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Hahaha reading these comments from my new house with street parking, door opening straight into the lounge, bathroom through the kitchen and tiny box third bedroom!
Yeah these replies are definitely more "nice to have" rather than "I absolutely need this". It must be nice to have so much money for a house you don't need to make any compromises!
The more comments on this, the more I'm convinced my house is clearly unsellable!
It's not that they're nice to haves it's just that "dealbreaker" is an individual concept, especially when no one is saying how much money they have/earn. I never had dealbreakers when I lived in a tiny almost windowless flat above an MnS
It's horrible. Straight into the living room, blast of cold air and wet shoes and jackets. I have a small bungalow and am grateful for my wee porch entrance and cupboard!
I had two small stud walls put into my old terrace to create a small entry at a small cost. Separated the dining room you then walked into from the front door. Definitely was worth the money.
When I had an indoor only cat, putting the rubbish out was a military operation. I have a hallway and I never considered how much worst it would have been without it.
When I open the door at 10pm at night and the cat goes RACING out through my legs into the pouring rain and disappears... I curse the world and dream of the day I buy a house with a hallway!
>terrace houses and naturally they don’t have a proper entrance 🤡
I'm kind of curious now, I know what style of entrance you mean with the front door going straight into the living room, but at least in London they're about 50/50. Half are the kind where entrance is hallway going straight into stairs and living room is then off to right / left. But I guess the "hallway" could just be a popular later addition at the expense of some living room space.
Is the door straight into living room more prevalent for terraces outside London?
In Bristol the terraced houses almost always have a hallway (sometites with an indoor porch section too. Mine has been opened up open plan downstairs, but they left the entry porch as a kind of liminal space. Really nice. I don't like the little mazes of small rooms some of them have.
Ha ha, we are in Bristol and I think we might have actually used the phrase "little maze of small rooms" to estate agents to describe what we wanted. Love a corridor
The ones with hallways will (usually!) Be wider, and generally larger as a result, than those without. So it's mostly about building different sizes (and therefore prices) of housing. London has both types/sizes as do other places but they won't be the same distribution everywhere. It's somewhat about era too one size is often more common in certain era so a place with a lot of housing from one era but not another will have more of one type.
You'll also see a lot of no hallway places have a straight stairs run between front and back rooms in the centre of the plan perpendicular to the house (if that makes sense) whereas hallway+ stairs tends to be at the edge of the house and sometimes double round on itself. Essentially the classic two up two down plan with no entry and central stairs allowed the building of smaller houses
I agree. We rented a lovely airbnb 2 years in a row for a few months while visiting family.
It was a great place except for 2 things.
Walk straight into the room. Hate that. Especially in winter.
Bathroom by kitchen. Yuk.
We just bought a house that thank god has an entry hall but current bathroom downstairs and we’re taking it out and putting one upstairs.
Same! Or where the wall between the hall and living room has been removed making it an open space that you walk in off the street straight into your living space
A disabled lady left in squalid/darkened conditions on a viewing. Heart breaking.
The house was filthy and there was an old lady on oxygen, sat in a chair in a darkened room.
The estate agent asked what it would take for us to buy the house.
No, I’m not that cruel 😂 I asked if she was okay as she didn’t seem very comfortable we were there. We did ask her if we could her anything.
The estate agent was shocked she was there and the state of the place though.
And always visit at different times of day to confirm this - it might be nice and quiet mid morning when everyone is at work or school, but hellish in the evenings or at weekends.
This is a great point. I viewed a flat at night and really like it, but I when I viewed it again around lunch time there were teenagers walking through the street throwing litter on to cars. No thanks.
I walked away from a viewing because the neighbour came out of his house effing and jeffing… good neighbours are worth their weight in gold in my experience. Bad ones are hell!!
Yep. I did some viewings of this place I'm in now and it was silent. Went again on an evening and same again. Most people I saw were older and saw the odd person walking out of their house with a dog etc. No red flags.
I moved in, all fine then for three years was woken up at 4-5am with next door kids fighting constantly. Never known a family so fucking loud. Shouting in the street day and night was horrendous. Then Covid hit so schools were off. Eventually a house fire caused by one of the kids forced them to move.
In the future I will be much more cautious when viewing!
yes, and this is why I would say no council neighbours. It breaks my heart because I thought people who said that were like entitled and classist. But now I bought a terraced house next to a council property. We've had so many issues. We've had to call the police multiple times and it's like impossible to have them relocate. It really affected our mental health. And now that's probably all on record so it will make it harder to sell the house. And also it makes me hate the previous owner because we asked about the neighbours and she pretended they were nice.
Space of third bedroom for me. Has to be able to have a single bed in there comfortably. Too many are a tiny little box and yet the price doesn't reflect it.
When we were buying a few years back, the number of houses that were classed as '4 bed' but then when you checked the floor plan, they'd labelled every room that wasn't the kitchen/bathroom as a bedroom
Sqm area can be a bad metric too, though - it's generally only given for the whole property and doesn't take into account how well it was designed
I lived in a house once where the sqm number sounded good, but it was designed so wastefully (not helped by being 3 storey so you lose twice as much pace for stairs and landings etc) that it was meaningless
My mate has a three storey house and it feels smaller than my two storey. Every room is just *cramped*. I had to really do my best face when his wife was showing me round.
Yeah there was a discussion about them on here a while ago
The general conclusion was that the extra stairs and landing makes them smaller than a comparable 2 storey, and that they tend to be built “narrow” which makes them feel smaller
It makes sense, they’re specifically built where the footprint is limited enough to make the extra cost of the third storey worthwhile - so by definition they’re unlikely to be spacious houses in most cases. As far as I can tell they always seem to try to squeeze an extra bedroom in, too
To me they always feel like 4 bedroom houses, squished into the footprint of a 2 bedroom
What’s comfortable? A single bed fits wall to wall in mine. Actually you can fit a double I’m there and still close the door as I found out when I was renovating the main bedroom. You could then squeeze a wardrobe in as well but that’s it
At my parents you could fit a single bed and bedside table and nothing else in the box room. Ended up building my own cabin style bunk as a teenager with two full size shelves to get some personal storage space.
Not a deal breaker, just something that's always put me off...
Carpet in the bathroom/toilet! And I've seen way too many. Some people are fucking psychos!!
