Bear Necessities

This is how it seems to have panned out for us. Rental through our twenties and into our early 30s. Then in 2016 we bought a house (170k) that was a 3-bed semi which I feel was one step up from a starter home and somewhere I could see us being in long term. So we bought that (a doer-upper) because it seemed to have the most potential and anything in the "dream detached with acres of space and a barn" seemed to be nothing but a dream. So since buying this place we've extended it from a small three-bed semi into a large 3-bed semi whilst raising two kids and it feels like this is an "enough" home. So although its not what I would have considered a forever home like my parents had (which was the big detached with a half acre of garden and a barn and a (tiny) outdoor pool) it does feel like it's good enough that I'm not looking to move again, unless there is such a crash that one of those dream houses was within reach. But I don't think the boomer dream houses are achievable for almost all of us early millennials. And even now we have a good chunk of money (see below) I still dont feel that we will want to chase the giant house "dream" as we are only a few years from the eldest leaving home, so we don't really need the big family house of our dreams any more, for anything other than status. Which I don't give a crap about. That describes almost exactly the situation we found ourselves in this last couple of years. left a £700k house plus shares etc but divided by two siblings, so half each (£400k) and my wage closer to the £25k than the 50k figure. So yes I feel we have "done better" by chance, not by merit (I was always top 1% prize winner etc at school/college/uni but that doesn't always equate to success in the real world, and certainly hasn't in my case, and I don't go through life thinking i'm top 5% of anything, apart from maybe slacking.) And that's a very good point about "financial situation at death". This money wasn't expected because we were hoping for the parents to have a longer life with lots of cruises and then later lots of care costs, but sadly that didn't happen. Very sudden and relatively young (one parent late 50s and one early 70s) so that did mean that the money was still there to inherit. A very interesting point somewhere else on this thread from @jiltedjen about whether there will be anyone to buy these big houses in a few year's time. I think we were "fortunate" from a money perspective in the timing of being able to sell this inheritance house at nearly peak price "before the boomer exit rush" as it were, but very unfortunate personally in the timing, as it's beloved family members who are not longer here.

My gran lived with us for 10 years after my grandad passed away, I know all about old dears with the TV volume up to maximum! We bought her some wireless headphones in the end so she could have it as loud as she wanted, but we could still hear ourselves think!

Yeah, I don't know them well enough to actually ask them some of this stuff, but I'll keep it updated, especially around agent, asking price and how long it takes them!

I'd be keen to know how it goes. I'd dread the idea of going to all that effort on the soundproofing and it not being as good as they say! And like I said above, it's only if the new neighbours are worse than the nice ones we have right now. It seems quite a lot of work to do otherwise (especially without knowing how much difference it would make.)

There are a couple of 5-year fixes at around 5.85% which haven't been pulled (not ISAs), so yes I don't think we are heading lower any time soon. Even the 5 year fix ISAs there are some for 5.26%

Good idea. My money is on them putting it on for £285k (bought it for about 225k I think, ours was £170k but was a couple of years prior and needed a little more work, we actually looked at theirs before we bought ours) mainly because a couple of identical layout houses on the street are on for £280k/£290k (one is SSTC but that means nothing these days!) Then again if they need to sell for financial reasons, and putting it on lower doesn't leave them underwater, they might be sensible enough to put it on for £260k or less, to undercut the competition (of which there seems to be a lot these days), otherwise I feel they might be chasing the market down for a long time. Guess it depends if they really just want a "change of scene" in which case they aren't that pressured to sell it. I'll let you know as soon as it hits Rightmove, my wife has an alert set up! (but I won't share the link!)

The guy always has a decent car but I think it's a company one. A few bits of carpentry at various times but I dont think a whole kitchen. certainly nothing on the scale of the work we've had done (which caused friction at times because I'd underestimated how long and how loud the work would be) So I'm not sure. They only had the soffits/facias and the double glazing replaced in the last 12 months (and she said they were saving up for a few other bits they wanted/needed doing) so it seems surprising if it's just a "change of scene" and not a financial or relationship decision. The double glazed windows and doors were fine, just brown and maybe a few years old, so they arent something I would spend a few grand on, unless I'd been planning to stay. Guess I'll never know and it's none of my business (but I'm nosey)

Haha, yeah one plays thrash metal on his electric guitar and the other is a really shit drummer. Nah, not really, they are both lovely and good kids, but yeah it makes me slightly paranoid seeing all the For Sale signs going up! We did piss everyone off for months during the pandemic when the builders decided to press on with the extension anyway, but that was ages ago now and I think next door have nearly forgiven us. Maybe. No point in them moving now it's finished!

