Owning your own home

Ah... we're north of London, but not that far north.

Thanks anyway. Will definitely try that app.

thanks. I've got someone for the garden though. still like the wild west out there for trades, I gather. we've just booked in some joinery work... for november.

Yeah a ton of cowboys out there, only trade you can get is gas engineers the now (unlucky the trade im in)

Other half went to view a place this morning only to turn up and find the estate agent wasn't there. Fortunately the vendor was and was happy to show her around - turns out that the estate agents had cancelled the viewing thinking that there was an offer that had been accepted. Turns out it hadn't been accepted yet.

Possibly quite lucky in the end, as they ended up chatting and she was there for over an hour vs thr 15mins she would have got with the EA....
Place sounds ideal, and very well looked after, if a little further out than we had planned originally.

We have put an offer in, so now to wait and see...

Yeah that’s a bargain. Can’t be london right? I remember looking at garages for 40-70k.

SE23

Ahhh so not london.

Anyone know someone who can lay paving stones in SE18 ASAP. About 2.5m x 4m worth.

@Soul (I think) or anyone else - what brand is your water softener? You were v. happy with it iirc?

Progress. He's also redone a wall in my office that had to be taken back to brick after the work that the previous plasterer did blew (should have been back to brick the first time).

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I've got an Ecowater eVolution Refiner Power. Installed in October last year.

Basically a large water softener (approx. 300 days between refills of salt) with a carbon filter for taste. We got it installed along with a Quooker chilled / sparkling / boiling tap.

Very happy with it. Still got 138 days of salt left so it's roughly a year (370+ days) between refilling. App is handy in tracking water usage and service intervals but that's about it.

We're in a very hard water area (359.5ppm - It's removed 26.7Kg of 'rock' since install). Noticeable difference in limescale across the house. Shower, toilet, sink etc all stay cleaner for much longer. Water straight out of the tap (not chilled from the tap) tastes different but the carbon filter removes most of the 'softener' taste.

Would recommend.

It is massive though, so lives in the garage rather than in a kitchen cupboard.

I remember you signing its praises last time - great to know it's still proving itself. Ours will have to be an under counter model - but tough to discern between brands, so appreciate it!

but tough to discern between brands

They all do the same thing and work in the same way. Probably all come from the same factory.

I had a quote from Harvey's. Seemed fine, pretty similar in price to the equivalents.

Didn't go for it in the end as we didn't want to replace the kitchen tap with a three way one.

Am I missing something here...

Jan 2021:
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices/detailMatching.html?prop=78682941&sale=11830333&country=england

July 2021:
https://www.zoopla.co.uk/for-sale/details/59116964/

White paint. Really, really expensive white paint…

New kitchen? And a photographer who charges £300k :)

New kitchen, new flooring, one less bedroom in new listing, looks like it's been redecorated throughout. I think it just shows that you can make serious gains (if it sells for asking and thats your thing) by spending a bit of time tidying a place up, getting good photos taken.

The new listing looks like a lovely house from the photos, the old listing looks like its a place that needs a serious facelift that would put a lot of people off.

that’s it in a nutshell I think. it’s mad but there we go - TMH listings fetch a 12% premium on other EAs iirc. most of that uplift is probably driven off the set dressing and photos (plus some uplift from the prestige service they prob give to buyers)

Don't disagree but it takes 2 mins to Google and £40-50k of work to try and add £360k is a madness. If you're spending that much you'll do your DD and it's not such a flawless job or location that the premium feels worth it.
Maybe I should get the TMH round to value my gaff

Presumably TMH charge a lot for their marketing sales service? Wondering if I should try to sell my flat with them. Simultaneously having imposter syndrome anxiety that the flat isn't sufficiently cool...

There's a house over the road from me that's been flipped twice in two years, gained who knows how much (offers over system), but sold very quick both times. Got to be something along the lines of folk getting fed up not getting a house they've bid on over and over again, so when they see one that's "could move right in" they go nuts and drop all the dollar.

Our under sink model is from Kinetico. OH wrote it up here.

https://www.lfgss.com/comments/15763563/

apparently TMH often use props/their own furniture to get that "look" too. their business plan is amazing imo. would like to see how well they are doing financially

Our original buyer fell through and our second in line buyer just stepped into the breach. Looks like I'm moving into a Warner Flat!

Too small for companies house accounts so maybe less than you might think.