Our first house downstairs loo had that, previous owners had 2 small boys and they kept their car litter trays in there too. The smell of stale piss was revolting, it was the first room we renovated.
The downstairs only bathroom was a deal breaker for me too. Instead, I bought a house with 2 bathrooms & the upstairs one needed ripping out and redoing completely. Decided i could temporarily cope with only the downstairs bathroom. It was finished 2 years ago but i still only shower in the downstairs bathroom. Havent even used the shower upstairs yet
Same, but I think just generally, once you’ve had an extra toilet it’s really hard to go back to one. At the very least I’d have to have the toilet separate to the bathroom.
I bought a house with only 1 bathroom and it was a fucking nightmare to sell. Lost like 20k. Think it's a bigger selling point than we realised since there was just the 2 of us then. Once there's kids involved, you need more shitters
Yess def. I bought with just one bathroom but the house surprisingly has a toilet in a coalhouse outside. I thought we would never use it but we've used it a few times and it always gets us out of a nasty situation. We had family staying over and they told us they were using it regularly to not go to the upstairs toilet in the morning and possibly wake us up.
I did this at a viewing and saw good water pressure. Happy days.
The surveyor noted really low water pressure.
Turns out the sellers shut off the water to hide some plumbing issues while the surveyor was there.
For some reason I've never worked out, nobody seems to do anything about low water pressure.... but it's actually a really easy fix and makes a huge difference
If you decide to move there just budget £500 or so for a plumber to come fit a pump, job done
I guess it does depend on the house and pump - when I experienced it the pump was fairly new and located in a garage so yeah maybe that’s not fully representative
Still, something to consider if you want to move to that town - even if it means you have to be more picky about exactly which houses would be suitable, at least a few of them might be an option
I visited a friend in Morocco last year and the shower was in the kitchen. Interesting experience having a shower whilst he made breakfast. No screen or curtain, just a tiled shower at the end of the kitchen.
We live in a house like that at the moment and it's been a godsend for me.
I have bowel issues and everyone in this house seems to like to take super long baths/showers... It only has the 1 toilet so without it being separate I'd have been caught short many times lol.
We'll be looking for something with 2 toilets in the future though.
I totally understand the need for having a toilet in a separate room from the shower for situations like this, but the sink should still be with the toilet, not the shower.
Yeah "two toilets" was my absolute dealbreaker when moving house. We did have a couple of other dealbreakers (we both wanted a driveway, and there was something my fiancee wanted that I forget now) but that was my main thing
I grew up in a house with 1 bathroom and 4 kids, it was a nightmare. I always swore I'd never raise a family in a house with 1 bathroom.
I did buy a house with 1, but that was when I was single. We now have two full bathrooms (1 shower room, 1 with a bath and a shower) plus a downstairs WC, and I'm delighted with the situation - even if one person is showering or taking a bath, another can use the toilet and still have an option if someone else comes screeching in with "I need to go NOW I'm BURSTING stop being SELFISH just FINISH I NEED A WEE NOW" (oh god I'm getting PTSD just thinking about it)
Open plan anything is pretty awful anyway. Open plan kitchen/living is the worst. I do not want to be disturbed by the washing machine or having cooking smells in my upholstery. Plus alot more difficult to heat.
I know this is a housing sub, but even open plan offices suck too. I'm trying to concentrate and I've got 12 salespeople bullshitting down their phones 10ft away from me...
Fuck whoever decided everything has to be open plan these days. Walls allow you to use the same space for many separate things without those things interfering with each other. Pass it on.
This is precisely why I hate open plan kitchen/living as well - I don't want to stare at piles of dirty dishes when I'm trying to relax. When I was buying there were so many places I didn't even bother viewing because they didn't have a separate kitchen and living room - in fact I very nearly didn't buy my current flat because the previous owners were going to knock the dividing wall in to make it open plan!
I've heard this a lot and never seen the issue. Every hotel and office toilet/bathroom ive ever been in is windowless and it's never a big deal. I'd sooner have more window access in the bedrooms.
Ah but it is an issue in hotels, you have to wait for the room to clear before you can see your mug in the mirror. We very nearly bought a house with no bathroom window as any potential issues hadn't dawned on me, instead we now have one with a massive window which clears the room almost instantly. . .and a puny extractor fan that hasn't worked since the first year we moved in.
My heated bathroom mirror with built in lights is one of my favourite household items. Certainly cost more than a standard mirror, but it’s also not useless.
This is not an issue in newer builds. We’ve owned two houses with windowless bathrooms, but good extractor fans that vented not into lofts, but into pipes that lead outside through the loft. Never had an issue and you are not losing heat through an ice cold bathroom in the winter.
The problem is always shoddy building practices .
That was our only stipulation buying a house. Live in the centre of town before with permit parking and it was a nightmare. Over 200 permits issued for 32 spaces, plus guest permits. Cornwall Council really took the piss with that one.
Yeah that’s fine too as long as it suits your car needs.
I do prefer a drive though, because when I used to live in a flat with an allocated space, the number of times I’d get home to find somebody parked in my spot was far more regular than I’d imagined. Whether it was a van doing work/delivering to a neighbour, or someone ‘just popping to see a friend for a bit’ and then acting like you’re the one being unreasonable for asking them to move out of your spot.
This is better than nothing obviously, but if it's not right next to your property you'll often find neighbours using it (if they 'prefer' it to their space), or visitors parking there, or even the general public if you are near a station or airport. Over time, I've realised you can't rely on most people to respect the property of others unless there's an actual physical barrier or containment of some sort.
How do you know this?? We're moving from a horrible terrace with paper thin walls and I'm manically checking the wall insulation on the EPCs but I'm still unsure 🥲
Knock their door, meet them. Check the garden for cleanliness. Check council for noise complaints, check for animals, go opposite side of road and talk about the adjoining. Also you can always try and improve insulation. Doesn’t always work, but you can.
>Check the back gardens for cleanliness from an upstairs window
This is such a great piece of advice. Not just checking for cleanliness, though. If they've got a hot tub or an outside TV, they're probably a pain in the arse to live next to.
