature trees to the front and one of the sides. It’s not too close to the next house either. It has a garage which is on its own and two side by side parking spaces. There is also a good strip of grass in front of the house which isn’t part of the house and is owned by the management company, but which looks like the front garden. It’s right at the end of the cul de sac/ a dead end so I can’t see why people would be walking on it. We like the idea of potentially buying the land in the future and then we’d have quite a large plot and potentially scope to extend down the line. However we’d probably want to do that in 10 years or so, by which point we’d have teens and less need for the extra space downstairs. The garden is slightly bigger than house 1, but it’s a bit of an odd shape as it’s a corner plot.
DP thinks he will be WFH less and less but we would still want a computer room/office either way, though the less it’s being used the less important it is.
the estate agent has said someone is booked to reserve house 1 on Thursday, so we don’t have long to make a decision, but may mean we are less likely to be offered incentives on house 1 as they’ve had more interest. House 1 has been reduced so was initially priced higher than house 2.
Both are the same price - so which would you value more? Two extra rooms and a bit more space, or a bigger/better plot + better parking? Both houses are potential forever homes/long term homes so not overly worried about which is the best investment, but I’m assuming the corner plot will be worth more long term. Are there other factors I need to consider? We are really torn!