Older House that needs modernising or newer house for FTB

gazfocus

Just looking for some opinions please. Out of the two houses below, what would you go for:

Property 1: a 1950s (maybe) 2 bedroom semi. £50k for 70% shared ownership. Needs a lot of modernising and old conservatory needs demolishing. Needs new bathroom, kitchen and central heating. Big garden with drive that's full length of house. Lots of potential to extend (other properties in the area have 2 stories extensions to side and single story to rear. Both bedrooms are ok size doubles.

Property 2: a 2004 3 bedroom semi. £65k for 50% shared ownership. Needs little work doing, although would benefit from new bathroom. Needs new carpets and decorating. Driveway is full length of property but not much scope to extend at the rear as garden is fairly small. One room is an ok size double and the other two are more likely to be single rooms.

arbrighton

You are unlikely to get bathroom, kitchen and central heating sorted for 15k- would you prefer to have greater share of ownership or less to fix up? Personally, I woud value the larger bedrooms and outdoor space more.
Please excuse my ignorance, but if it is shared ownership are you allowed to extend?
Given your sig regarding deposit, and timeframes, is this a hypothetical one?

gazfocus

Thanks for taking the time to reply. We wouldn't be looking to extend until we own 100% of the house which we can do after 12 months on both properties.

My wife's mum got central heating installed in their house for £3k, bathroom would cost about £1k and kitchen (to same standard as property 2) would cost about £2-£3k

We would only need 10% deposit so for property 1 we will only need £5k (we will already have £4k by Wednesday).

cattie

I'd go for the older property every time. Far more character & usually bigger rooms than new builds. Also, it always seems to me that older properties seem more desirable to buyers than new builds do. Older is usually better built too, thicker walls than newer properties have.

Does one house 'speak' to you more than the other does? Only when I buy a property it's usually because I like the feel of it & want it to be mine.

Lots of buyers love the opportunity to extend & add value in the future, so it's always a good option to have that possibility.

gazfocus

Thanks. When we looked round the newer house we were disappointed with it and dismissed it almost instantly. When we went round the older house the things that needed doing didn't really bother us. I don't know if it's because we expected it due to the price or what but it just didn't matter.

phoebe1989seb

Definitely the older property.......

Catblue

Neither.

£50k for 70% shared ownership suggests that you are not in an expensive part of the country to buy a house.

How come house 1 is offered as shared ownership anyway? That is odd in itself. Is it being sold by a developer who took it as a part-ex? That suggests that it is a difficult house to sell on really and therefore not a great investment. Same with house 2.

You've already saved up 4K, which is a decent enough start but you'd be better to save up your target of 10K and then get a normal mortgage (NOT shared ownership) to buy a house around the 100K mark.

gazfocus

Catblue wrote: »

Neither.

£50k for 70% shared ownership suggests that you are not in an expensive part of the country to buy a house.

How come house 1 is offered as shared ownership anyway? That is odd in itself. Is it being sold by a developer who took it as a part-ex? That suggests that it is a difficult house to sell on really and therefore not a great investment. Same with house 2.

You've already saved up 4K, which is a decent enough start but you'd be better to save up your target of 10K and then get a normal mortgage (NOT shared ownership) to buy a house around the 100K mark.

The house is not being sold by a developer. From what I gather, the house was left to someone who died and as I say it needs a fair bit of work doing to it, hence the price. Other properties in that road are on at £108k

We're not in a 'cheap' part of the world but certainly not expensive, but the price of house 1 reflects the work that needs doing IMO.

House 2 would work out at £132k based on the £65,950 for 50% share.

Regardless of what deposit we manage to save, we wouldn't be able to get a £100k mortgage and to be honest, I don't think I'd want a £100k mortgage.

Pupnik

Personally the older property would appeal to me more. One thing to consider is how long you see yourself living there - if you plan on being there a long time a house you can grow into and change to suit you might be better than the new build. If the older property has character then I think it will be more appealing for buyers in future - the new build's sole attraction is that it is new, but of course in 15 or 20 or 25 years time that won't be applicable.

gazfocus

Pupnik wrote: »

Personally the older property would appeal to me more. One thing to consider is how long you see yourself living there - if you plan on being there a long time a house you can grow into and change to suit you might be better than the new build. If the older property has character then I think it will be more appealing for buyers in future - the new build's sole attraction is that it is new, but of course in 15 or 20 or 25 years time that won't be applicable.

Thanks. The 1950's (ish) property hasn't got what I'd call character as such but as you say it would be a property we could change to suit. It's also appealing because at the price it's on for, we wouldn't mind taking a year or so doing it up and making it nice which would obviously then increase the value a little as well.

Beckyy

I'd go for the older house everytime, but I'm not keen on the idea of shared ownership at all.