House needs money spending on it again

[hillsandtrees]

Feeling overwhelmed as house needs money spending on it again
New kitchen
Redecorating (everything grubby)
New carpets
Some new floors
Garden work

Etc etc etc

What things do others have to do in their homes?
Is it worth it?
Haven’t decorated for ages as careless teens but now looking around chipped yellow skirtings, grubby looking even when cleaned.
Just wandering if others feel same and what you all need to do in your homes?

No answer for you, but thinking exactly the same.
Just bought a house that is way grubbier and worn than we thought when viewing.

Feeling overwhelmed as it needs freshening up top to bottom.

We just moved in and decorated from top to bottom. Except for the bedroom, which needs the wallpaper removing and probably reskimming, which we can’t afford right now so just washed it down with sugar soap (and it was minging). The garden needs a new fence and an overhaul, gutters/soffits need work, chimney needs repointing, kitchen and bathroom both functional but look tired. And I’d love a bike store in the front garden, currently tripping over two bikes in the hallway and two in a cupboard.

Also spent weeks getting our old flat ready to rent out - there seem to be a million and one little niggles to be fixed (we lived with them, tenants wouldn’t). I thought it was in quite good condition! Apparently not.

Yup, same here - I’ve got the ‘10yr everything seems to need attention’ problem. And I really need new windows too … just the cost!! I feel your pain x

Mine's 20 years. Everything could do with fresh paint and flooring. Need a new sofa because we're using a donated one (MIL weed on ours when she lived with us).

The mortgage is now paid off so we have a bit more money to do things. It's just deciding where to start!

Roof
Skirtings
Skimming
The lost goes on.

Cosmetic stuff I'll paint myself when/if I have time but honestly at the end of the day it's just stuff and I have better things to spend my money on.....like buying food 😄

I feel the same like every house I’ve owned has been a money pit ( I’ve moved a lot). The fact is properties need constant maintenance.

Even our current house that seemed in great condition when we moved in about 6/7 years ago. We’ve spent lots of money on the garden, redecorated several rooms, had new en suite installed, sorted a leak that meant another room had to be unexpectedly redecorated, paid for a new consumer unit etc etc.

It’s endless really. And if you don’t do it you look around one day and the house looks tired and unloved. Which affects the price you can get when you come to sell.

I have just been having a look at the property listing photos of my house when I bought it nearly 10 years ago. It looked lovely. It looks dreadful now. I have no money to redo kitchen etc but thinking I buy lots of white paint and at least freshen all the walls, one room at a time. First I’m going to clean as much as I can and clear any clutter.

My garden and the exterior need a lot of work but I repainted the front door not so long ago and that helped a little.

Can you think of anything you can start on OP?

It's endless isn't it? On top of the endless housework.

And if you don’t do it you look around one day and the house looks tired and unloved.

This is what happened with me, I hadn’t paid attention and then realised how run down it is. It’s difficult now to find the time and money.

I've just bought a house. I've spent twenty grand so far, new kitchen, new boiler, new radiators, walls re plastered, walls knocked down, new back window and door, sockets moved, vents blocked off. Still to do, new bathroom, decorate from top to bottom, carpets and flooring throughout, blinds and curtains, front porch needs to be stripped out and re plastered. Oh and the garden is a jungle.

I bought a 1930 house last year and It really was a shock to realise how much updating it needed...

The survey missed some stuff but also I constantly have to make good decades of dodgy DIY and botched jobs by tradesmen.

1 year on it does look better but there is still a lot to do!

The decorating (painting all the rooms, removing all the carpets, restoring the floorboards, painting the kitchen units, painting the shed and fences, putting on new shed windows...) I managed to do myself and I also cleared and re-designed the garden.

Ive never expected to live in a new-looking showroom so im ok with things not all being perfect.
If i stressed about every mark in the paintwork id constantly need to be doing something. I also purposefully have never gone in for being super on trend with decor, i just decorate how i like so it doesn't date in the same way

Mine needs new windows, a new drive, painting top to bottom, a new kitchen and new flooring everywhere

i can’t see that I’ll ever be able to afford it all

Me too I bought my house 5 years ago. It had had a major refurb 20 years earlier. So now of course lots of things need doing. Seems to be a small leak under the bathroom floor so that seems to trigger replacing the 20 year old bathroom as floor will have to come up. I just remortgaged to do works but having dilemma about whether to include the bathroom or not

I’m gearing up to sell and the thought of spending time and money to tidy it up is galling. At least you will get the benefit of any improvements!

We (well, dh) massively underestimated both the scale and the cost of doing work on our house. Sometimes I get really down about it. The things I'd want to change now aren't essential but they aren't what I'd have chosen. Skirting boards, light fittings, artex ceilings, I'd like to put coving back in for example. A lot of areas are tired and need refreshed. We have done so much work in this house, I estimate we've spent 100k over 8 years. We've just done our bathrooms. In doing that we uncovered yet more wiring that needs replaced, so that now needs done, and then hopefully we can skim our ceilings, then decorate hall, stairs, landing.
The garden is big, full of weeds, old fashioned, and just work really, we aren't natural gardeners and it's just another chore.

Yeah... I'm a single parent. In 2012 I was earning 8k part time and had a 2 year old. My ex left, 3 months after we'd moved from our beautiful extended house to a doer upper. He was a tradesman. He'd found his ex on FB and left for her.

