Head or Heart? I need sorting out!

Tinkaf1

Bit of background.... Put our house on the market last Oct and moved into rented 200 miles away, finally accepted an offer 2 weeks ago. We are planning to see the sale through to completion and then we will be in a very good proceedable position to buy.

The longer I live here (rented) the smaller my ideal area to buy becomes. LOL! I admit I am a fussy mare, who wants as much as I can, for a decent price. I have a "want list" as long as my arm, and need to understand how to compromise.

Ideally I want a 3 or 4 bed detached with a nice decent sized flat-ish garden. I would prefer a kitchen diner or potential to make one, instead of a lounge diner. I want a conservatory or space and scope to put one in, kerb appeal, bit of character and a garage. If it had room to put the caravan on the front or side without being an eyesore for the neighbours all the better. SEE - fussbag!

To top it all off, the "perfect area" is too expensive for us by far, yet the neighbouring zone is "almost perfect" and cheaper so we have more chance of getting what we want for our budget. However we are talking an area about a mile square here.
In the last couple of weeks we decided to view a few properties to get an idea of what we could afford. I decided to only look at chain free ones in this time because we weren't under offer at that point, and I didn't want people to have to tidy up for us when we weren't able to proceed.

Saw one which ticks many items on the wanted list, including location, 3 bed detatched, flat and private garden, however I would have liked a bigger garden and extra bedroom or kerb appeal which it doesn't really have too much of.
Properties in the area are really slow coming onto the market, and I could really do with sorting something out this summer because of school admissions by Oct. This house is a "head house". One that is sensible, decent value for money, spot on location, but is lacking in wow factor, or the land around to create an extension. I could put a conservatory on, but would have to say goodbye to the kids swings, playhouse, climbing frame etc. If there were loads of houses with big gardens in the area I would be hopeful, but looking on google maps I would say only about 15% of the houses in the area I want have a decent sized garden. Can I really sit around hoping one of these come onto the market?
With our old house I just knew I wanted it the minute we walked in, it was a huge 1930's semi and needed work. The area I want are either character properties outside my budget, or 60's builds which lack some character.

Ok, I am waffling.sorry ...

Do you feel you have to have that heart connection to something, or do you let your head rule and go for sensible option? On one hand I want to hold out for something I fall in love with, on the other I think we need to find something that "will do" and I could waste years waiting for something that might never come up!

Has anyone gone with head or heart and regretted it later? The thought of "settling" then seeing the "perfect place" come on the market 3 months later makes me feel sick.

ladymarmalade1970

I went with my head on the house i am living in now! I went with heart on the one we sold to buy this. My heart house i still miss now. It was a huge 5 bed Victorian terrace with a cellar. It had split floors and so much character but we moved because they were going to put double yellow lines down the road and we had no parking. We only lived there 8 months and made nearly 30k profit. We brought this house i am in now because it ticked all our boxes. 4 bed detached, large private garden, double garage and sought after area. It needed lots of work but i knew it could be done. The day we moved in we both looked at each other and thought !!!!!! have we done! 4 years later, 60k in improvements, numerous leaks and problems but it's now home. We still have lots to do and i still look longingly at some "heart" houses but you have to be practical. If i end up staying in this house for ever then that's ok as the longer i am here the more i like it. It has adapted to our family well and is proving difficult to match or improve on unless we increase our mortgage.
Our old "heart" house came back on the market and i joking said to my partner can we buy it back but i know really no parking is just not practical.
I have no regrets about going with our heads.

smartpicture

When I bought my last house, I had a spreadsheet with a list of columns of various essential features, followed by nice-to-have features etc. Then I entered each house in a row of the spreadsheet with a tick or question-mark against each feature I wanted, to see at a glance how closely they fitted my ideal house. There were about 25 columns on my spreadsheet, so I don't think you're being fussy at all!

However - what actually happened was that I went to see a house that fit hardly any of my criteria, even the essential ones, but as soon as I saw it I knew it was 'the one'. So that was that.

I think it's good to be aware of what you're looking for, so long as you're not too strict with yourself about letting those factors be the only thing you base your decision on. So go see lots of houses, and you'll end up with the one that's right for you.

quantic

I don't have much experience in buying houses, but one thing I have learned is that the things you think you want turn out not to be what you want. Go see a lot of houses, some of them might offer something which you didn't even know about and thus didn't know you'd want until you see it.