Yeah, no impact noise, which is good. I agree, I think an airgap, a frame, then a layer of soundproof plasterboard, a layer of mass loaded vinyl and then another layer of the plasterboard. Would only lose about 20cm from the room at the most and can afford to lose that without it being noticed. I did look into it a bit when we first moved here (but didnt have the budget to fit it at the time and it turned out not to be very noisy so I didn't bother. If we do that then I'll also build some sort of media wall thing in front of it so I don't have to plaster it, with some places for the old mega drive and other retro stuff and the TV. Then the other party wall room has a fireplace and built in (by me) book cases, so any soundproofing could go behind those and wouldnt even be noticed. Bit daft to be planning this out when the neighbours house hasn't even hit rightmove yet, but its good to know my options!

Damn, has that broken the HPC poll winning streak? Maybe we will have a few months of wobbling before the wobbling means they have to start raising them even further

thanks for the tips. I was looking at mass-loaded vinyl and that kind of thing if we did need it one day. Will cross that bridge if we come to it. But like I say it's not thumping sounds and full conversations and music, just a low murmur occasionally and a very muffled cheering sound if England score, so I think it's fairly ok as it is. Look out for a thread in a year's time when I'm crying about how terrible and noisy the new people are!

Their milkshakes do bring all the boys to the yard. So I've heard.

Yeah all the places they are building near us seem to be three bed minimum for the detached ones, although most don't have much garden maintenance, as they only have a small bit of outdoor space so they can cram more houses on the plot. Sounds like if you are sure of what you want then you should look into self building or one of those sort of cabin type homes that are deliberately designed to be compact and easy to look after. Used to see some lovely ones on the property porn programmes like that one with the mini homes (can't remember the name of the show but its on youtube somewhere) problem is finding the land (at a good price) I guess Just looked it up and its George Clarke's Amazing Spaces on Channel 4. Some of them are a bit w*nky but some of them are properly nice, compact, low maintenance dream houses.

Don't really hear much in this semi (1940s). Nor in the probate place we just sold which was a massive semi-detached but 1920s, so I guess it depends on the build quality. The neighbours went away for a week recently and we didn't even notice they were gone, or know when they'd come back we hear so little of them usually! I did hear those screaming matches from the drink driving girlfriend but I imagine people three streets away would have heard those! Occasionally dog yapping, but then that's when it's let out in the garden via the patio doors of a morning, which would be the same deal with a detached. But yeah there is the occasional sort of murmuring noise if we are in the sitting room when they are in theirs, not enough to hear words, and no creaking or thumping up and down the stairs, but I've never heard their TV or music which I'm thankful for! I don't know if it's just things were built better in those days? Maybe just lucky. With the extension, our bedroom is the other side of the house now and so is my office so it works out pretty well. Can be as loud as we like (oooh err missus) in both locations. I guess if the new people are noticeably louder I could get some sound proofing on the party wall, we shall see! Fingers crossed we don't need to But yeah, all things being equal we would have gone for a detached, but wasn't in our budget at the time! And although we could move to one, you get attached to a place, and I think I've done it up quite well, so would be a shame to move. Hoping for the best!

