What is the best, and the worst, money you have spent on your home?

Best Buy was installed in a new house. A small unit (about the size of a salt shaker) sat next to the kitchen sink. Turn the knob and get water hot enough for tea or instant coffee.

When I posted, I forgot to say that another one of my best buys in my old house was the wonderful parquet design Amtico floor I had laid in my through lounge.

Back then I had quite a lot of young g.children, and the rear of my through lounge was the dining area and had french windows into the garden. No way, could I replace the carpet with another one, would be moaning about children dropping food and bringing in dirt from the garden. I spent well over a year agonising on this - then saw this Amtico, all separate tiles, and the border was designed on the computer in the exact colours I wanted. When it was laid in 2006 - it took a week and cost three grand. I can remember, at the time, thinking I was mad spending so much money on a floor - but from the moment the last tile was in place I never regretted one penny of that cost. Looked brilliant (virtually everyone who entered my house remarked on it), was so easy to keep clean, couple of small rugs and, I am certain, is was a major help when I sold the house.

I've always private rented so haven't owned my own home. In private rented you are not even allowed to paint the walls or change the carpet and in many places you can't hang pictures up! You can't own a pet either...but that is vearing away from the topic!

Shysal , we have a conservatory which was either too cold or too hot, as you say. A few years ago, however, a local firm put a solid roof on it. Not expensive but the best thing we have ever done. So lovely to watch nature all year round.

Our conservatory is a delight al, year around.

I can’t understand this too hot, too cold thing.

We have blinds and doors and windows to use when it is hot. In fact I come in from the garden to sit in the conservatory when I get too hot. The conservatory face South/west so gets sun all day.

We have a very efficient heater for the winter.

Best was almost doubling the size of the house with an extension when DH retired.
Worst was probably an M&S lounge suite which started to fall apart almost immediately after purchase, I have never experienced such bad workmanship in all my 53 years of married life.

My best thing is small ut it was a Hive central heating Thermoset. I used to have to ask someone to set the timer every winter but now I can set it from my phone, even when I am abroad.

By far the best a completely new kitchen. My OH won £10.000 on a tv quiz show ( still to air so I can't name it yet ) and we went to Wren and designed it ourselves had to wait for it to be fitted because of lockdown,it's been in a month now and we love it.

The best money well spent for us is money not spent........on paying other people to do things. We have done absolutely everything in our house over the last 10 years ourselves. Converted a tumbled down barn into lettable accommodation, block paved the drive, added an en-suite to the main bedroom, built a summer house in back garden, laid paths everywhere, and latterly, a gorgeous conservatory with a slate tiled roof. Many more little things.
My OH isn't a builder, but he is REALLY GOOD at doing things, and I am told I am a top class unskilled labourer - speciality, mixing cement!
At the risk of sounding smug, I'm really proud of what we have achieved................and added a great deal to the value of the house!!

Both of these apply to the house I used to live in. Best- solar panels, I was making sufficient money to pay for our LPG gas supply and most of the electricity bill. Worse- a new kitchen. I foolishly went to a friend’s husband’s company, major mistake. If it could go wrong it did and the end result was an extremely expensive disappointment.

Buying quality furniture in the first place. Our 2 leather chesterfield settees are now 45 years old, and just improve with age, though we did have the seat cushions re-upholstered a few years ago by a guy who does up old cars. They have survived children and grandchildren climbing all over them /making dens etc and still look amazing. They were expensive (£500 each) when we bought them, but worth every penny. We also bought Hamlet dining table, chairs and dresser which are still in daily use after 40+ years. Much better for the environment too as so many people replace furniture unnecessarily. By the way, I'm married to a Yorkshireman!

Tied first place for best spent money definitely conservatory and knocking wall down to make big kitchen and dining area. Both done in last couple of years and created more mess and upheaval than I ever imagined. But both give pleasure every day.
Worst thing was having bathroom revamped and keeping the p shaped bath instead of having a walk through shower. On the rare occasions it has been used, the bath takes far too much hot water for the boiler to cope with.and DH finds climbing in and out of the bath to use the overhead shower increasingly difficult. ?

Best my bathroom. Love the tiles I chose and when it was done ( in a new flat) the project manager arranged for a deep long shelf along the wall above the sink which is so useful for storage and looks great.

Also two ottoman types storage boxes which open from the front rather than the top so they hold loads of mess out of sight but I can display things on top without moving them every time I want something .

And blinds instead of curtains , let’s in more light and makes the room look bigger.

Can’t think of a worst

We had Strachan fitted wardrobes in the bedroom about seven years ago. Brilliant.

We've hardly changed the Edwardian house we moved into 50 years ago so have never spent large sums of money on anything. Best buy is the three-tiered painted tea trolley I bought from a jumble sale many years ago for 50p. I stripped it to find it's solid oak & it's moved around the sitting room being everything from a TV & stereo shelf to it's current use as my frail husband's lunch table & bookshelf. Not bad for a bit of tat I pushed home on my bike.

I don't think we have done anything to the house that feels like money misspent.

The best think we have bought is our Ikea kitchen fittings.

