House Moving & Renovation

Tomorrow, the 21st May, is the 2 year anniversary of completion on the selling of my previous house & buying of the 1930's dump that I have renovated & extended over the period. It all took a lot longer & cost a lot more than it should have done. A combination of Brexit, Covid & the Ukraine war caused huge supply chain issues. I also felt my builder could have been a lot better organised & had a much closer eye on the ball. (But he is a really nice man & that's worth a lot in the building trade). The UK building trade doesn't have a very good reputation in comparison with Germany & Scandinavia for example. Eastern European trades are far better trained & valued & have an amazing work ethic.

I was lucky & had a good rental. But the cost of storage & rent was huge, so I moved into my house while the builders were still working in March 2022. It was all a bit of a nightmare looking back. I have always wanted to build my own house. This was the closest I am likely to come to doing it. 

The first house my husband & I bought had had a sucession of army tenants & was also in a fairly dreadful state, but not as bad as this. I actually physically did quite a bit of the work on that. The third house we owned had to be completely reconfigured inside & we built a very big extension on that too, while still living there. I tiled a whole bathroom in that. That went well over time too, but fortunately the price was fixed. The next house we owned had a massive water escape from the loft while we were on holiday abroad & two thirds of the house with everything in it was destroyed. We managed to live in one third of the house though. It took months to even dry out before building could begin. Then the Insurers builders did a really bad job of renovation & it all had to be done again. So it took a year in all & cost a fortune. Fortunately not my fortune!

I have always been able to think 3 dimensionally & see the potential in houses. So when I came to do this project on my own I knew what I was doing & what it might be like. However it was worse than anticipated. I seemed to be continually fire fighting & problem solving. I'm reasonably good at research, sourcing fixtures & fittings etc & organisation. But I didn't anticipate having to be as hands on in the actual building process & virtually project manage. It's not part of my skill set.

I'm glad I did it & I love my house. I am quite proud of what I have achieved. It isn't something I would want to repeat though. Looking back it definitely took it's toll on me physically & emotionally. I doubt that I could repeat the process now. But who knows? 

We don't know what we are capable of until we do it.

 

Moving Again

In theory I should be in my new house. In practice I have been staying with my daughter for the last week & it looks as if I'll be there for another week.

I moved out of my rental on the 4th, which was relatively fine. But when I got to my house I discovered that all the rooms were still filthy & full of builders stuff. There wasn't enough space to put the contents of the 3 bed rental. The bifold doors which had been promised on the 5th weren't there. Neither were the fittings for the wardrobes also promised for the Wednesday.

The builders were working with the team doing the cladding for the extension, because there had been a mix up over who was doing the battening & boarding under the metal cladding & the bifold doors finally arrived 6 months after they had been ordered & paid for. Unfortunately they are not all cream for some reason that I haven't yet discovered! 

The decorator developed a serious health problem at the weekend so was unable to work. The carpenter couldn't work for almost 2 weeks & then got Flu. Most of the remaining work inside is down to them.

So space had to be hurriedly cleared before the removers arrived & then I lost the will to live trying to decide where everything could go in the limited space available. The dust was so bad it affected my breathing. In the end once the removers had gone I was utterly exhausted & had to leave.

My lovely cleaners went to the house yesterday afternoon & did an amazing job. So today I've been able to unpack 6 boxes with kitchen stuff & bring my computer to my daughters so that I can access all my files etc. I've been able to do a bit on my phone & iPad, but didn't have all my passwords for everything. My life is on my computer. It's how I communicate for everything.

I don't know if the transfer of utilities & council tax has gone through. I do know I got a letter from Thames Water saying that my monthly direct debit would be £26,537.00 - No that isn't a typo! Thames Water have also overcharged me at the rental & at my house. 

I have tried to be understanding & patient over the last 10 months given the circumstances with Brexit & then Covid. In terms of the supply chain I don't blame the suppliers of things like windows & doors. It's the fabricators who just don't fulfil the contract. The suppliers are between a rock & a hard place, between the customer & the fabricators. In my case I actually think I am due compensation for the unacceptable delays & mistakes. 

The outcome is hugely increased costs & delays, much disappointment & frustration, & finally utter annoyance that so many people just don't communicate effectively & do their job. British workmen have had a bad reputation for a long time in comparison with the Germans & Scandinavians for example. But currently the system is not working at all.

This is not the time to be renovating a house & building an extension!

 

Mine has been so far outside my comfort zone I've forgotten where that is!