When we moved in 7 years ago there was a nice enough guy next door, never really heard him, occasionally the dog yapping, but always friendly. A few times a year though we would hear him having a blazing row with girlfriend (who lived elsewhere) who seemed to be a drunk driver from what we could gather through the wall. He'd be shouting at her saying "you can't keep driving home like this". She was going out for work drinks, getting plastered and driving over to his. The current neighbours moved in maybe 5 years ago I think. A different yappy dog but a nice couple and various kids from previous marrages, but all older and not there half the time (I guess the eldest ones off at uni and the younger ones mainly round for the weekends when they aren't with other parent.) No drink driving which is nice (!) Because they were both been married before and split up, think they both had money to put in from selling their own places when they moved in together, so I imagine they either own it outright or have a small mortgage on it, I don't know them well enough to be that nosy! I guess that 5 years would be the end of a mortgage term, but I feel it's more likely that they don't have a big mortgage. Not sure. I guess they aren't likely to tell me if they are moving for financial reasons! They bought it a couple of years after we moved in and paid about 25% more for it than we did for the identical one next door, so I assumed at the time that they had enough funds to overpay a bit. Who knows!

At the time we bought (Spring 2016), a detached wasn't an option for us, so we bought a semi-detached doer-upper and I did it up. Although we could move to a detached now, but I don't want to because I've finally got this place how I want it! I've noticed a lot of the detached houses around here, mainly the new builds but also some of the older houses, are yes, *technically* detached but are still only about a metre or two apart, which in terms of problem neighbours playing loud music or late night motorbikes etc isn't much of an improvement on a semi, not like what I think of in my head as a detached, where its surrounded by gardens and a good 10+ metres from it's nearest neighbour. Thankfully we are now in a position where we could "upgrade" to a detached somewhere if we had to, but I'd rather not because I'm quite fond of this place.

He keeps telling us how he's on £120k+ a year or something and keeps getting £30k raises. presumably in a job that doesnt mind him spending 6 hours a day on HPC! #ChinnyReckon

Because there are still a lot of Henriettas that aren't feeling any kind of financial squeeze and never will.

The other half of our semi-detatched is going up for sale. Photos being taken today. (we know the neighbours well enough that they let us know first so we weren't caught by surprise, and well enough that I can ask them occasionally how it's going) Reason given for sale: "Fancy a change of scene" but then they aren't going to say "because we hate you and your annoying kids" Obviously, I have close personal interest in this because I'm hoping they don't sell it to a chainsaw-juggling motorcycle gang with a penchant for playing metal at full blast all night. But I guess it will be interesting to see: a) what they put it on for (it's a non-extended mirror image of our place) b) how many viewings it gets c) how long it takes to sell d) how many times they have to reduce it There is a lot for sale around here right now. The bungalow at the end of the garden is for sale, plus another 3 or 4 round the corner, and two other houses on the road. Plus a massive new development half a mile away which is supposed to be over 1200 houses I think, and I imagine will soon be seeing reductions to the ones already built and maybe a pause in building the next phases. But lots of choice for buyers. I suggested to my wife that if it gets discounted enough, we buy it and knock through, but she's not keen!

Thats a good suggestion. In this case both beneficiaries were in agreement but there was a period of time when one was suggesting "maybe we should rent it out until the market improves". They changed their mind when they realised how much time and effort that would be, and that the market wasn't improving any time soon.

Enjoying the "plateau" in his "Shat-eau"

Yes! Take a decade off those ages and that's us. We were over 100 miles away with two kids in school! It was a lovely house, but that just wasn't going to happen (couldn't have afforded to buy the other recipient out even if we had wanted to.)

Not true in our case. Large house. Neither child needed an additonal house to live in, so it went on the market, took a year to sell, at a 14% reduction. Money split between the two kids, but not funneled back into additional housing purchases. "One of the two will live in them." This is pretty unlikely when you think about it, because it's rare that one sibling would have enough spare cash lying around to buy the other sibling out of the property. They are likely to either sell it, split the money and buy a smaller place each, or if they already have houses, then split the money and run. And also quite likely to take a lower offer because its still more money than they've ever seen, even at 20% or 30% off peak price. Early boomers are getting on a bit now. And there are a lot of them. I really think that a lot of these 4/5/6 bedroom detached places, with one remaining boomer rattling around in each are going to be sold over the next 10 years or so. Either for care fees or inheritance. Where most of the money ends up after that I couldn't say. But I think there will be a lot of supply coming to market, and we know what that does to prices. (and in the scheme of things it's good that these big family houses get freed up again, else it's just boomers hoarding houses that are too big for them and really need a family to fill them.)

I voted +0.25% last week and still think the same

What if we already have one? I don't need two.