What’s more important - outside space or a house ready to go

[chunkymunkyy]

Two houses. One we’re supposed to be buying but the delays have been ridiculous, also very real possibility we’ll only get a possessory title for…

I’ve seen another house. I like it, it has a smaller garden but it actually has a self contained annexe and a garage. It has two bedrooms on the first floor and a large attic room. It had a utility, which is a must for me. It’s also £385k compared to £430k we’re paying for the other one. It’s done up nicely, mix of old and new and wouldn’t require any extensive renovations

The house we’re buying while on the outside looks better, has more outside space and a huge garden, we will have to extend the kitchen and also probably (if we can) do a loft conversion due to one of the 4 bedrooms being much smaller than the others. It will need fully modernising. It has a garage too.

We have 4 kids. One is my dsd who doesn’t come over alot but will need a room when she does want too. Two toddlers and a ds starting secondary.

Both houses are detached but the second one is on a street on the outskirts of town rather than a busy road into town like the first. We don’t care about the main road as the drive is big and the house is quite set back.

What would you do?

That sounds like a normal negotiation discount. They need to take a hit on the hassle and stress of the title deed, in my opinion. At least the cost of the indemnity insurance over the next 12 years or so. This is not a normal house sale, so they are CFs if they expect the kind of money that a freehold property would fetch.

I think it depends a bit on your lifestyle. We have a small garden and it's fine, we are super busy, neither of us enjoy gardening, our kids are fairly "geeky" not football fans/wilders so don't need the roaming space.
How easy will renovations be with so many children and a busy house? Do you have money in the budget plus enough contingency for the work? We needed a house fairly ready to go due to work and toddlers so couldn't have faced an extension or project.
So I think it depends how you'll live in it? If you've really outdoorsy kids who are always out with a football, or you want chickens or love gardening then clearly a bit plot is really important. If doing work is fun for you,you love putting your own stamp on it, great. If neither of these apply I'd be tempted by house 2, although (I know you said bedroom 4 was too small but I don't think it is really) I think the bedroom set up of house 1 is better and if you've wild kids or sporty kids I'd be sticking by house 1. Suspect house 1 would also be the better investment when you've done a kitchen extensionandthe deeds issue gets sorted out

I used to work at a mortgage company...likely the solicitors don't want to do the extra work and it's easier for them to palm you off with indemnity insurance. However, for something like this, I would be surprised if your mortgage company would allow it, as it would make repossession harder if they needed to go down that route.

So, we went to view house 2 yesterday and it’s a really lovely house, decorated so well. But sadly I think it’s too small for us. Even with the annexe (which was so nice, even had loft space in there for storage)
I think that one bedroom which is split would be fine for the toddlers while they’re little but once they get older it wouldn’t work. The attic room has got building regs, but it isn’t as big as it looks on the pictures, I really wish estate agents wouldn’t use that long lens !
I think I need to go and see house 1 again and remember why I fell in love with it in the first place, it’s just been so long since the Initial viewing and all the stress and delays since has just made me fall out of love with it..
But in the long run that’s the house that we can really make our own, yes it will cost a bomb, and yes it won’t be pretty but ultimately it will add alot of value. Also it’s more convenient for a schools.

More land. They've stopped making it!