Boundaries - Physical & Metaphysical

I don't think I have ever had to think about this before. Obviously I know what my personal boundaries are. I try to tell the truth, unless the truth will hurt someone, I feel I have a strong eithical sense, I believe in equality & equal opportinity, I am assertive, but try not to be aggressive, I don't believe in physical violence, I don't believe in ignoring wrongs, so I am quite political & lobby a lot, I don't believe in inherited wealth & privilege, I do believe in fairness, I try to respect everyone even if I disagree with them.(I do find that hard - I don't tolerate fools well). Basically I follow societies rules & comply with the law.

Since I have been renovating my house & building an extension I have had several issues with property boundaries. My party wall caused problems & was very expensive to resolve. Fortunately I had employed a Party Wall Surveyor. Now there is an issue with a fence & also 2 walls in the garden which I have discovered are dangerously unstable. 

I thought fences were clearly marked on deeds & plans held by the Land Registry, but it appears this is not the case. However, for anyone who isn't sure which fence is theirs, this is what the Land registry says.

​Boundary Structures

​Fences

The following Boundary Presumptions or Conventions will normally apply, subject to rebuttal by evidence to the contrary:

1. The fence is on the land of the fence owner. This means that the boundary will be presumed to be on the outer side of the fence.

2. Struts. Where a fence has struts on one of its sides it is presumed that the owner of the fence is the owner of the land upon which the struts stand.

3. Upright Posts. Where a fence is supported by upright posts on one side it is likewise presumed that the upright posts stand upon the fence owner's land.

4. Fences with Footings. The Party Wall Act 1996 allows for a fence footing to be laid underground, partly under the adjoining property.

5. Wooden Panel Fences. Where the wooden panels are fitted between the posts the convention is for the external face of the posts to be placed on the owner's land against or close to the boundary.

6. Wire Fences. Where wire fences are supported by concrete posts the convention is for the outer face of the post to be against or close to the boundary, and for the wires to be passed through holes in the centre of the posts. Where the posts are of wood, the outer face would be against or close to the boundary and the wires would be stapled into the outer face of the post.
    

   Walls are different. 

   Unless the title deeds make specific reference to responsibility for a wall, it is generally accepted that the person whose land is retained by the wall is responsible for its repair and maintenance.

    
   The mark on Land Registry plans which denotes responsibility is like a sideways T 
   
   
   
   This is just one of the many unexpected problems my house project has thrown up. It's a microcosm of the situation with Nation States - everyone protecting their own piece of land. Going to war doesn't solve anything though. I feel I have been on a huge learning curve. 
    
   The end is hopefully in sight. I just hope that I will feel it has all been worth the time, effort, stress & cost. 10 months or more of constant fire fighting has taken it's toll.
   
    
    
    
    

   
    

    

    

    

Renting a House

On Wednesday I had been renting for 8 months, while the house I have bought was being completely renovated & an extension built. I gave my notice to move in 2 months time. So come what may, early March will see me in my own home. It's a big leap of faith.

So far I am possibly on my 4th projected moving date. I doubt the house will be finished, but it should be livable in. At least I will have all my stuff out of storage & I will be back in Summertown with everything that makes it convenient.

I am not looking forward to moving house again. It's exhausting & a huge amount of work. But the removers are booked. 

Planning, research & buying everything from the flooring up to make the house habitable has been a full time job. But I haven't had to do any physical work. I have a really good team of 5, (R, H, R, J & C + a plasterer & V who did the ground works), who all work very hard, sometimes in dreadful conditions & always seem to actually enjoy what they do. I certainly have no complaints about the quality of the work & I'm really looking forward to seeing it when it is finished.

It has been a steep learning curve because of the unique circumstances caused by Brexit & Covid in the building trade. Very little has gone smoothly. I have had to be far more flexible than I anticipated & find solutions to problems I couldn't forsee. I have always thought it was worth doing though & have been confident in the vision. I do have new sash windows in the 1930's house & a new side door now.

I've absolutely no idea whether it will prove to be cost effective to have done all the work. The property market is volatile & unpredictable. But I hope that won't be my problem. This is my long term home, not an investment. I don't anticipate moving again voluntarily.

I have actually enjoyed a big project, even if it was a particularly risky thing to do at this time. It has to be better than sitting at home vegitating. It has kept me active & engaged. What will I do when it ends? The garden will keep me going for a couple of years.