I had to pay for food and fuel on a credit card. At that time I wasn't good for credit as I'd never built any alone. So interest was high and I wasn't very savvy. Our house had no carpets, I couldn't afford heating oil that first winter, walls in most rooms were crumbling, the bathroom and kitchen were at least 40 years old, the bath had a hole in, half the windows were single glazed, the garden massive and overgrown, I could go on. Needless to say a lick of paint was the least of my worries.

Anyway, long story short, I couldn't sell without being left with massive debt and nowhere to live. So I slowly dug myself out of it. I did the major work slowly - new kitchen as we actually had a flood so insurance covered half of that. Carpets were a priority for warmth. I did lots of little jobs myself - bodged. In 2016 I was able to release my ex from the mortgage. In 2021 I was finally earning enough to increase the mortgage enough to get a new bathroom, roof trims, replace any dud windows, plaster and decorate, replace some of the internal doors. I started using a gardener a few times a year.

The work was completed in 2022 as it took ages to find people wanting small jobs. I was so proud and loved the finished house, despite it being such an old house that it would never be a patch on our old house that I still pine after 12 years later.

Roll forward to now... 3 years on. I look around and see the little dinks in walls, skirting that I didn't quite finish in the bathroom, carpet fraying on the bottom step, dirty walls on the stairs, bits of sealant peeling away. Household maintenance really. Those are things I wouldn't have noticed 5 years ago as the house was such a state I couldn't even face bringing people into it. Now I have a normal house I notice every little issue. I feel overwhelmed by the fact I finally got myself into a position to have a nice home, and now it needs decorating again. My mind has rushed to wanting to sell and buy somewhere newer before expensive jobs creep in.

Home ownership isn't all it's cracked up to be, but I still thank the stars I'm paying £800pm to own my house rather than £1600pm to rent it.

Our 1930s house was tired and dated when we moved in 13 years ago. After a big spend and help from builders/ decorators, we now paint one room a year and keep the house looking good. It helps to list jobs in order of priority and work out what you can do yourself and which jobs need paid help.

Loads. We have spent around £160k so far in 8 years. Its did need a lot of work at first with basics like electrics, plumbing, floors, kitchens, heating etc. All spread out whilst we save up for the next bit

We still have loads to do. Big project I’m hoping will not need doing another 5+ years is a new roof. We also need new driveway, garage structural fixed, would like to add solar. And all three bathrooms/ loos are still from the 1960s.

Im currently looking to take up and relay all the hardwood flooring to re trim and sort expansion gaps as too small for summer humidity. And then glue down. And add skirting we have never got around too. This is mainly a time and hassle thing rather than super expensive, but still a pain. Then need to fit and built two alcove cabinets ( using ikea hacks to save £)

Day to day things like painting/ repairs/ fixing small things we end up doing almost weekly. Just built some under stairs shelves and painted last few days, took up cheap curtain that was too long to go in front last night

Op the “maintence rule” is we should aim to spend 1 percent of the house value annually on maintenance. So if your house is worth 250k, you’d budget to spend 2.5k a year, obviously you won’t spend all that each year, but if we average it in terms of decorating, boiler, kitchen, bathrooms, repairs, flooring, plumbing, outside space, that should be the rough number. It’s a rough rule of thumb and of course many don’t do that, but gives a good indication of the rough cost of maintaining a house over the years.

A lot of people these days seem to automatically call a tradesman out for anything you need doing. However DIY can save you a lot of money, is very satisfying once done, and often much easier than you think. YouTube is full of videos if you’re not sure how to do something.

My neighbour is having her house redecorated and the cost has made my eye water, running into a few thousand pounds. When I did my house it cost a few hundred for the paint.

My other neighbour got her fence done and it cost her £3000. I did mine myself and it cost me £700 in materials (and that’s better quality posts and panels than my neighbour got)

Money just disappears doesn't it. A few thousand here and there, plus VAT, can make small jobs so expensive. Bathrooms can cost upwards from 10,000!

But I was just reading that thread on flats and service charges. I'm not sure which worry I would rather have.

I'm currently renting, have a choice to make soon and just can't decide between house or flat.

We have also bought a house that needs more doing to it than expected. Noone in our family has a trade but everyone will pitch in when someone else needs it doing basic stuff like stripping wallpaper and painting. That saves loads.

Also, we don't pay for anything garden related really, just have grass and bushes for easy upkeep and borrow a power washer for the flags.

Also we are trying to employ very local tradespeople and it's been hard to find them so everything has dragging on for months but I feel like the expense is more justified because they have done a good job and not left a mess.

We won't be able to update the 70s bathroom (avocado with tiles coming off the wall) or kitchen for years.

In my experience people wait till the kids leave home and then with the extra money begin to slowly renovate.

Tell me about it. We have a running list of things that need to be done and aim to tick one thing off per week. We have a weekly diary meeting anyway and decide our house maintenance priorities at the same time.

One policy we have is to eat the elephant one bite at a time. We break down everything into small jobs and DIY what we can. So last weekend I painted one internal door, that’s it. And this week’s job is simply to measure up for some curtains. Much better than looking at the whole list and getting overwhelmed.

House if you can afford it.