Need some input on this please as it is driving me crazy!

I have just seen a 4 bed house for sale in my area, closer to my kids school, right near my brother and sister, looks out on fields, in our price range. BUT

We live in 3 bed further away from the school, but the only thing is the 4 bed house has a tad smaller garden and front garden.

We had planned on our next move that we would move closer to the school but have a bigger garden, but with the way the property market is going we don't think we would be comfortable with a bigger mortgage in a house that had a bigger garden in the area we like.

So now we are trying to decide whether to put our house on the market and go for this 4 bed house, it would be great having more space inside the house and closer to the school but its the garden!!!  There are fields that we walk our dogs in right opposite the 4 bed house so it is very tempting!

Oh please I know its is hard for you to give your advise not knowing the houses, but should we go for it and move now or wait longer hoping we can comfortabley buy a more expensive house!
We have made mistakes before, like most people do and you always say 'IF WE HAD,,,' so now my brain is trying to work out if this is a good idea!!! :D :D

If the garden being larger is mainly for the dogs benefit then I woudln't worry.  After al many dogs liek mien only use the garden as a loo, adn may play in it a litte but their walks are where they get theri excersise.  More importan is are the neighbours right in your face where the dogs may cause you neighbour isues.

I agree with Brainless. Neighbours have to be taken into account when moving. My next door neighbours complained so much in the first year I moved here that I ended up threatening to have a solicitors letter sent to stop the harrassment :( Size of garden shouldn't be tto much of a problem if you walk your dogs on a regular basis so that they get plenty of free running excercise.

Exactly what I was going to say! NEIGHBOURS! (Oh sorry, I shouldn't have used a swear word on CD!:D ) We moved to a smaller garden and  smaller house (but twice as expensive) to get away from neighbours and it was most definitely worth it!

and another thought,....no idea where you live, but is it possible the fields could be sold off for housing as seems to be ever happening??? that would be a real pain...maybe do some research on it? are they private land or are they a park? If private land then anything could change at any time

Thanks everyone,
I have been talking to my friend today who popped round for coffee and she has said what everyone else on CD have said!
The dogs get walked and only really use the garden as a loo, they are not the sort of breed that go racing around the garden so that shouldn't be a problem.
The fields opposite the house are owned by the stables and use the land for grazing and some fields are corn fields.  There is also a public park right on our doorstep so would be closer to all of it.

I think I will call the estate agents and get my house valued! :D
The people that own the 4 bed are away for a few weeks so I have time to think things through as the estate agents dont have a key so no one can view the place yet anyway.

how can you exercise dogs amongst horses or corn??

The kind stable owners have dedicated some fields for public use so horses and corn are in surrounding fields x :)

ahhhhha

I do both as we have many public footpaths which go directly through crop fields and fields with horses and cattle :)

Good on yer. Garden size does not matter if you walk them regular. Ours is long and narrow and to be honest we traded in a huge garden for this little one and I've never regreted it. We now have the fields and walks that I wanted and the dogs have never had so much fun. Our chicken house is being delivered tonight and tomorrow, I'll buy some hens, something I would never of done in our big garden in suburbia. I hope you get this house, you'll enjoy it.

plus, my new neighbours are very doggy(2 spaniels)so walks together are common.

Only you can decide, and you won't know whether it is right for you until you view it, as soon as you walk inside you will know the answer :)

If you decide to go ahead I would suggest going to see the potential new neighbours and ask them what they will think of your canine set up (number of dogs etc).  If you get negative vibes then at least you will not have moved in.

Well I have called the estate agents out to value our house! :D

They are coming Monday, we have got a rough idea of the value but just want to see what the agents think.

I will wait until we can view the property before finding out more about the neighbours etc;

Get it on for the bank holiday weekend, if you can.

UPDATE:
Well we have done it!!! :D
We are now on the market (house that is! :D).
Had a viewer yesterday who was here for about half hour! They had dogs too so did not mind the greeting from my lot!
So now the arguments, stress, depression and bartering starts!!!

Could all CD's please wish us luck by crossing fingers and toes, and maybe wish for us to move with no problems and find the property we will be happy in for years to come :D :D :)

EDIT:  We are painting like mad in our house, if the dogs stand still to long we will be painting them too!!  Anyone got a spare paint brush, then come on over and have a painting party!!!

EDIT EDIT!  Got another of my pups coming to visit this weekend too, god things are gonna be MANIC!

Wish you all the luck in the world and hope it all works out with minimal probelms ;) :D

Lets hope it doesn't take as long and is as painful as it was for us but even if it is it is so worth it :D

Lucy
xx

Careful what you wish for - we all crossed everything for Lucy and Marianne and, well, they weren't the easiest of sales. :-D I'll wish you luck anyway and set the woodpecker to work again (poor thing about keeled over thanks to them other 2 ;-))

I have lived in lots of houses and I'm now in my forever home and it only has a small back garden but it is completely private. One house we bought because of the back garden, about an acre but I split with my ex I and couldn't keep up with it.  
My house backs on to the park so exercise is not a worry even if I had a large garden I would not leave my dogs out there unattended so the perfect house is now more important than a large garden so long as they've got somewhere to relive themselves I'm happy 

"Careful what you wish for - we all crossed everything for Lucy and Marianne and, well, they weren't the easiest of sales. "

Oh you're right Lori... yikes...

OK...so if we wish for something the opposite happens?

Could all CDers please wish for me NOT to win the lotto tonight :D

Good luck!

UPDATE:
Well we have viewed the 4 bed house!! :D :D

really want to live in the road, but the only thing is the house had no heating!!!  There was a few 'cosmetic' issues too with the house like will need new kitchen, bathroom, fencing and HEATING!!

There are other similar properties for less money close by with HEATING etc but we really wanted to live in the road this house is in as its close to family.
We are going back to view it again, and if we decide to put in an offer we will take into account the work we need to do on it!! :D

I did want to find a house that we didn't need to do anything to apart from decorating, carpets, but this house is where we want to live SOD LAW!

You can always update and redecorate - you can't move a house's location. I knock everything around after a year anyway! :-D Just get a real estimate for what it will cost to make the house livable so you can make an informed decision.

> you can't move a house's location

I'll second that the last two houses that we have bought have both required total renovation - but it is/was worth it for the location :) :) Paying for someone else's choice of decoration/kitchens/bathrooms etc is not a good idea as they usually get changed because you don't like them before they have reached their sell by date :D :D :D

Daisy

I'd third that as well. I loved my little old cottage and the village it was in, but I was running out of room and needed to move. My choice of house would be an older, character property, with beams and wonky floors. When a mid-50's bungalow came on the market in the same road I was already living, I opted for that. Not my sort of property at all, and needed total refurbishment, including heating. It's near-perfect location swung it for me.

UPDATE:
Well we have had an offer on our house, it is below the asking price but we did expect that as our home is not a 'show home', it could do with a new bathroom suite for starts!!
Anyway, my OH is telling me to refuse the offer (£4000 below asking price but £1000 below our minimum we could take) but I want to take the offer!!
The buyers are first time buyers so there would be no chain that side and the house we like has no chain their side either!!
We are going to chat about it tonight, but my OH can be stubborn and I just don't want to lose the house we like and have loads more strangers having to look round my house anymore!!! :D
I do understand my OH point about wanting more for the house, but there are alot of houses like mine for sale at the moment ,,,,

I personally would accept the lower offer as I think it's worth it to avoid getting caught up in a chain.

Best of luck :)

Don't lose a buyer, especially not when you have seen another house you want! It took us 18 months to sell my MIL's bungalow and in the end it went for £20 000 less than we had hoped for. In the meantime we lost the house we had hoped to buy, not once but twice -we were then incredibly lucky in that the sale of it fell through for the second time and so we did manage to get it in the end, but that was just pure luck.

To not have to go through all of this again, and to avoid the HIP etc, we are now selling our old house for 80 % of the market value to one of these firms that buy them cheaply and quickly. We need the money so can't wait around  for buyers to appear via estate agents, it's too much hit and miss. This bungalow we're living in now was actually for sale for almost 3 years before the sale finally went through!

If you hadn't found a house to move to, it might be worth hanging on to see if you get a higher offer.  But as you've found a new place I would say accept the offer if you can afford it - it's not worth taking a risk.

The market is in a definite downturn at the moment so if I were you I would accept the offer as in a few weeks time prices may well have dropped and you could be scratching round for another buyer who will match this offer!

I would speak to the estate agents and tell them about your predicament.  bear in mind that most people try an offer below what they can afford.  Your estate agent might tell you what the buyers are prepared to go up to.   let your estate agent work for you (they get paid enough for it)

Try and see if they'll meet you half way, if there's anyway to get an extra £500 or even the £1000 out of them - if this is their absolute top price then take it, it's really not worth losing the sale for the sake of £1K.

Good luck.

Thanks everyone for your import.

Well we have accepted their offer, although we managed to get another £2000 out of them!!!! :D :D
And the house we like is now ours (STC)!!!!:D :D :D
God now comes the scary bit, although there is no chain either side of us, we are wondering whether we will be in by christmas??
Would be nice!!!

That is fantastic news!!!:-)

Congratulations and fingers crossed you make it in before christmas!!!:-D

Wonderful!!!!!!

With no problems with surveys etc, there should be no reason why you shouldn't be in by Xmas! keep your solicitor motivated, they can slow things down.

Well done, and good luck! :)

Great news and will keep fingers crossed that it all goes smoothly :D

Lucy
xx