It's a new beginning & at 77 that is a good thing.    

Continuing Semi Chaos

 I wash up by hand - yes I know...! I live alone, so I can wash up once a day rather than waiting for enough crockery etc to collect in the machine. I only use the dishwasher if I have friends or family for a meal. The first time was on Tuesday. Lovely day, lovely friends, reasonably good lunch. Loaded dishwasher - brand new dishwasher didn't work!

The landlord came round & checked that it wasn't me or the fuses. The electrician came this morning. There is power but no one at home in the dishwasher. It's not a cheap make. Don't manufacturers test? How could it be sold? I also thought that was what the Inventory person was supposed to do - make sure everything is OK?

Then there is the garden. I made it clear at the outset that I am not able to mow & weed, etc. There wasn't a mower or any tools anyway, (but the landlord did get one). I couldn't stand the state of the garden by yesterday, so I mowed. I had also done some weeding in short bursts. My main problem was the weight of the grass box & the difficulty lifting it. Getting the clippings into a bag is really awkward. The thing is it's a very small garden & there is nowhere for a compost heap to put clippings. So I suggested that the landlord gets a brown bin & I will do my best to keep the garden tidy as a goodwill gesture & so I don't have to look out on a wilderness. For some reason I don't understand you have to pay for a brown bin. He told me it was my responsibility - I don't agree. Yes, obviously, I should pay utilities & council tax. But a brown bin? Really?

Switching Utilities is meant to be easy. The government wants everyone to have a smart meter. I want smart meters in the rental - (Really don't want the PayGo electric meter!) I also need the gas & electric meters moved & changed from very old fashioned meters in a totally inaccessible cupboard under the stairs, in the house I have bought. The wires / pipes literally have to be moved from the inside of the side wall to the outside. "Simples." No! 

SGN & SSE are both involved. SGN have been amazing. I only set things in motion this week & the gas surveyor did the survey yesterday. He asked me if I am a pensioner & so I told him that I am also a "Welfare Case" & theoretically have priority. The quote arrived in the afternoon & SGN are not charging me for the work because I physically can't access the meters. They do all the work so that my energy supplier can install the smart meter & SGN provide the new external box. So totally efficient & really nice with it.

SSE on the other hand don't seem to be sending anyone to survey. They just want me to supply all relevant information by email - e.g. the type of meter, the serial number, a photo of the meter etc. (The SGN gas man had to lie on the floor, half in & half out of the understairs cupboard to see the gas meter! There is no way I could do that.) They asked me to do that after I had told them about my medical conditions.

SSE don't provide the box, I have to source that. On the day the work is done I have to arrange for my electrician to be there with my utility provider to all do the installation simultaneously. I know from the situation at my rental that there is a long wait time for fitters to install smart meters. There is a backlog & not enough trained fitters. So getting 3 people from different companies on site at the same time is going to be tricky. Nothing like the seamless & helpful way SGN operate.

Finally there is my money. I sold my house for more than I paid for my new one. The surplus, after the huge bills, is in a bank account paying virtually no interest. I tried - 7 times, to transfer money into an account paying a slightly bigger pittance of interest. You have to do it from the receiver bank website for some reason. It kept telling me the transaction was declined & to contact my source bank. I changed the amount several times because I know that banks have different amounts they will process. I phoned my source bank many times. That involved lots of menus, lots of different people working from home, lots of security, lots of dreadful music & huge amounts of time & frustration. My source bank assured me that they had sorted the problem - many times. They hadn't. To cut the story short, I've ended up having to do 4 small transactions from the source bank, one every 24 hours, to get my money from one bank to another. Apparently it's because it's an unusually large transaction. It's ridiculous. I proved it was me & where the money came from. They must know I'm not a money launderer.

I keep telling myself life is complex - Change is hard to manage - It will all be OK eventually - I am actually a very fortunate person. I keep the vision of what I am trying to achieve at the forefront of my mind. 

But I haven't even started renovating my house & garden & building an extension yet. 

I really need to maintain a Zen like calm & remember my Buddhist teachings. Or I might just go completely potty!

 

Disorganised Chaos.

Never again! Apart from eventually moving into my renovated house at the end of the year, I am never, ever, going to voluntarily put myself through this again. It has been, exhausting, time consuming, frustrating, irritating & utterly beyond my control. I will go out in a box to the great beyond.

