HOUSES THAT ARE UNTOUCHED FOR DECADES

There is a large house next door that 2 elderly spinsters lived in after their father died it hadn’t been refurbished for 100yrs plus, maybe an indoor loo but that’s all. As the roof leaked they moved into a different room, it was awful, relatives eventually persuaded them to move into a bungalow.

The house was listed of course, the builder who bought it actually went bankrupt trying to refurbish it, a total money pit.

Gosh, it’s never occurred to me to analyse why or not people do work on their homes, if they’re friends, I go to visit them, not comment on their living environment.
Other people’s homes I know nothing about.

I totally agree Cariadagain. I looked at six bungalows during Covid for M & D. It was a minefield, it was around the time there was a bidding war going on for houses, especially bungalows.
The houses we look at were really dated, a few had the old back boiler behind the fireplace, old corner, or coloured bathroom suites, one even had poly tiles on the ceiling.
Nearly all had stippled ceilings 😩
One bungalow wanted £300.000, you could see daylight through the skirting boards, apparently the floor had sunk.

On the other hand I looked at an awful lots of houses where the improvements and updating had actually decreased the value.

Many had been done without really thinking through the impact ( the extension that leaves one room without any natural light) or had been done without really having the money to it properly and silly compromises had been made.

My little terraced house has its original bathroom. It was thoughtfully designed to fit the limited space, looks clean and works perfectly.

Why change it just because the colour and style is ‘outdated”?

“Why change it just because the colour and style is ‘outdated”?”

Because buyers are slaves to fashion and want their perfect Kitchen or Bathroom, they must have a range cooker and cupboards all round and an island not leaving room for a kitchen table.

It’s just one up man ship, exactly the same as cars going far beyond what is actually needed to cook a meal or travel

Someone else can update it when I go. Let’s face it, any updating is pretty soon out of date unless you sell straight away.

Islands definitely on the way out……l

I think it’s unfair of posters to tell CariadAgain to mind her own business, if we all did that there’d be few threads to comment on.
It’s a talking point is all, and quite an interesting one.It does seem that bungalows suffer more from being very outdated, as in swirly carpets, 70’s bathrooms and kitchens and thick swirly plastered ceilings.A friend of Mum’s moved into one around 20 years ago that needed everything doing including a new central heating system, boiler and radiators, all internal doors and of course redecorating and new flooring, as well as bathroom and kitchen.Nothing touched for 35 years.I guess that bungalows suffer more ‘neglect’ as a lot of them are lived in by older people who either don’t mind their house being dated and don’t have a lot of money, or (as many older people feel) they shouldn’t really be spending their money.Or in some cases they spend what they have on cruises!😄

'I think it’s unfair of posters to tell CariadAgain to mind her own business, if we all did that there’d be few threads to comment on.'

Precisely.

I would love to buy a bungalow at a decent price & put my own stamp on it but they seem to charge an extortionate amount now for bungalows.
I couldn’t afford what they want, plus have money left over to revamp from start to finish.
I read somewhere young people are after them so that it will become their ‘forever’ house.

I guess I can understand how people don't do anything to their properties for years because I'm sort of in that situation now. DH and I bought out his ex-wife and then we went to town on completely gutting and decorating the house. Knocked out walls, new carpets, kitchen, bathroom, central heating- the whole lot.
Twenty plus years later apart from redecorating the kitchen-diner a couple of times, we have not done much since. But I'm now realising that stuff needs updating - we had a new boiler installed in March - definitely had our moneys worth out of the old one!! We've had new blinds installed but things like kitchen cupboard doors need replacing not because the kitchen is falling apart but because the plastic coating on the doors is disintegrating! Our leather suite is also in dire need of replacing. So we need to sit down, write down everything that needs doing and then plan an agenda to pay for and do it all. But we would get in decorators to do the nitty gritty but only after we finish decluttering which is a marathon job in itself. The thought of moving stuff out even to do our open lounge is alarming but it means that the upstairs landing gets done at the same time for continuity. It's not just one area or room!!
Daunting and very much a reason to understand why people don't get around to doing anything for years!!

LovesBach

*'I think it’s unfair of posters to tell CariadAgain to mind her own business, if we all did that there’d be few threads to comment on.'*

Precisely.

To me - I think it would be a pity if even fewer people tried to mentally "put themselves in the shoes of" someone with a very different viewpoint. Earth is a warlike planet anyway - oh boy isnt it?!!!! Maybe there'd be rather less of all that if people sat down and tried to think "Why are they thinking/acting such a different way?" and try and find out how they are thinking and why.

Not to mention - sometimes one decides to adopt an idea here and another idea there - because you've found out the reasoning why and thought "Hmmm....maybe that is a good idea to try that out?" or "I quite fancy that thought - I'll have a go at it".

Same as with another topic - ie food - and I eat nothing remotely like the way I was brought up to do (ie restricted even by 1950s standards/meat/unhealthy). Million miles away from it - because I've asked this and I've tried that and I've tried something else and cue for a seachange - as I preferred it to what I had...