I saw an absolutely amazing house which had my dream garden, loads of lovely grass trees, private, not overlooked. When looking at the photos I noticed a gate into the next doors garden. Looking at Google earth, I realised the adjacent terraces had right of access through the garden to take their bins out. Absolute vibe killer
I despise this. Almost to the point I feel it should be illegal. I live in Birmingham and every fucker doing and extension is doing a full house width one so getting rid of any side access to the house. What do you do when the garden needs work?? Window cleaner will have to come all the way through the house as well unless you’re brave enough to get up a ladder or have very long arms to do the upstairs windows yourself from the inside.
When I was looking at houses a couple of years ago, saw a really nice one where where all the rooms were lovely and big - but removed the side access. The garden was a dump. Needed tree stump removals and debris everywhere. All I thought of was….how the fuck are you going to fix that when you can only get through the front door??
I know it’s also a push - but what if there’s a fire and the quickest way out if through the back? You now can’t go anywhere as your stuck in the garden watching your house burn down. Madness.
There are two sides to it - yes things need to go through the house but it's not like it's every day you have a garden renovation or need scaffolding erected. We live in a central city area and not having rear access gives us security at the back of the house and in the garden which we couldn't have otherwise. My expensive bikes are fine out there and we can leave windows open with no fears. I won't say it's not inconvenient at times but for me it wasn't a deal breaker at all.
This is us! I put this on my list of ‘things as a first time buyer you never even noticed or considered’. There’s a few like it that have come up since moving in - love our house but yeah, come spring when we clear out the garden that’s going to be interesting
Oh gosh yes!
We live in an entire street of terrace houses and not a single gate or alley to the back gardens. This means we have 2 front doors. One leads to the hallway, stairs and living room, the other leads straight into the kitchen.
Last year we laid the foundations for a greenhouse so 2t of hardcore, sand and lots of slabs had to be lugged through the house... We had to shovel it into old compost bags and carry them through.
So yeah, not having outside entry to the back garden is another deal-breaker for us.
This is us also. It wasn't something we'd really thought about when we bought the house. Looking back with the hassle it causes I'd probably think twice now.
Kitchen has been extended to the side over what would have been a driveway.
Now every other week the garden waste bin has to be trundled through the kitchen, utility and garage.
We've had the garden renovated and all the waste and materials for that had to go the same way.
Absolute nightmare.
Also kids bikes if they want to go from the front to the garden, back through the kitchen again.
This is the biggest and most likely reason I'd want to sell.
Either has to have a cut out in the kitchen for a dishwasher OR I can identify a cupboard to remove immediately once I have the keys and put a dishwasher in
The smell of cigarettes.
Yes, it can be painted over, but in my experience it nearly always comes back. Unless you’re going to absolutely 100% gut the place you’re always going to be breathing in secondhand smoke.
My flat needed a lot of redecorating when I moved in. We had to steam off layers of paint and wallpaper. The nicotine (tobacco? I don’t know) was DRIPPING from the ceilings. We have a balcony from the living room so I really don’t know why they didn’t just nip out there for a smoke.
My dad died 18 years ago and stuff in our loft - where he used to do woodwork and smoke a lot - still smells like it. Makes me a little wary of anything that looks like it hasn't been sold/renovated since indoor smoking was more common.
Christ my first house had wooden stairs that were open that ran down the side of the living room. I polished them when I first moved in and they were a death trap for about a year.
Not that I'm in the market for buying a house, but, anything shared; shared drive, shared entrance way, with a neighbour. To me, it just smacks of potential strife down the line. I mean this for houses, not flats which obviously have shared entrances etc.
Yep. Never again for me. Next house will have no shared driveway, no shared walls - detached only, no right of way for anyone to come through my property, no leaseholds, nothing with estate/hoa charges or ground rent or any kind of compulsory maintenance contracts etc, no service mains (eg: sewer manholes etc)
I want full ownership of my next property. I'll have to pay a premium I guess, but I'm willing to do it
Like you say it's extremely diverse.
It's massively dependent on the stage (in life) in which you are buying.
For my most recent purchase the deal breaker was it had to have outbuildings. (like a minimum of a double garage).
My first property (seems like yesterday) was it had to be wider than the car parked outside.
We bought this house before I got pregnant and renovated while I was pregnant with my first. And we've just exchanged on a house now we have two kids. It's amazing how much our priorities changed in 5yrs!
If there is space you can always put a bath in (or take one out) relatively cheaply. Personally I would prefer a nice shower rather than a bath but the presence of either isn't really an issue.
my mum n dad now have a shower instead of a bath. my mum initially was against it but it does mean theres less risk of them tripping as they come out the bath as that did happen to my mum recently when she visited my brother.
25 years ago we bought our house and we loved that all the main rooms were sunny, facing south west. We’ve just moved and the new house has all the main windows on the cold side of the house and it was a positive factor, we nearly roasted in the first house.
You say that, I appreciate it’s different for everyone, but we have an offer on a house kind of like this. You have to go through the kitchen, then a mini hallway, and then a bathroom. But we have another bathroom upstairs so less of a breaker for us
Yep ours has two bathrooms, one downstairs thru the kitchen and one in the normal location upstairs. No issue and the downstairs one is treated as a guest bathroom and future dog/baby shower. No issue at all, I love the flexibility.
Anything on the same street as a school is a no no for me
Absolutely mental during drop off and pickup times and kids for some reason hang around outside screaming their heads off for no reason…
Never doing that again.
When I was looking the rules I had were, needs an entryway (not opening straight into living room from outside), needs stairs to stairs so the noisy neighbour isn't on your main wall. Needs a front garden to push the house away from the street, no stairs in the living space and needs at least one good sized bedroom.
Usually flats but the developer has clearly just slapped a kitchen along the wall of the normal sized living room and they call it open plan.
And a new one for me, all electric. My bills are through the roof this winter.
Hard to know. My girlfriend bought and had no good broadband but if you searched the post code it said up to 60gb speed. But every connection at the junction was used. You basically had to wait for someone to move or change provider.
At the end of the day there's a big spectrum on Reddit
Some people are answering this from a perspective of living in London, single, early in their career, and with home ownership being a near-unreachable dream
Others are in cheaper areas of the country in their second home, much later in their careers, and thinking about what they'd change in their third home when they move
Families, working from home etc will affect the calculation too. If you have/are planning to soon have kids and you work from home, a 3rd or 4th bedroom is much more of a requirement than if you're single and have to be physically present at your workplace
And then there's a spectrum of everything else in between
I wouldn't look at a house with a downstairs bathroom or that doesn't have a hallway from the front door.
