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Choosing a location to live - Part 2
A 2 part buyers guide with tips on picking the most suitable place for you to buy a house.
Continued from Part 1...
View
Is a nice view important to you? To some people, a cracking view across rolling countryside is near the top of the list. For others, perhaps people who spend little time at home, the view
is of little importance and, as such, is not worth paying the extra for. Are the houses crammed in where you have seen a potential house
to buy? if so, how private will you be in your garden, and can you see anything other than the backs of other peoples houses from your garden or windows? A kitchen window that looks
straight out to a concrete wall is not particularly inspiring, nor is a landing window that looks straight into next door's bathroom (..). So when viewing a house, make sure you have a good look out of every window.
If buying off plan, ie before the house has actually been
built, then you can only use the plans as a guide to what you'll look out over. If buying a house that is within an estate still being built, ensure that you know exactly what is going to be built
on the muddy patch of earth across the road from your shiny new-build property. There may be a nice view out to the nearby hills now, but when a four storey town house is built on it in 3 months time, your
view might be restricted to one of Mr Jones washing his Astra on a Sunday morning, or a direct line of sight into your neighbours utility room.
Yet again pay attention to who would be living
next door to you. Your garden may look like something that Alan Titchmarsh has just got his gravel-wand off, but how about next doors' garden? - if the scene reminds you of your local tip, or
the garden undergrowth closely resembles something that a Tyrannosaurus Rex might appear from at any moment, you may want to re-think this particular purchase. This advice applies whether you are looking to buy a
traditional house, a flat, or inner city loft conversion.
Desirability of the area
To many people, the perceived desirability of an area in other peoples' eyes, is hugely important. Taken too far is does sound slightly vain, but in truth it doesn't feel half as special buying a
new place if you don't think friends and family will at least like it a bit, even if they wouldn't live there themselves. Being all pragmatic for a moment, one day you might want to sell this house,
and it'll be a lot easier if it's in a nice location. People like to live, and therefore buy, in nice areas. Ceiling prices for houses in run-down areas will also be lower than for similar properties in smarter areas, so it might be something to bear in
mind if you do see this as a stop-gap purchase.
All the factors already discussed have a direct bearing on the desirability of an area. Desirability doesn't necessarily mean super-expensive
houses either, some of the most desirable places in a town may not be the largest, or most expensively appointed, but other facets, such as location or some historical notoriety perhaps,
will hold them above other swisher abodes in the desirability stakes.
Just as people have certain ideas about what area is nice, and what other areas you wouldn't let a dog walk in its own in, so
do insurance companies. Sadly they usually paint all houses in a postcode with the same money-brush, so if a broad postcode area is notoriously dubious for criminal activity, it will bump up
motor and home insurance premiums, even in nice streets that just happen to share a postcode with these higher-risk suburbs. If you run an expensive car, try contacting your insurance
company and see if your premium will get a clobbering. Nice areas usually attract nice people. Less nice areas also attract nice people who can't afford a nicer area, but also attract people that
you wouldn't ordinarily like to be around.
Council tax rates are often quite steep in nice areas too, even if there are far fewer public services nearby as if often the case in rural areas.
Off street parking
Anyway, back to the house itself. Does it have off street parking? this is high up on most peoples' wishlists, especially now that many households have more than one motorcar. Victorian
terraces and many other older properties suffer here, as they were of course built when the nearest thing to transportation many families had was a penny farthing, or sturdy
set of footwear. Parking therefore is a real issue.
Some home owners convert their back yards, which does get around the problem albeit at the expense of garden.
Others have to park out on
the road, which is less secure than parking on your own property, and has the added downside of increasing your insurance premiums. Be sure to check out parking availability, and if there
is no option but to park on the street, try to find out if certain times of the day are worse than others during which to find a place to park. If your terrace house is near a school, you can bet that
finding a parking place during kicking out time will be nigh-on impossible. However by the time you get home from work, things may be a lot more sensible.
I personally would never buy a house
without off street parking of some kind, but I doubt I could be this choosy if I lived in a city. If this was the case, I'd buy a banger and accept that door mirrors will get knocked off from time to time by
passing Transit vans.
Proximity to family members, babysitter etc
Cue the mother-in-law jokes. To many, it will be important that close friends and family are just a short stroll away. Many however wouldn't want either on the same continent as themselves.
To many couples, being close to annoying
relatives or in-laws is the last thing that they would want, and could even be the main reason they want to move at all!
Even the nicest relatives can overstay their welcome sometimes (no not you mum and dad, if you're reading this), and if they keep popping
in to borrow a chainsaw or cup of sugar every ten minutes, it could be a little wearing. And that is if you get on with them! If you're not overly keen on relatives or in-laws, moving a discrete
distance away could be the best thing you ever do, especially if you want to make your own way in the world and find a little independence, probably as a first time buyer. The downside to
making sure there is sufficient distance between you and yours, is that they won't be able to keep a close eye on your place if you go on holiday, or help out quite as often with decorating or
babysitting duties (thats if they want to help with either anyway!).
If you're not particularly adventurous, or are slightly scared of moving out of the family nest, you might want to buy a
home within a stone's throw of your parents or in-laws, so as to minimise the wrench. What I would say is that sooner or later you will have to make the break, so do it now and get used to it !
Other factors
- Is there an airport nearby, and if so are the aircraft liable to be a nuisance as they fly overhead?
- Are there industrial or chemical plants in the vicinity? depending on the direction of the wind, unpleasant smells (or worse) may occur
- Flooding - are you in a flood risk area?
- Is this area troubled by subsidence caused by underground mineshafts, even if long since abandoned?
Local searches performed by your solicitor should ellicit much of this information, but the more you can find out before shelling out hard-earned ££ in professional fees the better. There are facilities online now
where you can enter your postcode, and a summary containing this type of information will be shown. See links below.
The above is not a definitive list by all means, and parts were a little tongue in cheek, but all of the above issues and considerations should at least feature somewhere (however briefly!) in your reasoning behind selecting,
or rejecting, a particular house that you have seen. Needless to say this is just my personal view of things, and should be seen as a suggested list of criteria only.
Handy Links
Homecheck - check your location for flood risks, environmental issues etc
UpMyStreet - enter your postcode to find out lots about an area, inc crime rates, and the types of people who generally live there. Worth a look!
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