PasturesNew

The problem I have is that small houses don't have "all that extra stuff". By the time you've got "all that extra stuff" you're into 4-5 bed houses and people say "but you don't need all that just for you!" ... I know... but I want the "extra stuff".

Extra stuff: Good sized kitchen (not a galley); breakfast bar/open plan; patio doors; conservatory; utility room; garage (preferably double) off-road parking for 2-3 cars minimum; some outside sheds/stores (preferably brick built); an actual bath; an en-suite. If I had all that lot I'd just need 1 bedroom.

Tinkaf1

Thank you for all the replies. I think I just want to feel excited about moving in, not just plod in thinking we have saved 10k by having this one. I am 39 this year and this could be the house we spend the rest of our lives in, especially given the ups and downs of the market. I just need to feel it is somewhere I could spend the rest of my life in if we never moved again.
The trouble is with me I look at houses that are above my budget for jollies! Now houses that are double my budget are easy to look at, but houses that are marketed say at 40 or 50k over what we can afford are sooooo ideal.
I think as FTB when we bought our last house we looked at a couple of small houses and then went into the one we had and were just gobsmacked by the size. We were amazed it was in budget - and it was because it needed everything doing to it!! We spent about 12 years doing it and still never getting finished though. LOL! But no list, no expectations because we didn't have the experience I guess.

harrup

I completely understand your dilemma - I'm the same.

The only ( marginally) useful bit of advice I could give you is this: aim high...but at the same time be brutally realistic. Diligently research sold prices of any houses in the area you like. It's pointless holding out for "the" heart house which would fulfill ALL of your desires to come on the market .... only to find they are all outside your budget. Or simply outside of how much you WANT to spend on a given property.

And from your description - the kind of property you are after is VERY likely to fall outside the "sensible price" remit. Simply because that's what most of us want! High demand ALWAYS equals high price.

So what to compromise on?

IMO a checklist is a GREAT starting point, but is only meaningful if its weighted according to importance.

Say, for instance" your list contains 5 "must have" features , 5 "should have" and another 5 "nice but not essential" features. To not get totally confused when looking at all different properties, sit down with your OH and rank these in order of personal importance and assign a numerical value to them (e.g. 4 bedrooms = 15 points, large garden for kids/grow veg= 14 points, specific location = 13 points, vicinity to particular school = 12 points and so forth and so on).

Take this ranking list with you when you view houses. After the visit total up the points. Invaluable in maintaining focus and thus avoiding buying a heart based, pretty mistake! Just to illustrate.... this list once narrowly avoided us buying a house with HUGE kerb appeal ( picture a wisteria ranked truly postcard-pretty property with a huge garden in full bloom, 5 bedrooms, etc, etc). Boy, was I smitten. However, when looking at my boring, but useful, ranking checklist we found that the house scored vitually nil on the "must have" scale, didn't do much better on the "should have" features....it was all fluff and heart and kerb appeal. Pretty or not I would have ultimately loathed living in a hamlet ( walking distance to amenities scoring highest on my list) & maintaining a huge garden without evening sun ( evening sun also scoring high, garden size scoring low).

And most importantly - stick to your budget. If it's more than you are willing or able to spend, don't engage in convoluted mental contorsions to make it happen anyway.

Years ago one of our friends fell in love with a property. Realistically, it was outside their means. But they vowed to forgo holidays and meals out and whatnot. So they bought it. For the next 2 years, they constantly, yet relatively cheerfully, robbed Peter to pay Paul. The 2 years after that they still had to do that....but the cheer had decreased markedly. Another 2 years and they hated the house and by now hated each other. Plus had accrued an impressive list of additional debts. The house was the nemesis. Is a house EVER worth that?

Good luck!

hazyjo

Heart every time. Unless you're buying as an investor, you have to absolutely love it. What you have to get your head round is, as said above, your 'heart' house won't tick all the boxes. Start again on RM or whatever you're looking on and only write off those that are absolute nos. Not those which have an awkward shaped room, or one with a smaller kitchen but great room next door you can use as a dining room or a 2nd reception where you can all eat that maybe fits a sofa in too and a telly. Look up conservatories on here - so many good an bad points. A few threads about them. I had a lean-to before and actually used and enjoyed it, but it would never be on my essentials list. Front character can be added. If it's a bit plain, maybe try a 'virtual' walk up the road on google maps - see what others have done to their houses. We're in an end of terrace and get no noise from next door. As nice as it is, don't entirely write off semis or end of terraces. You might be surprised - and it should knock enough off the price to enable you to get a bigger house.