Re the way I deal with a house - and I'm time and motion conscious (which makes for a house with no ornaments or pictures whatsoever) and I work out how it can "work" as efficiently as possible (ie minimum of housework/minimum of safety hazards/etc). My kitchen here was a typical example - ie putting in the absolute maximum of work surface space and storage space I could, splashbacks as far up the wall as possible, what needed to go where for maximum utility. Bathroom had to come out because of safety hazards (1970s wallfire looking very unsafe, bath set very high off the floor for little me, no radiator towel rail). Garden was full of trip hazards, a grotty rotating clothesline, nothing usable to eat, etc and don't get me started on storage space (lack thereof) and hence I went through the house adding bits of storage everywhere I could.

BlueBelle

Is it your business ?
You seem very invested in other peoples house, just carry on getting on with your own
Not difficult to see why you have neighbour problems (re your other threads) ‘mind your own’ as they say not your business whether they have ‘lots of money left over’ or scrapping the barrel
Get on with your own life don’t try and live someone else’s

Incredibly rude

We were delighted to buy a house in pristine condition but hopelessly dated, untouched since the 80s.

People who don't update the interior of their homes, often don't update essential systems either, the electrician who rewired the house was horrified at the Heath Robinson approach to some of the wiring. The ancient boiler was in a cupboard in the "dining room". The Artex ceilings were frightful. The chimney breast took up half of the space in the living room.

We updated everything and the house is transformed from a dark and dated space to a light, airy, welcoming home. Now ready to look for the next one!

We went right through the house a couple of years ago. Every room decorated, new carpets or hard floors in every room, blinds and curtains replaced where the old ones didn't match, light fittings replaced, bookcases built, a new kitchen and bathroom and a bedroom covered into a study. I'm very happy with it, but I will never do it again 😂.

Everything had to be declutterred, which is a task in itself, the organisation was daunting (particularly doing all the bedrooms at once, which was my daft decision), and it felt as though the house wasn't our own, as there were workmen and decorators in, which I find stressful. We slept on the floor for a week waiting for new carpets and beds to be delivered and the rooms decorated, the kitchen ran into snags and all the contents were in the dining room for ages - I'm hyperventilating just remembering it😂. I was about 63 and my husband is around to help. At 73, 83 or older it would just be too much, particularly if I was on my own.

In my area, bungalows tend to be on modern estates on the outskirts of town (the centre is old and built before bungalows were popular), so when one does come up for sale in the centre, where the facilities are located, they command a high price and are snapped up. I can well imagine someone selling a house that might need a bit of work and getting less than the cost of the bungalow, so if they are on a fixed income they might not be able to justify spending thousands on updating - the important thing is living somewhere with no stairs near the doctors and shops.

One of my dds bought a probate property that was extremely dated, and not in a ‘tasteful’ way, IYKWIM. However it had a lovely warm atmosphere and had evidently been a much loved, and cared for, family home. Former owners had bought it from the council in 1971 - they were evidently being sold off well before Thatcher.
They paid almost exactly 1% of what dd paid!

But it was perfectly liveable, still is. Dd has done very little to it several years later. When asked why, she told me, ‘I’m putting as much as I can into my pension!’

Doodledog did you update your neighbour on exactly what you did to the house preferably along with detailed costings? Some neighbours seem to examine all that...

Lathyrus3

On the other hand I looked at an awful lots of houses where the improvements and updating had actually decreased the value.

Many had been done without really thinking through the impact ( the extension that leaves one room without any natural light) or had been done without really having the money to it properly and silly compromises had been made.

My little terraced house has its original bathroom. It was thoughtfully designed to fit the limited space, looks clean and works perfectly.

Why change it just because the colour and style is ‘outdated”?

Yes I know what you mean. Shoddy work & not to my taste

Witzend

One of my dds bought a probate property that was extremely dated, and not in a ‘tasteful’ way, IYKWIM. However it had a lovely warm atmosphere and had evidently been a much loved, and cared for, family home. Former owners had bought it from the council in 1971 - they were evidently being sold off well before Thatcher.
They paid almost exactly 1% of what dd paid!

But it was perfectly liveable, still is. Dd has done very little to it several years later. When asked why, she told me, ‘I’m putting as much as I can into my pension!’

"Atmosphere" - though intangible is a thing imo.

It was (a small) part of the reason why I moved from there eventually - as I was finding the odd inexplicable incident a bit worrying (you try hearing a very loud factory machine noise in one of your Victorian bedroom alcoves for no known reason one day - ie when I was trying to go to sleep in it - and I'd have to stop and google where the nearest factory to it was - ie some distance away). I don't know which incident was most disconcerting - the factory machine noise or the black helicopter or two that woke me up hovering over my house for half an hour or so in the middle of the night one day. Mustnt forget the loud noise in the middle of another night - which was a thief trying to break through into next doors front door (I was too scared to take action at the time - but rang the police the next day to tell them "Door open/neighbour away right now").