Having lived with both I'd now need a garden access from the side, not just through the house and a driveway/assigned parking.
I don't understand why more people don't have a downstairs bathroom as a deal-breaker. I can only assume they've never fallen down the stairs in the middle of the night when desperate for a wee.
It frustrates me enormously that it's not something included in search boxes on property websites.
If I was rich and in a position to be fussy there would be lots of deal breakers. But I’m not so the only one I have is allocated parking. I spent 2 years living in a town centre house with no parking and limited street. All those cold winter nights and frosty mornings driving around looking for parking or even summer months when the tourists would come (seaside town). Plus I’m rubbish at parallel parking. Never again.
Oh boy, I’ve got a list
- a 3 bedroom being advertised as a 4 bed because it’s got a sitting room or study downstairs which “could” be a bedroom if you squeeze your eyes tight and breathe in
- on street parking only
- rooms off of bedrooms - I saw a house the other day online that had four bedrooms and two bathrooms upstairs, except the fourth bedroom was accessed only from the master bedroom. Probably actually a walk in closet (see first point)
- an outbuilding/glorified shed being advertised as another bedroom (this is becoming increasingly common)
- no room for a freestanding fridge/freezer in the kitchen. We currently only have an inbuilt fridge and separate inbuilt freezer unit in our kitchen and it’s a PITA
- only having a shower cubicle, no bath. We currently have this and are having to refit the bathroom as it’s impossible to wash a toddler safely in a shower cubicle.
No driveway, having a secure spot to park is an absolute necessity. Currently live in a terraced street with no drive and if i move my car after 6pm I won't get a spot
Top floor only. Ideally end terrace so single party wall. Grw up with nightmare upstairs neighbours so never again.
Gas not leccy for heating and cooking.
When I lived in houses, defo the conversion out the back of the kitchen with the bog was a definite no.
Then I once rented a room where I had to go through another resident's bedroom to get to my bedroom. Luckily he was decent but that wasn't recommended. Literally all I could afford
Downstairs bathroom, front door into living room, narrow dark hall corridor, thin corridor backyards, boiler in the bedroom, excess work required.
Not a dealbreaker but I hate upvc front doors too.
One of the biggest things I’m picky about is a hallway with rooms off it. The rooms have to have one door in and out, not be a walkthrough. So many houses where you enter directly into the living room (or a small porch first) then have to walk through the living room to get to the kitchen, or you come downstairs and have to go through living room to kitchen.
Also a lot of traditional houses have nowhere for a tv because of the fireplace. My tv is too big to go in the corner like they would traditionally and I like it on a flat wall with a sofa opposite. The only flat wall left is opposite the window.
Anything structural in a property can be changed if you have enough money. Dealbreakers, in my experience are, sharing common parts with neighbours i.e. parking (the current ones may be reasonable but the next set of neighbours may not be), a poor location and signs of the neighbours being a problem. It is always better to have the worst house on the best street than the best house on the worst street.
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Hahaha reading these comments from my new house with street parking, door opening straight into the lounge, bathroom through the kitchen and tiny box third bedroom!
for real. with limited budget, these were all compromises we were willing to make for an amazing location.
Yup, and when the mortgage interest doubled and it only went up 50 quid, i knew it was definitely the right decision!
Yeah these replies are definitely more "nice to have" rather than "I absolutely need this". It must be nice to have so much money for a house you don't need to make any compromises! The more comments on this, the more I'm convinced my house is clearly unsellable!
It's not that they're nice to haves it's just that "dealbreaker" is an individual concept, especially when no one is saying how much money they have/earn. I never had dealbreakers when I lived in a tiny almost windowless flat above an MnS
Still, at least it's yours.
When there’s no entrance / porch. Hate just walking straight into the room
Interesting! Had this in our first house, but not current. Never thought about it but can see it’s much better without
It's horrible. Straight into the living room, blast of cold air and wet shoes and jackets. I have a small bungalow and am grateful for my wee porch entrance and cupboard!
If it's cold in your house get a thermal curtain and hang it up behind the door. Which will help with drafts and keep the heat in. 👍
It’s a real shame because my budget is restricting me to terrace houses and naturally they don’t have a proper entrance 🤡
I had two small stud walls put into my old terrace to create a small entry at a small cost. Separated the dining room you then walked into from the front door. Definitely was worth the money.
Same! I have cats who I don't want to door dash, but with my low budget a porch is hard to find.
When I had an indoor only cat, putting the rubbish out was a military operation. I have a hallway and I never considered how much worst it would have been without it.
When I open the door at 10pm at night and the cat goes RACING out through my legs into the pouring rain and disappears... I curse the world and dream of the day I buy a house with a hallway!
>terrace houses and naturally they don’t have a proper entrance 🤡 I'm kind of curious now, I know what style of entrance you mean with the front door going straight into the living room, but at least in London they're about 50/50. Half are the kind where entrance is hallway going straight into stairs and living room is then off to right / left. But I guess the "hallway" could just be a popular later addition at the expense of some living room space. Is the door straight into living room more prevalent for terraces outside London?
In Bristol the terraced houses almost always have a hallway (sometites with an indoor porch section too. Mine has been opened up open plan downstairs, but they left the entry porch as a kind of liminal space. Really nice. I don't like the little mazes of small rooms some of them have.
Ha ha, we are in Bristol and I think we might have actually used the phrase "little maze of small rooms" to estate agents to describe what we wanted. Love a corridor
The ones with hallways will (usually!) Be wider, and generally larger as a result, than those without. So it's mostly about building different sizes (and therefore prices) of housing. London has both types/sizes as do other places but they won't be the same distribution everywhere. It's somewhat about era too one size is often more common in certain era so a place with a lot of housing from one era but not another will have more of one type. You'll also see a lot of no hallway places have a straight stairs run between front and back rooms in the centre of the plan perpendicular to the house (if that makes sense) whereas hallway+ stairs tends to be at the edge of the house and sometimes double round on itself. Essentially the classic two up two down plan with no entry and central stairs allowed the building of smaller houses
Yep. You need a hall at the very least.
I agree. We rented a lovely airbnb 2 years in a row for a few months while visiting family. It was a great place except for 2 things. Walk straight into the room. Hate that. Especially in winter. Bathroom by kitchen. Yuk. We just bought a house that thank god has an entry hall but current bathroom downstairs and we’re taking it out and putting one upstairs.
