Large communal garden and living centrally vs private garden in the suburbs

[hodgepodge01]

WWYD?
We have toddlers and are weighing up living centrally with a large beautiful communal garden with playground across the road and being close to parks and playgrounds, better transport, museums etc, but being in a large flat with a high service charge, that needs at least some renovating. Or a terrace house in the suburbs with a large private garden. It's been updated but not extended and is in a quiet neighbourhood we don't know so well, but seems family orientated. The commute is equivalent as one is better for either one of us. They are the same price.

The house

I would take private garden any day over being in a a flat in the middle of town with toddlers. But each to their own.

I made this choice and chose the central / no garden option. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a pang about it when the weather is good but I do adore my neighbours and DD has a huge gang of friends who play out in our communal garden all day (no pestering for
screen time at all here). The short commute plus work from home means I can spend the max time with DD. I really value the close community here too. I guess the other thing is that my interests and spare time is normally spent doing cultural things so I do value location for that too.

House. Communal gardens would be a bit useless with kids, probably neighbours complaining about noise, can’t put play equipment or paddling pools out, can’t have the door open and let the kids run in and out, can’t hold a birthday party there etc.

I’d also think that renovating a flat in a central area is going to be a bit tricky, again friends that have done this have had neighbours on the warpath, difficulties with the freeholder etc, builders wouldn’t touch it because access/ parking was tricky, cost a fortune for similar reasons.

depends
one house with communal garden we discounted as the garden basically was a dog toilet and the seating/bbq area quasi unusable due to that.

House, that service charge will be an issue when you sell. Without it I'd do for the communal garden option.

With toddlers, the house. A private garden space just makes life so much easier.

Thanks all. I forgot to mention the communal garden is huge - like 4 city blocks. I would probably walk them in a wagon across the road with some water play table stuff etc. Definitely big enough to kick some balls around too. It's jsut weather having their own vegepatch, swing set, sand pit, garden connected to the house is more important. And if we can adjust to the burb and feeling more disconnected from cultural stuff and other parks etc (there is one big park nearby). And also stairs vs being on one level.

The high service charge includes heating and hot water (and porter), though i'm not sure how much it is for heat and hot water for a 3-4 bed terrace house without double glazing in London?

The communal garden size still doesn’t matter. I’d choose the house every time.

House with toddlers coming from a mother of toddlers who moved from flat to house. Fling open the doors and let them roam safely, they love it!

For me it would depend on if Dc can access the communal garden by themselves or not. A private garden is invaluable when you can just open the back doors and kids can wander in and out. I would hate a communal garden if they can’t do that.

Thanks all - can I ask what percentage of the year your garden gets used? Is it weather dependent or do the kids go out into it all year?

I holidayed in Copenhagen in a flat where this was the set up. It was lovely seeing all the parents and children meeting up in the communal place.

Google is saying it costs 400-500/mo to heat a terrace house in winter - does that sound right?

Mine were out in all weathers, although I preferred them not to be if it was pouring with rain. They went out all year round.

We moved from a first floor flat with communal gardens to a small terrace with private garden in burbs. I greatly missed where we used to live but 100% it was much better with kids in house. You can have free flow in and out of the house - it’s not a palava every time you want to go in the garden. If one needs the loo you can be there in 20 seconds. When they’re a little older you can answer the front door when they’re in the garden. The baby can be sleeping in the house while you’re playing outside in back garden with older toddler with back door open and baby monitor.
You can get baby and shopping into your house without playing stairs / pushchair / communal entrance hall shuttling logistics. You can usually park outside your house. You can put what you want in your own garden and dry clothes and kids can have a swing and paddling pool that you can leave out till the next day.

We can go to the park if we want more space but our own garden is one of the main reasons we moved. Don’t regret it for a second - I miss the old place, but no regrets.

Go out everyday in summer (and a lot of the day depending on plan), and very little screen time as a result, also frequent in Spring and Autumn, not so much in Winter, so basically March-Oct very well used. So much great stuff to entertain themselves outside, esp with the heat as don't have to go out but set up water and sand in shade and both kid happy for ages. Flat was sweltering in the summer, so although we went to splash pads, hose in the garden with paddling pools, sprinkler is so much better!

Early spring through to about October. Our garden gets really wet and puddles in the winter but if it wasn’t for that they’d be out there more. Plus we use it as an outdoor fridge for Xmas food overspill :-)

Did you need to change neighbourhoods? We love our old neighbourhood - it's very hard to leave it for the burbs...

I pay £140 a month for gas and electric for a 3 bed Victorian semi detached house with no cavity wall. £400 a month for a terrace sounds very excessive unless it’s huge. You can ask the vendors how much they pay though…it’s a reasonable question.

Stairs inside the house are way easier to manage than stairs up to the flat.

This ^

I’m going against the grain and saying the flat. The extra cost of bills in the house and the extra cleaning will outweigh the service charge imo. And being central is great, you’ll save on transport costs too

And I would 100% go for the house. Dd was in and out the garden under her own steam from 2yo. Sling the kids out while you keep half an eye on them. 👍