How much money would you spend on home improvements?

phoebe1989seb

If you are definitely only going to spend a small amount like £2k and you are doing the improvements for your own benefit rather than as an attempt to add value, I would go ahead and do the work, although a £2k budget for all that work does seem extremely optimistic

Like littlesparkles we spent money on our last house putting in a kitchen and two new bathrooms. These were high end and in total we spent in excess of £40k, initially intending to stay in the property for many years. However when that didn't pan out (family reasons plus we hated the location) we lost around £60k when we came to sell after only 3 years, although the *improvements* we carried out did make the house more saleable and enabled us to sell in only two weeks.......

poppysarah

PrincessLou wrote: »

We have just bought our first house and currently i can think of about ten different home improvements i would like to do. My question is, we're planning on staying in the house for three years, how much should we limit ourselves for spending on home improvements?

Why have you bought somewhere to live in for only 3 years?

pledgeX

Surely if you're only doing the improvements for your own satisfaction (i.e. not to add value), then it doesn't matter what any of us think. We don't have the same opinion as you! Just don't do something stupid that will reduce the value of the house!!

PrincessLou

Why is it that someone can't just ask a simple question without being attacked for everything that they say? 'Why would you buy a house you were only going to live in for three years? Why do you want this doing, why do you want that doing?'

I asked a simple question, and all i've received is people questioning every little thing i want to do. It's hardly very helpful....

Jimbo1976

Hello PrincessLou

These forums are a double edged sword, on one hand you are asking for advice or suggestions but on the other you are inviting people to comment on your ideas and plans.

The vast majority of the posts here are excellent and there a just a few where people are querying your decisions. To be honest, the post over why you are buying a house for 3 years is a relevant question. Financially the costs of buying and selling a house over that period alongside mortgage payments probably exceed the cost of renting a similar property. But when you take into account the intangible benefits of home ownership, you have decided that buying is best for you.

In terms of your improvements, I would get a pen and paper and walk round the house, make 2 lists, the first about things which you hate about the property, the other about things which you want to do. Then take the top items for each. For example solid oak floors are lovely but if the existing flooring isn't that bad then maybe its better to get rid of the hideous avocado bathroom suite which is so awful that you close your eyes when you go in there (yes i know its an extreme example)

DVardysShadow

PrincessLou wrote: »

Why is it that someone can't just ask a simple question without being attacked for everything that they say? 'Why would you buy a house you were only going to live in for three years? Why do you want this doing, why do you want that doing?'

I asked a simple question, and all i've received is people questioning every little thing i want to do. It's hardly very helpful....

Those questions are very relevant to sorting out the answer to your problem.

3 years is not a very long time to live in a property. It delimits the amount of work you might want to do and it affects the objective. Are you doing it for yourselves to enjoy or for increasing the resale vale? The advice you will get will differ on what your objectives are.

The big thing I would say is do not spread your money too thinly. It is fine to have a strict overall budget, but if you do, don't try to get all your jobs done within the budget. Only do as many jobs as the budget will allow. It is better IMO to have a good new bathroom and a poor old kitchen or vice versa than to have both refurbed poorly.

LandyAndy

PrincessLou wrote: »

Why is it that someone can't just ask a simple question without being attacked for everything that they say? 'Why would you buy a house you were only going to live in for three years? Why do you want this doing, why do you want that doing?'

I asked a simple question, and all i've received is people questioning every little thing i want to do. It's hardly very helpful....

Well you asked a fairly open ended question

PrincessLou wrote: »

We have just bought our first house and currently i can think of about ten different home improvements i would like to do. My question is, we're planning on staying in the house for three years, how much should we limit ourselves for spending on home improvements?

And then you sort of indicated that you don't have much idea about what things cost.

PrincessLou wrote: »

Just to clarify, i don't want to make these improvements to add value to the house. I want to paint, put new sockets on, change the cheap laminate floorring to Solid Oak flooring, take out the awful gas fire from the 80s, etc, etc. These things are for my satisfaction and to of course make the house attractive for when we sell it in a few years time. However, i want to make things look nice but i don't want to waste too much money either. That's why i was asking how much would you limit yourself on spending? The projects i am wanting to do would cost £2000 total maximum.

Three years is quite a short time although I stayed in my first two houses for only 5 and 4.5 years respectively.

If you know you are only going to be there three years I would do as little as possible. There's no telling that a buyer would want your choice of bathroom or kitchen or flooring or gas fire any more than they'd want the current ones.

poppysarah

PrincessLou wrote: »

Why is it that someone can't just ask a simple question without being attacked for everything that they say? 'Why would you buy a house you were only going to live in for three years? Why do you want this doing, why do you want that doing?'

I asked a simple question, and all i've received is people questioning every little thing i want to do. It's hardly very helpful....

Attack?

I'm quite offended.

martinsurrey

Jimbo1976 wrote: »

Hello PrincessLou

The vast majority of the posts here are excellent and there a just a few where people are querying your decisions. To be honest, the post over why you are buying a house for 3 years is a relevant question. Financially the costs of buying and selling a house over that period alongside mortgage payments probably exceed the cost of renting a similar property. But when you take into account the intangible benefits of home ownership, you have decided that buying is best for you.

I think people oversetimate the cost of a mortgage and underestimate the costs of renting.

a house near me sold for £200k and is rented out for £1k a month.

the mortgage INTEREST payments on a 4% mortgage at £160k (so 20% deposit) is £6,400 a year, so 3 years is £19,200 add in stamp duty £2k, mortgage fees £1k, legals £1k. sales fees EA £4k (2%) assuming you sell for what you bought for, legals £1K total £28,200.

rent over 3 years assuming a 5% increase a year (average for UK) is £37,830, agents fees ~£600 IF your land lord doesnt kick you out after trying to get a 10% increase each year. total cost £38,430 less £2400 interest on your £40k deposit (at 2%net) net cost £36,030.

add in the benifit of owning your own home, you dont have to deal with EA, your not worried about getting evicted after 6 months, your not stuck with an orange bedroom because you cant paint.

true there are downsides, such as not being able to move, being liable for repairs, but your £8k up on renting to start with, so that should cover like for like repairs.

I FULLY understand why you would buy for 3 years...

Jimbo1976

Martin.

In the situation that you describe clearly renting is cheaper, how the fact is that now you can't get an 80% interest only mortgage. if you don't have an repayment vehicle then you would need to take out a repayment mortgage.

However in some situations you have shown that ownership can be cheaper than renting. Thats why I put probably in my post