Owning your own home

Kitchen appliances chat :) >>>

Thoughts and prayers.

The thing is, you spend a lot more time in the loft than you do looking at the outside. Given the planning restrictions most things are going to look pretty similar to maximise the space.

Yeah that’s nice. Sauce?

Con Form Architects. It's this project, but they seem to have taken down most of the external images - https://www.dezeen.com/2019/07/24/domore-con-form-architects-loft-conversion-london/

Anyone seen any nice pivot window suitable for a dining room remodel where we’ll put a bench seat on each side?

The rest of the windows (and the french door which will be 2m away from it) are white painted wood so trying to work out if anything will coordinate, or if we need to replace both… which blows our budget a bit. Would be good to see if this is a realistic idea or will end up a bit of a pipe dream.

Yeah that's madness. The way materials meet, can't even imagine the effort...

My neighbours did this recently which I find troubling.
Perhaps a nicer use of cladding would have made it less oppressive?

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PD rules insist on a finish to match existing

Not great not terrible. I'd be investing in a taller fence or trellis or something.
At least they didn't use those red / terracotta coloured tiles.

PD thing is stupid on this one. It looks awful. Absolutely awful in any colour tile. Vertically hanging roof tiles scare me too!

Dormers are shit. You can roll them in glitter and fill their pokey en-suite bathrooms with Aesop products, but they ultimately provide sub-standard space 99% of the time with overly low ceiling heights and overheating rooms.

The introduction and continued relaxation of Permitted Development Rights paired with an immobile property ladder (stagnant salary growth paired with continued rising property values and cheap debt to make us all feel richer) along with general 'every man's home is his castle/I'm alright Jack' mentally has a lot to answer for.

immobile property ladder (stagnant salary growth paired with continued rising property values and cheap debt to make us all feel richer)

These sorts of extensions are driven by Stamp Duty more than anything. When moving house to get more space has a £100k deadweight loss the incentives are all screwed up.

The last part of your comment triggered a huge eyeroll I am afraid.

Sorry for the eyeroll and completely agree on the cost of moving in general, which when paired with items above has all but changed the traditional model of the property ladder and moving up/down as life needs change. Stamp duty holidays when things go a bit sideways demonstrate that an active property market and continued upward rising prices, or at least no drop in value (in London at least) trumps all.

Dormers; functional but shit.

I actually don't mind that, but not on that house. Windows don't look too bad and those tiles match the pattern and rhythm of brickwork, which that doesn't actually have.

It looks pretty well done.

More space > No more space.

Also, Parklife!

I've got three estate agents visiting me this weekend for a probate valuation. Do I need to care very much about what they get up to? I may or may not be selling the actual property and it's entirely, for the moment, for the probate solicitors.

No just get the valuations. For probate purposes ask for the lowest value for a quick sale.

Do I need to care very much about what they get up to?

If the valuation is way overstated you might end up paying too much IHT, but I think these days the thresholds are sufficiently high that it doesn't affect most estates.

It’s certainly irrelevant in London!

relevant, surely? If you are passing on less than [£1 mm] of primary resi property it's IHT exempt anyway so the valuation doesn't matter. I was envisaging the scenario where your agent says it's worth 2, you pay tax on 2 but when you go and test the market it was only worth 1.8 so you paid too much tax.

I would guess high-value London property now funds the bulk of IHT receipts for this reason.

The issue I remember my parents having to deal with is IHT being due for payment before a property sold.

So unless the cash held by the estate covered that you could be in a bind to close probate and sell a house.

Always get the house undervalued. Tell them it's a probate valuation and they are your preferred estate agent (winkwink)

my mum and her siblings are currently selling my late granddad's house - said something about being liable for tax on anything above the valuation if it sells for more..?
not sure if that's something different, or she's got mixed up?

fwiw, house is about 600k

something about being liable for tax on anything above the valuation if it sells for more

When you inherit property your cost basis for CGT purposes is the probate valuation, so yes theoretically you could have to pay CGT on any uplift (above your unused tax-free threshold) after probate is granted and the change of ownership occurs.

The above is not relevant if property is sold from the estate (i.e. does not pass into the ownership of the heirs).

aha! so it seems i'm just mixing up/conflating IHT and CGT without merit - good stuff, thanks!

I’m still going with L&C, couldn’t get another mortgage offer due to interest rate rises putting what I need slightly out of reach now.

Last question from Nationwide was - who’s looking after it if you’re abroad for a long time? 🤷‍♂️

Managed to get L&C to escalate it today so hopefully hear back tomorrow finally…although I’m sure they’ll have another impossible question / document request to ask.

Part of me tempted to throw the deposit money at a VW T6 and be done with it all!