You honestly can't always tell from the EA's details. Shortlist others you'd written off for whatever reason and just go for a look. Doesn't matter if you view 50 properties, you have to wait for the one you fall in love with.

I remember my first flat many moons ago. There wasn't a great deal on the market, and some were still holding out for higher prices (1990s' recession). We were adamant we knew what we wanted and viewed half a dozen, but nothing really grabbed at our heartstrings. We'd shortlisted one in the maybe pile which we thought we'd take a look at just for a comparison. It was on a main-ish road (something we'd completely ruled out initially), but very set back with parking spaces in the front. The kitchen was a galley one and built into the old hallway, just off the lounge. Second bedroom was very small, no window in bathroom... but we went and absolutely fell in love with it. Ceilings were high, really old Victorian massive house - we roughly had a quarter of it - it was a duplex so our bedrooms and bathroom were upstairs, and it felt like a house... we just absolutely loved it to bits.

Sometimes, you just make it work for you when it feels right. Go with your heart, for sure. I've loved all my houses except for one - bought it in haste as two purchases had fallen through. Split up with my (now ex) hubby there. I think there were horrendously bad vibes there. If you don't love something, you never feel quite 'right'.

Good luck!

Jx

sonnythecat

For most of us, buying a house is the biggest financial commitment and responsibility we will ever have, by far.

Head.

motherofstudents

It's an interesting dilemma and I think you can't exclusively go with head or heart but in reality a bit of both. I do think you can grow to love a house if you have the basics that you want ie the most important factors such as location, garden size, parking, as you can't really ever change those things. I wouldn't entirely go just for a detached either. Modern detached houses are built very close together too but not sure if you want something older. We went to view an edwardian semi which was almost perfect for us as the front door was next to the joined on house so that there were stairs between and a bathroom. The only room where you could possibly have heard any noise from next door was from the smallest bedroom as all the other rooms were on the other side of the house. We didn't go for it in the end because of location and small garden. Our second house I immediately fell in love with and I always loved it even though it had some things wrong with it, I just knew I had to have it. That feeling never changed. The next house ticked all the boxes but did not have a wow factor and I most certainly wasn't in love with it. It took me about 3 years to feel at home there. The next one, a bungalow was in a very bad state so we had to completely renovate and I did not fall in love with this one either. For practical reasons, this is our last house but I can't help feeling I have one more house left in me ! Good luck, I hope you find what you are looking for.

LydiaJ

harrup wrote: »

Just to illustrate.... this list once narrowly avoided us buying a house with HUGE kerb appeal ( picture a wisteria ranked truly postcard-pretty property with a huge garden in full bloom, 5 bedrooms, etc, etc). Boy, was I smitten. However, when looking at my boring, but useful, ranking checklist we found that the house scored vitually nil on the "must have" scale, didn't do much better on the "should have" features....it was all fluff and heart and kerb appeal. Pretty or not I would have ultimately loathed living in a hamlet ( walking distance to amenities scoring highest on my list) & maintaining a huge garden without evening sun ( evening sun also scoring high, garden size scoring low).

smartpicture wrote: »

When I bought my last house, I had a spreadsheet with a list of columns of various essential features, followed by nice-to-have features etc. Then I entered each house in a row of the spreadsheet with a tick or question-mark against each feature I wanted, to see at a glance how closely they fitted my ideal house. There were about 25 columns on my spreadsheet, so I don't think you're being fussy at all!

However - what actually happened was that I went to see a house that fit hardly any of my criteria, even the essential ones, but as soon as I saw it I knew it was 'the one'. So that was that.

Thanks for those. People like you help me to understand why the EAs would keep sending me details of houses that didn't meet my essential criteria, which was a puzzle to me at the time.

I wasn't like either of you. I knew what my criteria were in my head without needing to write them down, and I could look at EAs details and rule out almost all the houses without actually going to view them. I viewed several to keep the EAs thinking I was a serious buyer, but I never once liked a house "in the flesh" that I hadn't liked on screen.

I had a long list of criteria, and in the more than two years I was looking I only saw 2 houses that would tick all my essential boxes without doing an extension. I knew they were fantastic houses for me the moment I saw the details on RM, and viewing them only confirmed what I already knew. I bought one of them - it ticks almost all of my "desirable but not essential" boxes too, and I still love it.