Cue for current house just feeling "probate house....probate house.....oooooooh....dear!" when I first got it. I could see everyone reacting a bit "ho hum" or negatively to it at the outset and I certainly hated the reek of fag smoke from last owner (vendor had hidden that by having all windows wide open when I came viewing).

These days - the reaction to the house itself is that they like it/wonder how much I'd sell it for if that was what I wanted to do or just smile. One of the latest friends reaction to it when she first came here was "OOOh...now if I could afford a house and you were selling yours = I want it....".. Everyone then takes a look at the view at some point - ie the only positive thing that could be said about it when I bought it.

I sympathise re the putting money into a pension if need be - as that's exactly what I did and made it a financial priority (hence very few holidays).

Aveline

Doodledog did you update your neighbour on exactly what you did to the house preferably along with detailed costings? Some neighbours seem to examine all that...

Funnily enough, no 😂

I was raised in a garrison town. Some ex=military people never escape from that imprinted conformity. 0ne right way to do things. Everything correct and in its place.

Our current home is in a development built in 1990. The first owner, a lady aged 70, bought it off-plan, maintained it perfectly, and lived in it till she was 100. It still has the original kitchen units and both original bathrooms . One has a pale blue suite; the other is peach. Both fully tiled. As perfect as the day they were installed. So are the oak and pale beige kitchen units. OO replaced the boiler in 2009; I had that one replaced yesterday. We personally stripped off her 1980's wallpapers with compementary dado strips revealing perfect plaster, and painted it white. We replaced all the floor coverings.

Otherwise, its all original. It's a house of its time, a rare combination of quality materials, best workmanship and design, a joy to live in. I appreciate its old-style quirkiness. One day it's time and type will be fashionable again, I'm just ahead of the trend.

We also have a collection of maybe tenth-hand inherited furniture, not new when my pre-used second-hand dad bought it a century ago.Added to that is my own magpie collection of stuff from charity shops. Old linen; unmatched bone china, tools. Quality lasts. Its our everyday stuff in daily use by us... and all its previous owners.

Don't get me started on my pre-owned clothes, and n'th hand rescue dogs with a history...

Perhaps they're like the situation I'm in at the moment and JUST CAN'T FIND ANYBODY to do it!!! Grrrr!

Cariad Your parents acted very differently to mine when they left they forces. After 25 years of constant moving and packing and keeping personal possessions to a minimum and disposing of anything you werent actually using.

Mine retired to a large bungalow, footprint roughly 30 ft x 50, with a huge lit loft. The inside of the house was immaculate -warm comfortable and attractive. My parents were very sociable and entertained a lot.

But a day or two after my father died DS and I tried to get the loft ladder down - and it broke and we had to get a man to fix it. When he had done so and went up to turn the light off, he looked around and came down and said to DS and I. 'I do not envy you having to clear that lot up. When we got into the loft we found the whole loft, all 30 x 50 feet of it was full of - stuff-. All neatly arranged in rows with old doors and planks forming walkways up and down. Everything within reach and broadly arrange dby category.

25 years of never having anything unnecessary caught up with them in one momemnt and after that, if anything could be consigned to the loft it was. I cannot remember it all, but I do remember the rolls of garden fencing.

butterandjam never buy anything new if you can buy it secondhand. When DH and I got engaged, our first outing with my parents was to the local auction rooms. My father not long retired from the army and my mother, brought up buying everything second hand had found the local auction room as soon as they found their first home of their choice in 20 years and they could not wait to let us know about it. DH the grandson and nephew of antique dealers, brought up round the family shop and furniture repair shop, was equally avid.

Its just that we like old houses to put all our second hand belongings in.

There is a difference between taking a very worn and out dated house and bringing it up to date, and ripping perfectly good kitchens and bathrooms out, for example, because you do not like them

Our current house was reformd from 4 condemned cottages in the 1960s. By the mid 90s they were looking sad and dated. The kitchen was 8 foot square, and the cupboard doors were splitting and faded. We renovated, enlarged the kitchen, installed another bathroom and for the next 25 years, redecorated every so often. Then we repeated the exercise, built an extension and refitted the by now tired chipped and fading kitchen. We have now sold it to someone who fell in love with the kitchen.

We are now buying a house, untouched since the late 1960s.

Every house we have moved into we have revamped. I really can't understand the mindset that you keep looking until you finally see a house with the kitchen you want, the bathrooms you want, the floorcoverings you want, the decor you want etc. This house will never come along. So we have the attitude that we buy in the area we want with the right amount of garden we want. Every thing else can be altered. We even bought a brand new house once and within a week we had builders in to knock down walls, alter the living room and put a different kitchen in (we sold the original one and the fireplace with a gas inset fire so nothing to landfill). We were in that house for 13 years and often when others on the estate came up for sale they still had the original magnolia paint on the walls. I couldn't stand the thought of using other peoples carpets or furniture, if I couldn't afford to replace I would be happy with floor boards until I could.