Owning your own home

Have I stumbled on the DIY thread by accident?

Not that I know the ins and outs of shared & party walls but their wall is already our wall.

Ah, I misunderstood. I thought you meant you intended to build up to an external wall of theirs and make it an internal wall of yours.

Have I stumbled on the DIY thread by accident?

Cheque-booking things now, it's all the rage I hear.

Got 5 quotes, came in at 16, 30 and 40, the other 2 were too expensive. Went with the Middle one as the cheap one just didn't seem realistic, and it ended up costing 21 as the builders left the job before they had finished. Golden rule pay in quarterly instalments At the end of each finished section of work. This is what I was advised by the guy doing the plans, who I then employed to do the job. Luckily I was able to remind him of this when he kept asking for early payments. Cost another 3 to get someone else to finish but most of it was done by the time they sloped off. By the way that website I linked to earlier is probably in the region of 50 upwards, so it was out of my league but great for showing the builder what you would want like and I managed to replicate one of them. Good luck, but ther are plenty of firms in London doing this type of work, if you're in North London I can give pointers

In an attempt to retail this thread from being all about dammit's kitchen and greenhell's misaligned bath tiles, I collected my keys today so I'm now all grown up with a three bed semi in the suburbs of E4.

I've put in a symbolic piece of furniture ahead of the formal move on Monday and started reading the manuals for things like the boiler, it condenses which apparently is good. The fridge, big fuckoff two door American style fridge freezer has an ice dispenser so I've ordered more gin from Tesco as I'm down to my last two bottles.

You've moved to Chingford? By choice!?

After he got his first Vajazzle it was inevitable.

It's moving day :D

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Yep, 118 meters from the forest.
12 mile commute.
Shed.
No more sitting in traffic trying to get to the motorway for trips to see my mum every other week* straight onto the M25.

*Unless we've away fixtures back to back weekends.

I can't quite see your house from here

very nice, can i ask how big that bath is? looks nice an compact for a free stander

Thanks man! Bath is only a 1500, as we had a pretty tight space to fit it in. Prolly could have gone a bit bigger, but we weren't sure how far out the cupboard was going to come, so played it safe.

Second viewing of a house round the corner this morning, it's about a foot narrower than where we are now but is lovely. The guy has done it up really nicely and all the fitted kitchen stuff is included, brought round a polo friend in the know for a look round at extending into the attic and building a workshop/shed out the back, all looks good. He's had 2 offers, one at asking price but said if we matched it he'd go with us as we're nicer. Had a brew with them and should be making an offer tomorrow. Fingers crossed it'll all go through quickly, he's ready to go and so are we.

^ I'm not cynical or owt, but if he'd really had the asking price from someone else wouldn't he be suggesting you go higher, not the same? And to suggest he'll defo give it to you if you match it doesn't make sense either, what if the other party increases?

I wager £1 there is no other party. Or there is, but at less than the asking price.

Ring him up personally and tell him a sob story that you're really trying to get the money together but are struggling and would he consider a slightly lower offer seeing as how he liked you so much. Don't say you definitely can't find the money but intimate it.

His reaction will reveal all. He'll either say 'what a shame, I really wanted to sell it to you' in which case you ask for a couple more hours to beg the money from relatives, then ring back and pay the price. Or he'll squirm and ask how much less you're talking about. In which case I win my imaginary £1 and you can bid less.

^ this

^^ I'd go in for a pound on this too. It's funny how many people seem to think that fraud is an acceptable sales technique when selling a house.

Yep, go with Hefty. Don't be a mug. Not that I'm suggesting you are a mug!

... that really is a CSB.
and that's the project I meant - was that yours? there wasn't another £2M one was there?

Nah, nice guy and the house has only been in there since Friday. We met his wife and dad and had a brew round there, things are nicer up north. We'd happily offer more and if there is another offer of more we'll do so, but he says he's happily to go with us if we offer the same, I believe him, the house is on far too cheap tbh.

Cool. So long as you're happy with everything, it matters not. Get it bought.

Will find out later on anyway.

In London, do everyone put in offers the day after viewing? Agent was obviously pushing for this.
Quite like the place I viewed at the weekend but as the market has slowed slightly and I'm just started looking feel strange about putting an offer on the second place I've seen.

Ignore the agents - they don't work for you.

Better - listen to what they say but don't let them put any pressure on you to do something you aren't sure about.

^^If you want to live there, make an offer. Didn't put one in on the first place we viewed, because it was the first place we viewed, and in retrospect I wish we had. And yeah, agents like really fast offers. Like yesterday fast.