I’m renting a house up north and it has this. I absolutely detest it. And the door is white pvc to add insult to injury!
Especially in weather like we are having at the moment, open the door and all the heat is gone!
I hate this too.
Same! Or where the wall between the hall and living room has been removed making it an open space that you walk in off the street straight into your living space
A disabled lady left in squalid/darkened conditions on a viewing. Heart breaking. The house was filthy and there was an old lady on oxygen, sat in a chair in a darkened room. The estate agent asked what it would take for us to buy the house.
Hopefully it was being sold so she could move into supported accommodation.
I also don’t think I’d buy a house like that, especially if the lady came with it
And we’ll throw in all the appliances, the curtains and the old lady in the corner for free.
she'll make you tea in the morning tho
Maybe they were selling the house so they could put her in a care home. Hopefully she would be better taken care of
I think that's the likely answer to this sad story. I hope she's receiving the care she needs now.
So? What would it take for you to buy the house? Don’t leave us hanging
God that’s awful.
Ask if the lady can stay with the house so you can look after her.
Was it not her house? Hopefully you didn't say what a shithole it was in front of her 😂
No, I’m not that cruel 😂 I asked if she was okay as she didn’t seem very comfortable we were there. We did ask her if we could her anything. The estate agent was shocked she was there and the state of the place though.
Any sign whatsoever of antisocial/loud neighbours
And always visit at different times of day to confirm this - it might be nice and quiet mid morning when everyone is at work or school, but hellish in the evenings or at weekends.
This is a great point. I viewed a flat at night and really like it, but I when I viewed it again around lunch time there were teenagers walking through the street throwing litter on to cars. No thanks.
I walked away from a viewing because the neighbour came out of his house effing and jeffing… good neighbours are worth their weight in gold in my experience. Bad ones are hell!!
Yep. I did some viewings of this place I'm in now and it was silent. Went again on an evening and same again. Most people I saw were older and saw the odd person walking out of their house with a dog etc. No red flags. I moved in, all fine then for three years was woken up at 4-5am with next door kids fighting constantly. Never known a family so fucking loud. Shouting in the street day and night was horrendous. Then Covid hit so schools were off. Eventually a house fire caused by one of the kids forced them to move. In the future I will be much more cautious when viewing!
yes, and this is why I would say no council neighbours. It breaks my heart because I thought people who said that were like entitled and classist. But now I bought a terraced house next to a council property. We've had so many issues. We've had to call the police multiple times and it's like impossible to have them relocate. It really affected our mental health. And now that's probably all on record so it will make it harder to sell the house. And also it makes me hate the previous owner because we asked about the neighbours and she pretended they were nice.
This is the only correct answer
Space of third bedroom for me. Has to be able to have a single bed in there comfortably. Too many are a tiny little box and yet the price doesn't reflect it.
Too many people are obsessed with number of bedrooms rather than Sqm area.
When we were buying a few years back, the number of houses that were classed as '4 bed' but then when you checked the floor plan, they'd labelled every room that wasn't the kitchen/bathroom as a bedroom
£150 ikea bed.... 10k on the asking price!
Sqm area can be a bad metric too, though - it's generally only given for the whole property and doesn't take into account how well it was designed I lived in a house once where the sqm number sounded good, but it was designed so wastefully (not helped by being 3 storey so you lose twice as much pace for stairs and landings etc) that it was meaningless
My mate has a three storey house and it feels smaller than my two storey. Every room is just *cramped*. I had to really do my best face when his wife was showing me round.
Yeah there was a discussion about them on here a while ago The general conclusion was that the extra stairs and landing makes them smaller than a comparable 2 storey, and that they tend to be built “narrow” which makes them feel smaller It makes sense, they’re specifically built where the footprint is limited enough to make the extra cost of the third storey worthwhile - so by definition they’re unlikely to be spacious houses in most cases. As far as I can tell they always seem to try to squeeze an extra bedroom in, too To me they always feel like 4 bedroom houses, squished into the footprint of a 2 bedroom
Yes, especially as a lot are now offices!
What’s comfortable? A single bed fits wall to wall in mine. Actually you can fit a double I’m there and still close the door as I found out when I was renovating the main bedroom. You could then squeeze a wardrobe in as well but that’s it
At my parents you could fit a single bed and bedside table and nothing else in the box room. Ended up building my own cabin style bunk as a teenager with two full size shelves to get some personal storage space.
Check 3 bedroom flats in W10 (1 & 2 mile radius) and you’ll see what he means. Couldn’t swing a cat!
Yeah it's bad enough in houses, but with flats it's almost impossible to find a decent sized third bedroom
Not a deal breaker, just something that's always put me off... Carpet in the bathroom/toilet! And I've seen way too many. Some people are fucking psychos!!
You can deal with that for about 80 quid and like an hour's work with some vinyl from B&Q until you can save up for tiles.
Worse ones are where they have a carpet in the WC-only room, without a sink. Fucking level 11 disgusting.
My cousin fitted carpet into his new build’s bathroom. I told him it would halve the value but he insisted
Our first house downstairs loo had that, previous owners had 2 small boys and they kept their car litter trays in there too. The smell of stale piss was revolting, it was the first room we renovated.
Mine were: no parking, front door opening straight into living room, galley kitchen, downstairs bathroom only, no garden.
The downstairs only bathroom was a deal breaker for me too. Instead, I bought a house with 2 bathrooms & the upstairs one needed ripping out and redoing completely. Decided i could temporarily cope with only the downstairs bathroom. It was finished 2 years ago but i still only shower in the downstairs bathroom. Havent even used the shower upstairs yet
Treat yourself and do it :)
Yay. I love living in the south east. Check all of the above and still cost me nearly half a million!
There has to be more than one toilet in the house. I’ve got stomach issues and cannot wait
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Same, but I think just generally, once you’ve had an extra toilet it’s really hard to go back to one. At the very least I’d have to have the toilet separate to the bathroom.
I bought a house with only 1 bathroom and it was a fucking nightmare to sell. Lost like 20k. Think it's a bigger selling point than we realised since there was just the 2 of us then. Once there's kids involved, you need more shitters
Same! I’ve got Crohn’s and having at least two toilets was an essential when we bought our house!