All my "control freak" best efforts at having a plan & a system failed miserably. I packed everything apart from fragiles. I had sorted the fragiles into storage or rental groups. I had clearly marked boxes with a S or R. I had put a green sticker on furniture etc to go to the rental & a red sticker on stuff to go to storage. It didn't work. Stuff has disappeared into the Big Yellow storage room & will never be seen again until my house is ready for habitation. Even food! Nothing fresh though I hope.

The rental is very nice, as is the landlord. The area is in a quiet rabbit warren & the neighbours I have met are lovely. There is a garden, with birds! Headington is a bustling & lively area of Oxford.

There are just so many ongoing issues, mostly related to switching.

I am used to a landline. Yes, I know the world has moved on & I do have a 4g mobile. But I am used to broadband & access to the internet on my desktop. Yes, I know I can get all that on my mobile. (Except when the transmitter goes down with an unplanned outage - Must change my provider. Their customer service is dreadful.) 

The switch to Plusnet didn't happen as it should have done the day before I moved in. The rental had Virgin who appear to have disconnected the BT line to the house. Presumably they don't want people to switch! So I had to wait for Plusnet, Openreach & a private contractor Dig Team to communicate effectively to put a line to the house & a phone master socket in the house. The delay was mostly the Dig Team, who are obviously very busy. I'm finally on line, & have a landline phone for my care alarm today - 17 days after I expected. 

I am, delightfully, a "Welfare Case" because of my medical conditions, my age, my Careline & the Monitor which connects my pacemaker directly to the hospital when I'm in bed. Plus the fact that I live alone. That supposedly makes me a priority, urgent case. It didn't seem urgent to me as I waited day after day. Had I fallen or had a stroke, no one would have known.

Similarly, with my energy provider. I switched to Octopus 8 days after moving in. I hadn't realised how much notice you have to give to switch - So my fault. I also didn't realise that the rental has a PayGo meter for electricity. There is a plastic stick you insert in the meter. Topping up is a pain. There aren't many places you can do it. Now I have to wait until the 2nd July for smart meters. Obviously they are very busy too.

Moving into a new home means dealing with little problems like not being able to get the heating or the cooker to work. I didn't have very much information to help. There is an Inventory, but I couldn't read it on my mobile - That's a job for this weekend. 

I discovered that the back door wouldn't lock. It was open when I collected the keys. It took a locksmith an hour & a half to sort out this week. He wasn't impressed with the door. 

The cold water pressure downstairs suddenly soaked me, then the water turned brown, then the pressure disappeared. Then, when my son in law moved the cleaning materials around under the sink looking for a tap, (there isn't one), suddenly the pressure reverted to normal. None of us understand why. I'm just glad it's working.

My point is that all of this was very time consuming & quite stressful. I seem to be "fire fighting" all the time. I spent hours on my mobile going through phone menus & security questions, holding to dreadful music, being transferred from one department to another. But speaking to, generally, very nice helpful people - eventually. Some companies are actually unreachable if you don't have internet - iD Mobile & Openreach for example. On the other hand some companies have stopped online chat & don't have an email address. The reason is Covid. But surely by now they should have adapted? It has been with us for 16 months.

The customer journey is not what it should be. For example I have 5 separate ID numbers for my internet / landline problem with Plusnet & have spoken to several different departments & numerous call people working from home. The amount  of information on the system each person has to assimilate about my issue is massive. I'm amazed they do so well & stay so calm & helpful.

It will all be solved, eventually. I know that. I can deal with it all. It has just been quite difficult.

It's a good job I've done it now when I'm 76 & reasonably "compos mentis". I do get quite tired though & there is definitely a limit to the amount of energy, mental & physical, that I have. I'm like the Duracell bunny advert - the one with naff batteries!

Organised Chaos!

I have no idea why I decided to vacuum before the removal men came. Complete waste of time!

I thought I had a good system. Green stickers for rental. Red stickers for storage. All cupboards & shelves marked with stickers. Boxes we packed labelled with R or S + room / contents. Similar things grouped together for easy packing. Some boxes taken to the "new" house. Plants & some garden furniture to go there too. Stuff for charity or Freegle gone. Rubbish gone. A plan of position of furniture for rental.

A lot of time & effort planning, sorting & packing.

Removal men very hardworking - a very physically demanding job. Quite stressful too. 9.30 - 2.30 constant work.

Once they started it was utterly exhausting. 2 men packing for a day - lots of queries. Me up & down stairs constantly. Because there were 2, I was on the go all day. At the end the house was literally stuffed with boxes. