Does a steeply sloping garden bother you/make a difference?

glasgowdan

Looking at a house and it's lovely, but the back garden especially is quite steeply sloping. Some steep concrete steps, not quite level terranced area etc. The good thing is the front of the house faces south and the back gets a lot of sun as it's quite high (the end of the back garden's probably the height of the house).

But I somehow feel the desire for a nice level garden instead. I've never had a steep garden before and have no idea if it would become annoying, kids playing etc.

Can anyone offer their experiences of it?

dc197

My parents in law have a garden like this. You can terrace it to create areas that are flat, such as for a lawn, but those areas would be small. As for gardening, the slope is not atoo much of a problem because you can create beautiful cascades of plants. The terraces create natural divides for different types of garden: veg, fruit trees, bedding, etc.
If a large lawn is what you want then this will be difficult.

Flosmum_2

It would bother me personally. You could however get it landscaped so it was tiered but depends if that would work for you. My elderly in laws have a tiered and struggle to get up and down

ScorpiondeRooftrouser

It's much worse than a level garden of the same size. Much better than no garden at all.

Expect to pay less than you would for the former and more than you would for the latter, and then decide for yourself if it's something you can or can't live with.

PasturesNew

Tricky to cut the grass. Annoying to try to sit on the grass when the weather's nice as your glass of squash falls over and you're having to continually tense your left buttock so you don't slide down. Probably not ideal in the cold/ice either. Bit of a s0d moving items in/out as you buy/sell them ... or even bringing in bags of spuds.

I'd not fancy it.

ellie27

Ours is steeply sloped but is tiered. A raised wall creates a raised bed where there are about 8 steps up to the first flat area. Then another couple steps take it to the 'top' garden as the kids call it. The top is very big and flat. Our side garden is just one big slope and kids sledged down it in winter.

We have been lucky in that all the work to level areas has been done and that the garden is really big to start with!

You really do need at least a small level area for a patio/seating.

Gardening is so much more interesting with raised bedding/rockery etc much nicer than one all level flat to me!

SmlSave

I loved my steep garden and find I still miss it. We terraced it which was hard work but sooo worth it. Ended up with a decked seating level, paving/bbq level, border level, fruit level and shed/storage level.

If you plan it right it can be wonderful, we chose no grass for an easy life and a small chamomile 'lawn'. My son soon learnt to climb up the levels

househunt

@ Glasgowdan - Can you post any photos?

Cakeguts

Does the front garden slope as well or is it just the back? You would have to be careful what you grew on it so as not to block the light out of the house.

Soot2006

I had a steeply sloped garden and terraced it (particularly fun task as there was no vehicular access to the back) ... The end result is a wonderful garden with lots of landscaping opportunities and more than enough flat to play a ball game.The levels are structured with 3x railway sleepers for each terrace. A lot of work but totally worth it and I am glad I didn't pass by the house because of it (also left an un-terraced pathway up one side and have a few other quirky features that make it stand out a bit)

Callie22

My parents have a very steeply sloped garden - it's got about six terraces with between three and six feet between them, and the top terrace is about ten feet above roof level. The terraces look lovely but it is really, really hard work to keep on top of it, mowing a slope with a sheer drop in front of you is interesting! It is really more of a 'gardener's garden' than a 'family garden', in the sense that the steps are really steep and my elderly grandparents really struggled to get beyond the middle terrace, which my parents decked and used as a patio. You get used to the vertigo as you go up but realistically the garden doesn't get used much in the rain or frost! They do have amazing views in the summer though.

I'm not sure though whether the garden has affected the house price, as lots of the houses in the village where my parents live have the same thing - it's pretty much what you expect if you want to buy in this particular place. I don't think that there are many houses in the village that have substantial areas of lawn, it's small courtyard gardens or something that's terraced so it doesn't affect prices that much.