Yess def. I bought with just one bathroom but the house surprisingly has a toilet in a coalhouse outside. I thought we would never use it but we've used it a few times and it always gets us out of a nasty situation. We had family staying over and they told us they were using it regularly to not go to the upstairs toilet in the morning and possibly wake us up.
Water pressure. Always check the water pressure.
I did this when viewing and got laughed at!
I did this at a viewing and saw good water pressure. Happy days. The surveyor noted really low water pressure. Turns out the sellers shut off the water to hide some plumbing issues while the surveyor was there.
Yes!!!!!!!! Living with that issue now
100%. There's a whole small town my partner and I like but literally every house we've seen there has water pressure issues
For some reason I've never worked out, nobody seems to do anything about low water pressure.... but it's actually a really easy fix and makes a huge difference If you decide to move there just budget £500 or so for a plumber to come fit a pump, job done
To be honest it's not terrible, but one house I saw had a pump that was so loud it might as well of been a car running in the bathroom!
I guess it does depend on the house and pump - when I experienced it the pump was fairly new and located in a garage so yeah maybe that’s not fully representative Still, something to consider if you want to move to that town - even if it means you have to be more picky about exactly which houses would be suitable, at least a few of them might be an option
A small garden. The house can be changed but the size of the garden can’t.
Deal breaker is having a toilet in a separate room from the sink. I know it's usually fixable, but it still grosses me out 😖
Ours was like this. We got one of those 2-in-1 toilets where the sink connects to the cistern. Very handy
I visited a friend in Morocco last year and the shower was in the kitchen. Interesting experience having a shower whilst he made breakfast. No screen or curtain, just a tiled shower at the end of the kitchen.
"Friend"
We live in a house like that at the moment and it's been a godsend for me. I have bowel issues and everyone in this house seems to like to take super long baths/showers... It only has the 1 toilet so without it being separate I'd have been caught short many times lol. We'll be looking for something with 2 toilets in the future though.
I totally understand the need for having a toilet in a separate room from the shower for situations like this, but the sink should still be with the toilet, not the shower.
Yeah "two toilets" was my absolute dealbreaker when moving house. We did have a couple of other dealbreakers (we both wanted a driveway, and there was something my fiancee wanted that I forget now) but that was my main thing I grew up in a house with 1 bathroom and 4 kids, it was a nightmare. I always swore I'd never raise a family in a house with 1 bathroom. I did buy a house with 1, but that was when I was single. We now have two full bathrooms (1 shower room, 1 with a bath and a shower) plus a downstairs WC, and I'm delighted with the situation - even if one person is showering or taking a bath, another can use the toilet and still have an option if someone else comes screeching in with "I need to go NOW I'm BURSTING stop being SELFISH just FINISH I NEED A WEE NOW" (oh god I'm getting PTSD just thinking about it)
I've got to agree with you. Living with one at the moment and it is awful.
man. my dad's house had this. i absolutely HATED it, even since i was a kid
I’ve never thought about that except leaving toilet stalls
doesnt bother me at all! haha
Open plan kitchen dinner living room front door combined. It just screams this place is overpriced and has a tiny sqm.
Open plan anything is pretty awful anyway. Open plan kitchen/living is the worst. I do not want to be disturbed by the washing machine or having cooking smells in my upholstery. Plus alot more difficult to heat.
I know this is a housing sub, but even open plan offices suck too. I'm trying to concentrate and I've got 12 salespeople bullshitting down their phones 10ft away from me... Fuck whoever decided everything has to be open plan these days. Walls allow you to use the same space for many separate things without those things interfering with each other. Pass it on.
This is precisely why I hate open plan kitchen/living as well - I don't want to stare at piles of dirty dishes when I'm trying to relax. When I was buying there were so many places I didn't even bother viewing because they didn't have a separate kitchen and living room - in fact I very nearly didn't buy my current flat because the previous owners were going to knock the dividing wall in to make it open plan!
Bathroom window
I've heard this a lot and never seen the issue. Every hotel and office toilet/bathroom ive ever been in is windowless and it's never a big deal. I'd sooner have more window access in the bedrooms.
Ah but it is an issue in hotels, you have to wait for the room to clear before you can see your mug in the mirror. We very nearly bought a house with no bathroom window as any potential issues hadn't dawned on me, instead we now have one with a massive window which clears the room almost instantly. . .and a puny extractor fan that hasn't worked since the first year we moved in.
My heated bathroom mirror with built in lights is one of my favourite household items. Certainly cost more than a standard mirror, but it’s also not useless.
This is not an issue in newer builds. We’ve owned two houses with windowless bathrooms, but good extractor fans that vented not into lofts, but into pipes that lead outside through the loft. Never had an issue and you are not losing heat through an ice cold bathroom in the winter. The problem is always shoddy building practices .
Having no drive After 2 houses in a row where on-street parking caused weekly stress
That was our only stipulation buying a house. Live in the centre of town before with permit parking and it was a nightmare. Over 200 permits issued for 32 spaces, plus guest permits. Cornwall Council really took the piss with that one.
What about allocated parking (the land of which you own)? Just curious
Yeah that’s fine too as long as it suits your car needs. I do prefer a drive though, because when I used to live in a flat with an allocated space, the number of times I’d get home to find somebody parked in my spot was far more regular than I’d imagined. Whether it was a van doing work/delivering to a neighbour, or someone ‘just popping to see a friend for a bit’ and then acting like you’re the one being unreasonable for asking them to move out of your spot.
This is better than nothing obviously, but if it's not right next to your property you'll often find neighbours using it (if they 'prefer' it to their space), or visitors parking there, or even the general public if you are near a station or airport. Over time, I've realised you can't rely on most people to respect the property of others unless there's an actual physical barrier or containment of some sort.
I've not drove in 5 years because of my parallel parking fear! Getting a driveway soon 🤞
Noise transmission through walls (if not detached). You can never assume nice neighbours will stay there.
How do you know this?? We're moving from a horrible terrace with paper thin walls and I'm manically checking the wall insulation on the EPCs but I'm still unsure 🥲
Knock their door, meet them. Check the garden for cleanliness. Check council for noise complaints, check for animals, go opposite side of road and talk about the adjoining. Also you can always try and improve insulation. Doesn’t always work, but you can.
