Anyone else in this situation??

lanyroo

Hi

Anyone out there got any advice? I live in a three bedroom house, worth around £250,000. Its far too big for me now but to buy a bungalow is around the same or dearer than the price of my house, unless I move to a different area.

No reason not too really as most of my friends don't live in my area - but I feel as I have lived in this area for over 25 years its a sort of comfort zone.

OR I could spend the little money I have doing my house up that has become rather tatty over the years,

Anyone got any view on this?

TomsMom

I think it really depends on whether you are happy where you are.

Do you like the area and what it offers (shops, social facilities, public transport, medical care, journey time to hospital if you need it), do you get on with your neighbours, etc?

Are your house and garden manageable and will they be so when you get older? If not will you be able to get maintenance people easily or will it be a massive chore and maybe get very run down?

If you would prefer ground floor living then I don't think it really matters that a bungalow will be the same price as your house, bungalows invariably command a premium.

My mother is 84 and has lived in her bungalow for 30 years. She doesn't like the stairs when she visits me but I can't help thinking that if she had stayed in a house then the stairs would have been daily exercise for her. My aunt lived until she was 90 and lived in a house where her bedroom was on the third floor and although she had slowed down she never found the stairs a real problem!

If you are happy in your comfort zone and don't want to leave the area, you could maybe look for a bungalow near you. Then again, do you have a spirit of adventure and like new challenges, like making new friends, like exploring new areas, etc?

If you are happy to move anywhere in this country then is there a favourite area where you've enjoyed holidays?

lanyroo

Thanks for that. Bungalows in my area are very expensive. I like the area although I am not near the shops.
I am a 20 min walk from the station and the buses are erratic.

The garden, although small, is getting unmanageable cos I have a bad back. I enjoy gardening but after a while the back seems to go and I have to sit down for a while and I am only 56.

The exercise is good going up and down the stairs - but I am now thinking of the price of keeping the house warm as all these stories of gas and electricity prices going through the roof.

Ho hum - I suppose its down to me making a decision - not good at that.

Thanks again for replying to me.

TomsMom wrote: »

I think it really depends on whether you are happy where you are.

Do you like the area and what it offers (shops, social facilities, public transport, medical care, journey time to hospital if you need it), do you get on with your neighbours, etc?

Are your house and garden manageable and will they be so when you get older? If not will you be able to get maintenance people easily or will it be a massive chore and maybe get very run down?

If you would prefer ground floor living then I don't think it really matters that a bungalow will be the same price as your house, bungalows invariably command a premium.

My mother is 84 and has lived in her bungalow for 30 years. She doesn't like the stairs when she visits me but I can't help thinking that if she had stayed in a house then the stairs would have been daily exercise for her. My aunt lived until she was 90 and lived in a house where her bedroom was on the third floor and although she had slowed down she never found the stairs a real problem!

If you are happy in your comfort zone and don't want to leave the area, you could maybe look for a bungalow near you. Then again, do you have a spirit of adventure and like new challenges, like making new friends, like exploring new areas, etc?

If you are happy to move anywhere in this country then is there a favourite area where you've enjoyed holidays?

missile

Older bungalos usually have a large garden. You might want to consider a flat?

If you are hoping to release some capital, do your sums carefully. It is surprising how much it costs to move home.

chesky369

What about a flat - perhaps not in a block, but maybe part of an Edwardian house.

lilac_lady

If you have the money perhaps you could get some work done in your garden so that it's very easily maintained. In winter you only need to heat the rooms that you actually use. If you get on fine with your neighbours and are near a shop and some local transport, I'd stay put and make your house as comfortable for yourself as you can. It would be awful if you moved and then hated your new home.

Ted_Hutchinson

Have you ever considered the Rent a Room Scheme?

We are not particularly hard up but we have just started doing this as our house/garden is too big for us to manage and someone in the village was about to be homeless and it seemed a good idea.

We now have a resident gardener/chicken sitter and caretaker, a little extra money each week and some general help about the place. ("If your going to the shops will you fetch some more milk?" "It raining I've bought your washing in") Apart from the company it's jolly useful.

