Buying A House: What We Are Looking For In Our Dream Home

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I’ve made no secret of the fact that we are desperate to buy our own home. Fingers crossed that 2018 will be the year. Recently we have started looking in our favourite areas for houses that attract us.

At the moment we live in Liverpool and we’re looking to move to the outskirts in areas where there is more greenbelt, good schools and a community spirit which we can get involved in. I currently work in Ormskirk and I love the feel of the market town with its olde world pubs, student bar scene and many sporting clubs. My husband is originally from Formby and he loves the idea of being next to the beach, our son attending an Ofsted rated excellent school and being near to his family. In both areas the house price for a three or four bedroom semi or detached hover from £170k to £300k. Our deposit will afford us a house of around £250k max.

With us purchasing a house of this value and being the age that we are, I am super keen to buy our forever home: something that we can update to reflect our own tastes, but also one that we won’t have to spend a lot of money on.

Bedrooms

We are looking at properties that have at least three bedrooms, simply because if we have another child and it’s a girl, we don’t want to have to move house again. Like I said, this needs to be our forever home. I would prefer it if there were four bedrooms so we have room for a guest room, but I’d rather purchase in a nice area and compromise on this, rather than have more space but not feel safe on my doorstep.

Garden

One of the main reasons I have started hating inner city living is the lack of green space. I want a beautiful garden for Dexter to play in, but also a space where we can relax during summer months with a barbecue smoking in the background and solar lights twinkling in the dusk light. Some of my fondest memories as a child are of me spending time in my garden on a swing just appreciating the warm sunny days.

Bike space

My husband is bike mad and I’m totally sick of his precious bikes taking up space in our cramped lounge. For this reason we are definitely going to need a garage or extra room downstairs where he can store his bikes and turbo trainer, also meaning I can keep well out of way during his training sessions!

Kitchen

I don’t want to have to spend a fortune fitting a new kitchen so I’m looking for a house that has plenty of space, storage and doesn’t need much doing to it. The kitchen is my happy place and I need this space to be perfect and ready for us to install a gorgeous American style fridge and room for a table and chairs. I’ll be spending lots of time in here cooking and baking so I’d prefer it if there was also room for a small TV which I can play music through and put Sky Sports News on during cold, wintery, Saturday afternoons.

Decor

When it comes to the decor, I’m not too fussed as I know we will be able to put our own touch on things, whether that’s installing wood flooring, purchasing plush rugs or ripping down the outdated wallpaper and painting everything white. This is can be one of the tougher things to get your head round when you’re house hunting as it can be hard to visualise the space without the current occupier’s strange furniture and taste in wallpaper. I have big plans for our bedroom which will require a new bed, new bedside furniture, mdf skirting boards and a new dressing table for me. Our current bedroom furniture will go into Neil’s bike room so he can store his many bike clothes.

Bathrooms

I would prefer to have an upstairs and downstairs bathroom but the biggest thing for me will be that the bathroom has a bath and a shower. I simply cannot live without my baths and my husband can’t live without his showers. In my absolute ideal home, the downstairs bathroom would somehow be attached to his bike space so that he can train and shower before coming up to bed, meaning our bedroom floor can stop being a dumping ground for sweaty, damp bike clothes.

I am so excited to be taking this next step in our lives and I hope you’ll join me along the way this year as we apply for a mortgage, go house hunting and finally move into the house of our dreams. In the coming months I’ll be talking a lot more on the blog about our journey, discussing interiors and detailing what buying a house is all about.

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