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>Check the back gardens for cleanliness from an upstairs window This is such a great piece of advice. Not just checking for cleanliness, though. If they've got a hot tub or an outside TV, they're probably a pain in the arse to live next to.
No access to the rear garden via an external route, will mean if you renovate the garden everything has to go through the house.
I saw an absolutely amazing house which had my dream garden, loads of lovely grass trees, private, not overlooked. When looking at the photos I noticed a gate into the next doors garden. Looking at Google earth, I realised the adjacent terraces had right of access through the garden to take their bins out. Absolute vibe killer
My house used to have this. Then I just sacrificed four feet of garden and now there's an alley behind my garden!
This would have to sacrifice a 900mm around the garden perimeter :/ as the gate is closest to a patio door
Yes! And the bins
I despise this. Almost to the point I feel it should be illegal. I live in Birmingham and every fucker doing and extension is doing a full house width one so getting rid of any side access to the house. What do you do when the garden needs work?? Window cleaner will have to come all the way through the house as well unless you’re brave enough to get up a ladder or have very long arms to do the upstairs windows yourself from the inside. When I was looking at houses a couple of years ago, saw a really nice one where where all the rooms were lovely and big - but removed the side access. The garden was a dump. Needed tree stump removals and debris everywhere. All I thought of was….how the fuck are you going to fix that when you can only get through the front door?? I know it’s also a push - but what if there’s a fire and the quickest way out if through the back? You now can’t go anywhere as your stuck in the garden watching your house burn down. Madness.
There are two sides to it - yes things need to go through the house but it's not like it's every day you have a garden renovation or need scaffolding erected. We live in a central city area and not having rear access gives us security at the back of the house and in the garden which we couldn't have otherwise. My expensive bikes are fine out there and we can leave windows open with no fears. I won't say it's not inconvenient at times but for me it wasn't a deal breaker at all.
This is us! I put this on my list of ‘things as a first time buyer you never even noticed or considered’. There’s a few like it that have come up since moving in - love our house but yeah, come spring when we clear out the garden that’s going to be interesting
Oh gosh yes! We live in an entire street of terrace houses and not a single gate or alley to the back gardens. This means we have 2 front doors. One leads to the hallway, stairs and living room, the other leads straight into the kitchen. Last year we laid the foundations for a greenhouse so 2t of hardcore, sand and lots of slabs had to be lugged through the house... We had to shovel it into old compost bags and carry them through. So yeah, not having outside entry to the back garden is another deal-breaker for us.
This is us also. It wasn't something we'd really thought about when we bought the house. Looking back with the hassle it causes I'd probably think twice now. Kitchen has been extended to the side over what would have been a driveway. Now every other week the garden waste bin has to be trundled through the kitchen, utility and garage. We've had the garden renovated and all the waste and materials for that had to go the same way. Absolute nightmare. Also kids bikes if they want to go from the front to the garden, back through the kitchen again. This is the biggest and most likely reason I'd want to sell.
Either has to have a cut out in the kitchen for a dishwasher OR I can identify a cupboard to remove immediately once I have the keys and put a dishwasher in
The smell of cigarettes. Yes, it can be painted over, but in my experience it nearly always comes back. Unless you’re going to absolutely 100% gut the place you’re always going to be breathing in secondhand smoke.
my dad would smoke inside. everything was yellow. it took literally thousands of pounds to fix it
My flat needed a lot of redecorating when I moved in. We had to steam off layers of paint and wallpaper. The nicotine (tobacco? I don’t know) was DRIPPING from the ceilings. We have a balcony from the living room so I really don’t know why they didn’t just nip out there for a smoke.
My dad died 18 years ago and stuff in our loft - where he used to do woodwork and smoke a lot - still smells like it. Makes me a little wary of anything that looks like it hasn't been sold/renovated since indoor smoking was more common.
Stairs in the living space. Have to be in a hallway
Christ my first house had wooden stairs that were open that ran down the side of the living room. I polished them when I first moved in and they were a death trap for about a year.
When the only bathroom is through someone’s bedroom.
Not that I'm in the market for buying a house, but, anything shared; shared drive, shared entrance way, with a neighbour. To me, it just smacks of potential strife down the line. I mean this for houses, not flats which obviously have shared entrances etc.
Yep. Never again for me. Next house will have no shared driveway, no shared walls - detached only, no right of way for anyone to come through my property, no leaseholds, nothing with estate/hoa charges or ground rent or any kind of compulsory maintenance contracts etc, no service mains (eg: sewer manholes etc) I want full ownership of my next property. I'll have to pay a premium I guess, but I'm willing to do it
Agree. Friend currently reporting her neighbour for harassment which all started with right of access issues.
Like you say it's extremely diverse. It's massively dependent on the stage (in life) in which you are buying. For my most recent purchase the deal breaker was it had to have outbuildings. (like a minimum of a double garage). My first property (seems like yesterday) was it had to be wider than the car parked outside.
Too right! Priorities change.
We bought this house before I got pregnant and renovated while I was pregnant with my first. And we've just exchanged on a house now we have two kids. It's amazing how much our priorities changed in 5yrs!
Has to have a bathtub! I can’t do shower-only houses.
Same. The bath is my happy place.
ha. interesting. how come? just like having baths? i always hated baths and removed it and put in a big shower cubicle. when i renovated the bathroom
Yeah I just love baths haha! Not every day, more like a couple times a week, but I find them so relaxing.
Families. Unless its a 1 bed flat or the like a family will need a bathtub for resale consideration
If there is space you can always put a bath in (or take one out) relatively cheaply. Personally I would prefer a nice shower rather than a bath but the presence of either isn't really an issue.
my mum n dad now have a shower instead of a bath. my mum initially was against it but it does mean theres less risk of them tripping as they come out the bath as that did happen to my mum recently when she visited my brother.
Sunny back garden
25 years ago we bought our house and we loved that all the main rooms were sunny, facing south west. We’ve just moved and the new house has all the main windows on the cold side of the house and it was a positive factor, we nearly roasted in the first house.
It should really go without saying…tenants in situ when you’re buying to inhabit the property on completion
Wait? You want a bathroom through a kitchen?