I bet there is someone locally you could share one of your rooms with, who would be delighted to give you a bit of a hand if needed and if it's all tax free extra income you won't begrudge spending a little bit to tidy the place up a tad.

With fuel bills rising having someone else help paying to heat the house isn't a bad idea.

Errata

I think you need some concrete stuff to point you in the right direction.
You've mentioned difficulty with the garden and the cost of heating.
Try thinking back to how you were at 46 and at 36 and what you were able to manage then, and can't now. Then based on that think forwards 10, 20, 30 years and try and imagine what you can manage now that you may have difficulty in managing in the future.
It will certainly feel more difficult and far more of an upheaval to move in 10 or 20 years time than it would be for you now. HTH

margaretclare

From what I have seen and heard over the years, and personal experience, I'm firmly of the opinion that if you're thinking about 'downsizing', do it while you're still reasonably fit, active and compos mentis, don't wait too long.

Dealing with stairs, climbing in and out of baths etc, is not necessarily an age thing - I knew a lady who had reached 105 and still did just that. It depends on physical ability rather than age. DH and I have replaced joints (my hips and his knees) and we prefer no stairs and shower rather than bath.

You already know that the garden is getting difficult. We have a largish garden at our 1930s bungalow, and mostly it's a wildlife garden now. I grow things in pots and containers - no bending. If you like gardening it's still possible to do some using containers, without feeling stressed and hassled by 'gotta mow the lawn, can't let it go wild'.

Fuel costs are something else, and if you don't need 3 bedrooms then moving would possibly be a good option. Houses ARE selling, but only if the price is right. A lot around here have been on the market for ages, but a few have sold, usually inherited, where there wasn't the need to get a good price to move up to something bigger.

I have never regretted moving to this bungalow in 1990.

HTH

nihcaj

I did live in a bungalow for a while, and liked it, although not everyone sees them this way. Most are well out of my range now though due to change in circumstances, but having seen the alternatives, it's not a problem for me in terms of mobility - whether you are moving or staying put there are solutions, and a move could well leave plenty of cash to do this, without a great loss of personal comfort -

Stairlifts - from about 1500 quid., free you up to live on two floors in most houses.
When mobility is limited, bathing is often far more of an imminent problem than stairs, (after all, stairs are each about 8" high, a bath needs about a 20" lifting of a leg - so a bathroom conversion to some sort of wetroom is not a bad idea, even in a bungalow. For more convenience, a downstairs wc might be a good idea if a suitable under stair space or whatever can be found, (pump assisted perhaps) and could even add value to the house, although removing a bath will NOT, but hey, it's no big deal, and the luxury of a wetroom you can sit down in to shower has to be experienced to be believed, and can even allow you to cope with very restricted mobility levels :-(

This sort of conversion made a radical difference for my parents, and meant no move at all, and a lot less stress; and as my mobility is now poor, (at a lot younger age) I need the bathroom work doing soon, long before I need even consider stairlifts.

Conversion costs on a smaller convenient house could well cost a lot less than an equivalent sized and specified bungalow, and give a lot more choice of area and accommodation standard too. Sadly there is still the problem of selling up, although anything will sell if priced low enough, and there could still be enough left after being able to solve the restricted mobility problems. You do have to be thinking on your feet when looking for a new house though - outside steps or poor access will need to be put into the consideration too, naturally enough that applies to bungalows too!

Local Authority grants are around, but I understand this is often no easy thing, and is an issue in it's own right! :-(

Flats have been mentioned, and I know people who love theirs, but for someone who has been used to their own self-contained defensible space like me, this is a step FAR too far - you need to be deaf to the noise of others, and tolerant of junk being left in communal areas, and immune to the smell of their cooking as well as the many other pitfalls. Service charges in shared accommodation of all sorts are also an issue, especially if the reason for the move is a financial one, and you are not used to having that monthly outlay.

One tip... stay clear of certain "specialist" companies who advertise a lot for doing this sort of work, and look for more independent people who have a good track record: there is nothing rocket-science about it that means normal tradesmen can't do the work. (Just Google the company name + problems to see the sort of hassles you might expect!)