The NEW after Completion "New Home" Thread

JennyP

We completed on Friday. Moving from west London to a rural bit of west Yorkshire so a complete lifestyle change. And from a boat to a five bed house with its own field.
Husband has lot of stuff (hoarder) so spent Friday moving the first van ifload out of storage and into the house. The stress of it promptly gave me a migraine so since yesterday, I have been all alone in a friend's house (he's on holiday), throwing up and in terrible pain, whilst another friend is helping my hubby move his stuff. I am feeling very sorry for myself - not just for being so ill but for being out of things. A strange start to our new life. Hubby is coming back for me on Tuesday evening so I've a lonely 48 hours ahead.

Littlebobo1981

Poor you Jenny - hope you feel better now !

Had couple of the ceilings skimmed today and the difference is amazing now more holes in ceilings ..Hooray !!!!

JennyP

Littlebobo1981 wrote: »

Poor you Jenny - hope you feel better now !

Had couple of the ceilings skimmed today and the difference is amazing now more holes in ceilings ..Hooray !!!!

Loads better now, thanks.

I am jealous! Loads to do on our house but heaven knows when we'll be able to start. Hubby is a bit of a collector so any work will have to be done working around his many boxes. I have never seen so many boxes!!!

Littlebobo1981

How's everyone getting on, barely have chance to get on here now so much to do, finally getting the boiler sorted week after next and new windows coming at the end of the month, might actually get round to putting some paint on the walls then !

SassySaver88

Hi all 
Its been a while since Ive been back we brought in January 2018...and ever since then its been a whirlwind 
Hows everyone getting on?

RelievedSheff

We bought a detached new build this time last year thinking it would be great, not much work to do compared to our previous ex local authority 1930's semi. Hmm. Seems we were a bit optimistic on that score.

But this period of lock down and the OH being furloughed has given us a chance to start working our way through the house and sorting out all of the jobs that need doing and start decorating rooms to turn this blank canvas into our forever home.

We knew there would be shrinkage cracking we were prepared for that but we were not prepared for the terrible level of workmanship we would uncover at almost every turn. The kitchen in particular has been trying with wiring and socket to the extractor not fixed to the wall and just hidden behind the chimney, an interior door frame that was not fastened to the wall, a window not secured at the bottom, a hole through the wall just taped over, etc. So what we initially though would be a lick of paint and repair a few cracks in that room turned into a good 10 days work over Easter.

The living room was a tad easier but there were still bits that were uncovered that really should have been done better to start with. The level of finish really isn't what you would expect from a well respected builder but was easily missed with rose tinted spectacles and everything painted white!

He has moved onto the hallway now and that is proving to be equally challenging. The cracks all along the stair turned out to be a combination of shrinkage and the plasterboard not actually meeting up with the stair for a good majority of the length and just being covered up with caulking. Deep joy. Cue lots of swearing and filling from the OH.

Hopefully after the hallway we will have tackled all of the rooms that we already knew or suspected had hidden problems and the rest of the bedrooms and bathrooms should be straight forward decorating. 

Had we not found ourselves in the circumstances we are in and spending so much time at home we would probably had called in the developers to sort out a lot of the problems we have uncovered. But with circumstances as they are it is just easier for the OH to sort the problems out and do the job properly this time around. So they have got away with a lot of snagging this time round!

phoebe1989seb

It's been twenty-six months since we bought/moved into our repossession. The first six months most of our stuff remained in storage in a different part of the UK whilst we camped out upstairs in the cottage, cooking our meals on a camping stove/microwave with just a small sofa and a mattress for creature comforts.

Worst thing was lack of water supply - the cottage had originally got its water from a well on a nearby farmer's land but apparently he'd decided to cut off the supply to the three other properties his water fed. Our nearest neighbours had a borehole drilled so two months after moving in, that's what we did too (£11k!!!) although we still didn't have hot water or a properly flushing loo. That came later after we'd been here four months and we got the heating etc sorted......

Whilst the cottage is far from tiny, it's still a heck of a lot smaller than our previous homes and that has taken some getting used to - having already sold loads, we've had to jettison more stuff....but more items have also been acquired, expanding our collections of interesting artefacts, lol!

Anyway, things are far more comfortable inside now - nowhere near finished though - and despite DH still working we're currently making the most of the good weather by cracking on with the garden we started two years ago. There's only half an acre of actual garden (plus woodland), but it was basically weed-infested scrubland when we took it on, so it's a labour of love getting it looking presentable.

I'm thinking of starting a thread detailing our house (and garden) restoration progress in the In My Home sub forum.....so watch this - or should it be that - space