Stretch for forever home or stay put and have more financial security/freedom?

[Birchwoods]

I’m interested to hear what others have done/would do. We live in a lovely four bedroom, detached extended house but with a fairly small garden on a road of 1970s semis. The house is great and size isn’t an issue, but we’ve never seen it as our forever home. We have a good household income, DH is a high earner, and 20 yrs ago would’ve been able to buy a big house on a large plot, but as salaries have not kept up with the cost of living, we’re in a fairly modest property.

There’s a house that we know will be coming in the market soon, less than 50m from ours but overlooking the common, with gates and a huge garden. A proper forever home. But we would stretch ourselves financially if we bought it. It would need some work (garage conversion to create a bigger kitchen) but it would be an investment and 20 yrs ago the owner got planning consent for a building plot at one end of the garden, so that would potentially be an option in the future.

if we stay where we are we will never have the garden we dreamed of and would feel a bit like “is this it?” but if we move we won’t have as much disposable income and we’d have to extend our mortgage term. Although that would probably be reduced in 10-15 years if we got planning for the plot in the garden and sold it. DH will be 45 this year so if we’re going to make the move it really needs to be this year. There aren’t really any other suitable properties in this area, and we’d like to stay here because of schools etc. For info purposes house would probably sell for £575k-ish and the house we like would be around £750k. Any other properties we’ve seen are more expensive than ours but it would be a sideways move as they’re not any bigger and it’s a big leap to the next level of house that would be worth moving to.

Any advice or wisdom appreciated!

My mum is 74 she is still there in the ebed home we grew up in and a very large garden. Most aould say the house is too big for her but when we stay over its the right space. She spends alot od time in her garden, growing various vegetables etc. Her garden is immaculate because of the time she spends in it but more importantly it keeps her fit and healthy and the food she grows is much healthier too as its not sprayed on etc.

Gardens are useful to have past kids and in particular if you like gardening.

Im sure at some point it will become hard for her but she is doing pretty right at 74 and long may it continue.

Thanks for all the replies, it’s seems
pretty 50/50, but one thing that sticks out is that the majority of people who have stretched themselves haven’t regretted it. I’m going for a coffee with the owner of the house on Friday to See what she plans on doing in terms of putting it on the market and what she thinks she might accept for it. It might be that it’s out of reach for us or someone will
offer higher than we can go, in which case the decision will be made for us, but part of me does think that if we don’t get the outside space we’ve always wanted and felt we would have, we would regret it. I’ll post an update once we know if anything is happening, if anyone is interested.

We’re in the same situation. We currently have a 4 bed end of terrace house but just one bathroom/toilet and no way to change this. 3 kids so a family of 5 and DC1 is now a pre teen and she spends so much time in the bathroom, we argue every morning. Also this is not a desirable location but we bought the house 9 years ago as it was the best house we can afford then and we only had one kid then but now we have 3.
It’s lovely as all the kids have their rooms, there’s parking but as time has gone on, we’re earning more, we can afford lots of life niceties and overpay our mortgage but we just feel unfulfilled, DH especially. Houses we love will almost double our current mortgage which we can afford but means we’ll have to be more careful. I just want to live in a more desirable location, one where I’m not worried about my kids playing outside, more toilets and detached.
We decided to put our house on the market last week. If it sells and we find a lovely house that meets our requirements then that’s the sign we need. I think at some point, I feel coming home to a happy space will be important. DH just turned 40 this year so that’s been what’s spurred us because it’s either now or never. We’ll see how it all goes.

Is living by the common not pretty good in terms of wildlife? I would've thought you'd have more access there than in a bigger private garden.

Good luck! The house seems a great one so I am thinking that it will attract lots of interested parties.

How much would the garage conversion cost, 50, 100k? RN I would not be taking on another 200+ plus of debt at 45 unless I worked in the defence industry.

If she sold it privately to you she’d save on estate agent fees and might split the difference with you.

You need to ask yourself whether, if it sold to someone else, you’d be disappointed or relieved that the decision was out of your hands.

In theory, the best time to trade up is during a slump, ideally toward the back end of it. We certainly seem to be transitioning from a stagnant market to a falling market for 2026 - so that's that box ticked - if you have the CASH that is.
However "stretching" yourself (by borrowing more) could result in some real unforseen difficulties. If your not able to comfortably fund the move from savings I would say stay put !
Too much uncertainty around borrowing costs and another possible bout of inflation and cost of living increases imo. Throw in an unexpected illness or a reduction in earning capability and your in the crap quickly....
I would focus your efforts on using that extra childcare money ,and any other cut backs you can comfortably make, to save the difference between your home and the next level. Taking on more debt is not a clever idea at the moment. We are well passed the days of cheap borrowing and unlikely to be going back. Inflation at "unexpectedly" high levels is likley to continue and so are cost of living increases. The global financial situation is precarious at best. Do it the smart way by saving while prices adjust. Have a read of another thread on the property section about why 800k plus houses are struggling and realise that that hasn't yet, but will likley filter down to difficulties in the lower price brackets too.

If you’re thinking of selling off some of the garden for building don’t underestimate how much noise, dust and mess this will create. A new house was build about 50 metres from us and it was awful for about a year, you’ll be much closer if it’s in your back garden.

We moved and don’t regret it - love the extra space and we can easily stay here for 20 years.

We fixed our mortgage long term for financial security, and since then we’ve had pay rises so we do have more wriggle room. We no longer pay childcare but teenagers are more expensive to keep so that evens out.

I’m really glad we moved when we did (kids were mid primary) as we have loads of time to enjoy the luxury of space with them. It was the right thing for us.

Its a no from me.

House prices are not going up significantly
Building work is through the roof.
Maintaining will be more as will utilities.

You have a 4 bed detached and are next to green space (if the new house is 50m away and overlooks a common)
The area is good / meets your needs (hence same.road)

There is no way in my 40s or older i'd be doing this.

We are in a garage less 5.bed semi and never moving.

Our hh income is north of 250k gross.
I cannot wait to stop servicing mortgage and childcare bills.

The amount of people saying stay put really surprises me, I woukd say make the move. However if the majority of people are staying put rather than moving to a bigger house that should bring down the price of bigger houses, in theory!!!!

A four bed detached house is not what I would call ‘modest’. Ok it’s not a mansion but bigger than the majority of people in this country.

I personally wouldn’t for a garden. How long and for how much of the year will you really use it. I’d much rather have spare money to spend or invest.

It sounds like your husband and maybe you have a different outlook though. Possibly a bit of pressure on yourselves to keep striving or keep up with/outdo the Joneses.

if we don’t get the outside space we’ve always wanted and felt we would have, we would regret it.
There is your answer, @Birchwoods . Go for it.