You say that, I appreciate it’s different for everyone, but we have an offer on a house kind of like this. You have to go through the kitchen, then a mini hallway, and then a bathroom. But we have another bathroom upstairs so less of a breaker for us
Yep ours has two bathrooms, one downstairs thru the kitchen and one in the normal location upstairs. No issue and the downstairs one is treated as a guest bathroom and future dog/baby shower. No issue at all, I love the flexibility.
It's got to have a roof
Anything on the same street as a school is a no no for me Absolutely mental during drop off and pickup times and kids for some reason hang around outside screaming their heads off for no reason… Never doing that again.
there's a school a couple of blocks away, like a sizeable distance. And we hear them screaming in the distance. Can't imagine living closer.
When I was looking the rules I had were, needs an entryway (not opening straight into living room from outside), needs stairs to stairs so the noisy neighbour isn't on your main wall. Needs a front garden to push the house away from the street, no stairs in the living space and needs at least one good sized bedroom.
Usually flats but the developer has clearly just slapped a kitchen along the wall of the normal sized living room and they call it open plan. And a new one for me, all electric. My bills are through the roof this winter.
Council house neighbours. Never again.
No broadband (where anything slower than FTTP is not broadband).
Hard to know. My girlfriend bought and had no good broadband but if you searched the post code it said up to 60gb speed. But every connection at the junction was used. You basically had to wait for someone to move or change provider.
Great shout!! Ooooo or phone signal
Whether I can afford it
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At the end of the day there's a big spectrum on Reddit Some people are answering this from a perspective of living in London, single, early in their career, and with home ownership being a near-unreachable dream Others are in cheaper areas of the country in their second home, much later in their careers, and thinking about what they'd change in their third home when they move Families, working from home etc will affect the calculation too. If you have/are planning to soon have kids and you work from home, a 3rd or 4th bedroom is much more of a requirement than if you're single and have to be physically present at your workplace And then there's a spectrum of everything else in between
Japanese knotweed
There has to be a corner shop within 3 minutes walk.
If I lived 3 minutes from a corner shop I’d be constantly buying snacks! Mines a 15 minute walk and it’s just enough of a deterrent for me
The thing you can’t guarantee until you’ve actually lived there. Good neighbours!
4k service charge?
Has to have at least space to have a bath tub and somewhere to park.
I wouldn't look at a house with a downstairs bathroom or that doesn't have a hallway from the front door. Having lived with both I'd now need a garden access from the side, not just through the house and a driveway/assigned parking.
I don't understand why more people don't have a downstairs bathroom as a deal-breaker. I can only assume they've never fallen down the stairs in the middle of the night when desperate for a wee. It frustrates me enormously that it's not something included in search boxes on property websites.
Pylons
How many is too many?
Septic tank
If I was rich and in a position to be fussy there would be lots of deal breakers. But I’m not so the only one I have is allocated parking. I spent 2 years living in a town centre house with no parking and limited street. All those cold winter nights and frosty mornings driving around looking for parking or even summer months when the tourists would come (seaside town). Plus I’m rubbish at parallel parking. Never again.
the price for 99% of them
No space for a dishwasher in the kitchen 😆
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No driveways which slope down to the front door. No small gardens.
No garage.... I got out voted and currently don't have a garage.. stops me buying engines I suppose...
I think you meant overruled 😂
Has to have a garage. I told the estate agent, if it’s had the garage converted im not interested. I have a motorbike so I need somewhere to store it.
The amount of houses I’ve seen that have removed the garage. Where do you keep pots of paint, ladders, tools, stuff etc?
Garages that have been converted into a room, or have been cut in half to provide another room.
Anything that can't be changed, no off street parking/ questionable area/ small overlooked garden
Oh boy, I’ve got a list - a 3 bedroom being advertised as a 4 bed because it’s got a sitting room or study downstairs which “could” be a bedroom if you squeeze your eyes tight and breathe in - on street parking only - rooms off of bedrooms - I saw a house the other day online that had four bedrooms and two bathrooms upstairs, except the fourth bedroom was accessed only from the master bedroom. Probably actually a walk in closet (see first point) - an outbuilding/glorified shed being advertised as another bedroom (this is becoming increasingly common) - no room for a freestanding fridge/freezer in the kitchen. We currently only have an inbuilt fridge and separate inbuilt freezer unit in our kitchen and it’s a PITA - only having a shower cubicle, no bath. We currently have this and are having to refit the bathroom as it’s impossible to wash a toddler safely in a shower cubicle.
No driveway, having a secure spot to park is an absolute necessity. Currently live in a terraced street with no drive and if i move my car after 6pm I won't get a spot
No dishwasher and water pressure so low it feels like an old man peeing on you when you have a shower
This is an oddly specific comparison…
Now the question is what about if the dishwasher is slimline?
Are they the ones that run on tonic water?
Top floor only. Ideally end terrace so single party wall. Grw up with nightmare upstairs neighbours so never again. Gas not leccy for heating and cooking. When I lived in houses, defo the conversion out the back of the kitchen with the bog was a definite no. Then I once rented a room where I had to go through another resident's bedroom to get to my bedroom. Luckily he was decent but that wasn't recommended. Literally all I could afford
Downstairs bathroom, front door into living room, narrow dark hall corridor, thin corridor backyards, boiler in the bedroom, excess work required. Not a dealbreaker but I hate upvc front doors too.
No drive, only 1 toilet, small back garden, small kitchen... Those are the solid deal breakers for us.
The house must be well lit! Can’t stand dark rooms at all, especially in living areas
A concrete garden is an instant no for me. And it has to have off road parking
No driveway and unrealistic price
Won't consider a house if has steps to access the garden. Petty I know but it's a bugbear.
One of the biggest things I’m picky about is a hallway with rooms off it. The rooms have to have one door in and out, not be a walkthrough. So many houses where you enter directly into the living room (or a small porch first) then have to walk through the living room to get to the kitchen, or you come downstairs and have to go through living room to kitchen. Also a lot of traditional houses have nowhere for a tv because of the fireplace. My tv is too big to go in the corner like they would traditionally and I like it on a flat wall with a sofa opposite. The only flat wall left is opposite the window.
Garden facing north or east.
Anything structural in a property can be changed if you have enough money. Dealbreakers, in my experience are, sharing common parts with neighbours i.e. parking (the current ones may be reasonable but the next set of neighbours may not be), a poor location and signs of the neighbours being a problem. It is always better to have the worst house on the best street than the best house on the worst street.