Would you rather.. (house buying)

[HouseoneHousetwo]

..a smaller house with large garden with views over countryside but slightly overlooked by neighbours.
OR
a larger house with a small but private garden.

We are family with young kids

😂😂 smaller house is about 2-3 times bigger than most family homes so I think you'd survive.

Smaller house with bigger garden - it depends on how overlooked but you can add strategic trees for privacy. Views and lots of outdoor space are a luxury.

4500 sq ft is 5 double bedrooms, 5 bathrooms, 4 receptions, kitchen...obviously many variations but that's one.

I wouldn't want a house that size tbh...unless maybe you have 6 kids or something.

I'd 100% go with the 'small' house which is still a large family home.

I'd definitely go for the "smaller" one in that case. When we bought our current house, we always thought we'd move somewhere bigger and more rural as the DC got older. Both DH and I grew up semi-rurally. As it is, we're staying here at least until they leave school as:

• 2 min, pavement walk to bus stop for secondary school and less than a 2 mile walk if needed, again on lit pavements in built up areas
• same less than 2 mile walk to local town
• plenty of friends in the village so DC have freedom to go out, to the play area, to the shops/coffee shop
• lots of people for lift shares. With a DH who travels a lot for work and DC who play a lot of sport, these are invaluable.
• when the DC were a bit younger, a ready supply of very local teens to babysit who could then walk/be walked home
• now they're older, I don't worry about the kids being home alone as, if there is a problem, they can nip to a neighbour.
• I like the semi-regular but pressure free contact of having neighbours. Impromptu cups of tea/drinks, someone to provide a missing ingredient, let a handyman in and that sort of thing. It is worth saying that we have really nice neighbours
• we don't have any family locally so knowing that there is an immediate net work to fall back on if something went wrong is reassuring. When one of the neighbours with 3 DC broke her knee and couldn't drive or do much, we all stepped up and made sure all of her DC got to their activities and things, helped out with supermarket shopping, took her out for a cup of tea when she was going spare with boredom. That sort of thing. Again, we have really nice neighbours. If a friend of mine who did that lived more rurally, I would want to do that sort of thing but the logistics would mean I just couldn't do as much of it.

Do the 3000/4500 figures that the poster is giving refer to the size of the garden, or the house? OP's posts are not very clear.

“Smaller” (haha!) house has everything going for it

wouldn’t be a hard choice for me

4500sqft would take fucking ages to clean.

Our house is1700 square feet and is pretty roomy - it's hard to judge OP as I think you have your sizing out. Unless you really are comparing a 5 bed 3 reception house with a 7 bedder!!