[Petunia] Get a pressure washer (Good One) - use mid Spring and mid autumn. Will just blast away most weeds - any left a tiny squirt of killer and Bobs your Uncle. It is noisy and messy but a couple of times a year and really will make it like new.

My Best Buy is probably the huge chest of drawers we bought in an auction for 15/- when we were first married. It cost another 10/- to have it delivered. It has been a boon for 53 years, coping with a family of five children.
Also, the push-along dog bought second-hand for 10/- .It supported all our children when they were learning to walk, and was also passed around friends and neighbours and , eventually, the grandkids. I’ve re-covered him twice.
Thirdly, the downstairs loo we put in when DH had a stroke, and which now saves me the trudge upstairs on my ‘creaky’ days!
Bad buys? The new gutters we had installed which stop me from fully opening the top windows in my bedroom. The bread maker, with slices too big for the toaster, and I don’t eat much bread nowadays. Luckily I only paid £10 off EBay for it.
Which reminds me of another Best Buy. A pallet full of new bricks from EBay. They cost me £11, and there were enough to build a double front garden wall, which is now bursting with flowers.

Worst ever, ages ago, were new DG kitchen windows with a top opener. When they arrived there was a wide PVC band right at eye level, so ruining outlook to the garden. Could absolutely not live with them, they were out again within a week - very expensive mistake.

Best though not expensive were thanks to dh’s DIY skills. He moved a stud wall to turn one very large double bedroom and one very small single, into one still perfectly adequate double and one large single or ‘just’ double.

Ditto one of two deep cupboards on the landing - he converted the one next to a single bedroom wall into a wardrobe for that room, making it a lot more spacious.

The worse thing I did was, in a mad moment of economy, buy a cheap washer/dryer. I hated it from the start. It was noisy and took hours to dry clothes (I live in a flat so washing has to be tumbled or dried on a rack by an open window). The first time it broke down I replaced it with one of the more expensive ones. I love it. It is so quiet, clothes come out dryer and tumbling takes less time.

Best - the whole house - new build - warm in every room, 3 loos! And silly money on garden - hard landscaping and trees (we just haven't the strength for these jobs) - but makes us happy every day - an unexpected bonus during the lock down. Bit of a waste - pop up plugs in the kitchen worktop - ah well, but handy too.

My neighbour had their entire front garden block paved a few years ago and there's never a weed in sight - he sealed it with the liquid sealer you just roll on with a roller and redoes it once a year. We had a patio done and used the same sealer and so far it's working well.

Best buy would have to be the huge extension we added to this house 26 years ago going backwards, sideways and upwards making a larger dining room, a utility room and en-suite bathroom - we also changed the plans at the last minute from an enclosed back porch to a small office which I practically live in!

Too many silly purchases - a spiralizer probably being the most useless!

Best purchase has to be the conservatory as lots of you have said. I love sitting in there it's so bright and I like looking at the garden. It faces south so any little bit of sun warms it up even in the middle of winter. I am considering getting one of these insulated roofs on it to make it more usable on winter evenings as it's too cold to use then even with a radiator in. Has anyone else had one fitted? If so do you recommend them?
Worst buy was in our previous house when I was 8 months pregnant with our first child and on maternity leave we had British Gas fit a power shower in our only bathroom and toilet in the property using our existing gas boiler. My husband usd it the night it had been fitted and one of the pipe joints they'd fitted in the loft had not been sealed thus we had a waterfall in our bedroom! A couple if days later our electricity all went off and an electrician we called out found a fault in the main fuse box. The fuse box had to be totally replaced at a lot of expense and the fault is as probably caused by the fitting of the electric pump for the new power shower. British Gas did repair the leaky pipe and gave us some compensation to pay for redecorating our bedroom but they would not admit any liability for the fuse box. The shower was great to use and we had it until we moved house 16 years later. But it turned out to be a much more expensive and bigger job than expected and caused me loads of stress!

Another conservatory fan here! A few years ago we were thinking of moving but decided instead to stay put and change the house to suit our needs/wishes. This included a conservatory which we loved and used as much as temperature would allow. 4 years ago we decided to upsize the conservatory and take it along the whole back wall of the house. It now holds a 3 piece suute, tv, bookcase, dining table and chairs and we love it. A decent radiator means we can use it every day of the year Worth every penny. Used a local company and they were fantastic! Worst buy? Theres been a few TBH but nothing major and nothing that a good sort out and trips to the charity shop cant put right. We definitely paid through the nose for a wall of sliding doors in a bedroom alcove which have never fitted properly. The doors constantly come out of the tracks and wont slide. But on the bright side they are in what is now a spare room and hide a multitude of sins ?

Best things:
Having a second kitchen extension to double the size of it, thought it might be too big, but I love it. We decided on custom built units, which seemed extravagant at the time, but worked out just a little dearer than readymade units; the kitchen is gorgeous and my favourite room in the house.
We have had fitted wardrobes installed in all the bedrooms and I wouldn't be without them; all installed by a local company.
Worst: had family bathroom and our en-suite refitted 10 years ago and as our house is traditional, chose Victorian tiles ,(with a high shine) and fittings; wish I'd chosen matt tiles as the shiny ones look so dated. Now working on convincing Himself that we need a re-fit!