Homes Under the Hammer

Doozergirl

"A 20th century dining hatch"

A WHAT? A hole in the wall with shutters on it. They're period pieces now are they?

Moron.

maninthestreet

I think the statement is meant to mean they aren't considered desirable in the early 21st century - nowadays, people knock the entire wall down between the kitchen and dining room, creating a 'kitchen-diner'.

PasturesNew

I've been half watching this. All the property programmes merge into one after awhile. Not seen this one before.

Lounge wallpaper's ... er... interesting in that flat

PasturesNew

My parents have a small dining hatch. It's really handy as they're both about 80 so they make a meal/coffee on the worktop which is under the hatch, open the hatch, shove it through onto the small shelf the other side, then walk round to the living room (2 doors), sit down and reach up to the shelf to get their food/drink.

It's saved them many a trip and spill by now.

Doozergirl

PasturesNew wrote: »

Lounge wallpaper's ... er... interesting in that flat

Looks better than the seven samples I've got taped to the wall in my living room with brown tape because I can't decide! And the two walls which my husband had a brief go at stripping the wallpaper when he was drunk. And the PVA drips running down the walls from having the ceiling reskimmed. Just waiting for our plasterer to come back off holiday and reskim the artex off the walls down to the picture rail. Why do people do this to houses?

I hate this house right now. My dining room is full of my new kitchen because it was a bargain and I couldn't resist, despite needing virtually all the trades in before we can install it. I need to phone a structural engineer.

I think I might be in a bad mood!

PasturesNew

I had a wall that was artexed. Done by the previous householder, himself, 0 skills. There was no pattern, it was just smoothed on, leaving a "feature" of straight/curved lines every foot or so at all angles. With knobbly bits. I went along it with a (forgotten the name: triangular thin metal with a wooden handle) tool to take the bobbles off. It looked passable for me.

My parents have the full 9-10" diameter deep swirls on every wall in their hallway/stairway/upper landing. Painted yellow.

My parents bought their house 12 years ago, from people who had used some thick wallpaper throughout - it sort of looks like it's used some blown polystyrene method of patterning, odd stuff. Hideous big pattern swirly carpet. Artex and ceiling tiles in abundance. Old 1970s kitchen units. And they've not changed a thing. It's all hideous. They'll never change it. It's a real step back in time.

Bless them. They're happy enough.

PasturesNew

This grotty end terrace was bought/resold:
http://www.houseprices.co.uk/e.php?q=burnley+penistone+street+18&n=100

Auction date 6 September 2006

Pobby

29/06/2007£60,000Ter.LNoMap18, Penistone Street, Burnley, Lancashire, BB12 0PSGet FREE, instant value estimate220/09/2006£38,000Ter.LNoMap18, Penistone Street, Burnley, Lancashire, BB12 0PSGet FREE, instant value estimate317/03/2004£11,000Ter.LNoMap18, Penistone Street, Burnley, Lancashire, BB12 0PSGet FREE, instant value estimate411/11/2002£25,000Ter.LNoMap18, Penistone Street, Burnley, Lancashire, BB12 0PSGet FREE, instant value estimate511/11/2002£9,000Ter.LNoMap18, Penistone Street, Burnley, Lancashire, BB12 0PSGet FREE, instant value estimate

Wow from £9k to £60k all in 5 years. Have I got that right? It dropped from £25k to £11k in 2004!

PasturesNew

That corridor the man created didn't look wide enough to walk down, never mind get furniture along.

PasturesNew

Pobby wrote: »

Wow from £9k to £60k all in 5 years. Have I got that right? It dropped from £25k to £11k in 2004!

This is where house price lists are meaningless. We don't know that the house didn't have a big fire or something equally significant.

Doozergirl

PasturesNew wrote: »

My parents bought their house 12 years ago, from people who had used some thick wallpaper throughout - it sort of looks like it's used some blown polystyrene method of patterning, odd stuff. Hideous big pattern swirly carpet. Artex and ceiling tiles in abundance. Old 1970s kitchen units. And they've not changed a thing. It's all hideous. They'll never change it. It's a real step back in time.

My husband's parents used to live in such a horrible mess. And they're not short of a bob or two either. They've moved now to a newish build and we addressed the wall colours etc for them so it doesn't look too bad but they still have some quite shoddy furniture and they keep all sorts of rubbish - 30 year old pens that don't work. Spare birthday invitations from when the kids were kids, 'just in case', Those rubbishy souvenir soldier dolls with bear skin hats etc.

They have a new apartment near Lisbon too - H went out there a couple of weeks ago and nearly had a heart attack. He said it's amazing. It's all kitted out in modern style stuff and they've even bought themselves a 40" Samsung LCD TV. They were sniggering as they showed him round!

I've called a structural engineer, waiting for a call back. I can't live like this anymore. H is away and I've done no housework because it still looks crap when it's clean. And I have finally realised that I can't live with other people's dirt. I am firmly a new build in an old shell kind of girl these days.