Buying a house that needs work

Pixie5740

You just need to save up and do it a bit at a time. I lived with a completely pink bathroom, pink bathroom suite, walls painted rubber glove pink, for a couple of years. It was like being trapped in a blancmange.


The days of getting a LTV of 100%+ are long gone so you can't add it to your mortgage. You could put down a smaller deposit but 15k to 20k is a huge chunk out of the savings you've got for deposit, legal fees, SDLT if applicable, moving costs, etc.

Coveredinbees!!!!

It can become a chore, we have had to renovate all of our house and 9 years on it's still not finished, didn't help me putting my foot through a recently plastered ceiling.

Zola.

The house structurally is in great nick. Yes taking wallpaper off, painting and replacing carpet is the easy bit. That would be the living room, hall, stairs, landing and bedrooms sorted. The fireplace is very dated so that could be replaced but maybe at a later date as we can afford.

The kitchen is livable, not ideal but not a major emergency. The bathroom however is horrible, a mint green bath and toilet with horrible dark tiles, it needs an urgent revamp. Its a small bathroom so hopefully wouldn't be too much money.

Mojisola

arbrighton wrote: »

I'd be more concerned about the state of the electrics and potentially heating.

If you're going to redecorate throughout, take arbrighton's advice and look at all the hidden stuff first.

It's a waste of time and energy to give the place a make-over and then find you've got to knock holes in walls and lift floors to rewire or redo the central heating.

One thing for sure - there won't be anywhere near enough plugs in most rooms.

H4ppy83

We bought our first home in July 2014, and we were in the same position, everything needed doing, including windows, most of it still does! The kitchen was useable but held together with grease! Got this done first less than £2k. Ripped up carpets and have just had floorboards until we can afford carpet, we will get there! As for the bathroom, if it's just a case of the suite is a horrible colour, it will be useable until you can afford it. If I were you I would look at buying it! We took a risk with our and slowly we are making it our home.

CLAPTON

Zola. wrote: »

The house structurally is in great nick. Yes taking wallpaper off, painting and replacing carpet is the easy bit. That would be the living room, hall, stairs, landing and bedrooms sorted. The fireplace is very dated so that could be replaced but maybe at a later date as we can afford.

The kitchen is livable, not ideal but not a major emergency. The bathroom however is horrible, a mint green bath and toilet with horrible dark tiles, it needs an urgent revamp. Its a small bathroom so hopefully wouldn't be too much money.

it would seem that the bathroom was fully functional but you don't like mint green and dark tiles : difficult to see why this is urgent

depending upon what you mean by a fireplace being 'dated' (often very fashionable) you may consider this a higher priority as dealing with fireplaces can be messy so best to resolve this 'problem ' before decoration.

fishpond

Zola. wrote: »

The house structurally is in great nick. Yes taking wallpaper off, painting and replacing carpet is the easy bit. That would be the living room, hall, stairs, landing and bedrooms sorted. The fireplace is very dated so that could be replaced but maybe at a later date as we can afford.

The kitchen is livable, not ideal but not a major emergency. The bathroom however is horrible, a mint green bath and toilet with horrible dark tiles, it needs an urgent revamp. Its a small bathroom so hopefully wouldn't be too much money.

Depending what it (fireplace)is, it may be worth resurrecting
Live with the bathroom if it is still functional, its also not the ideal weather to have a shower in the garden.

Jhoney_2

Zola. wrote: »

The house structurally is in great nick. Yes taking wallpaper off, painting and replacing carpet is the easy bit. That would be the living room, hall, stairs, landing and bedrooms sorted. The fireplace is very dated so that could be replaced but maybe at a later date as we can afford.

The kitchen is livable, not ideal but not a major emergency. The bathroom however is horrible, a mint green bath and toilet with horrible dark tiles, it needs an urgent revamp. Its a small bathroom so hopefully wouldn't be too much money.

Mine had the much cherished 70's pink suite and a brown one downstairs with 'wild west" doors directly opposite the toilet!...marvelous. I hade to look at/use them for a over a year as it wasn't the priority works to be done.

A new white suite is £500 or less if you just want a stop gap replacement, Take the tiles off apart from the ones around each one and just regrout ant paint (again just a temporary makeover if money not immediately available). Get the walls smoothed/replastered (c200) and put a quailty ventilation product in to avoid damp issues (30). Paint it yourself (£20max). Put some new lino down.(50). done.

At this stage, I would be doing big one off, dusty labour intensive stuff roof/electrics/damp/heating if applicable so when I have saved funds for the fun/non urgent stuff, it goes into a safe, secure foundation.

phoebe1989seb

rosyw wrote: »

Couldn't agree more!

I've never bought a property that you could just move into, the first one many years ago was a Victorian terrace that hadn't been touched since it was built, didn't even have electricity, but it was fun doing the work, even my current home, which technically was a new build, needed work to finish it off. There is so much satisfaction when you can stand back and say "I did that"! So go for it

Same here!

We're on our seventh *project* and have learned an enormous amount along the way.....in everything from Victorian to Tudor We've restored four flats back to a single family home and (in our last house) lived without heating and hot water for six months.....not for the faint hearted, but hugely rewarding!

Sometimes I think I'd love to just move our stuff in to a new build and have nothing to do, but in reality not only do we detest new builds, but we'd be bored rigid. Call me sad, but I consider saving old properties and restoring them to their former glory to be the one purposeful thing I've achieved in my life!

We've inspired DS and his GF to do the same - they embarked on their first project at the tender age of 21 and they are learning the hard way, by DIYing as much as they can.

If you can afford it and don't mind a [STRIKE]lot[/STRIKE] bit of inconvenience along the way, I'd definitely give it a go.....

Jhoney_2

Also, as this is a house thats been lived in for many a year (as mine was), check the attic first!

I had decades of clutter, broken bric a brac up in the attic as for some reason, the vendors kept things up there instead of throwing them out. It was a BIG job and once done, you could add some insulation to current levels or more.

I also did the garden quite quickly before any decorating as things had to be carried out through the property.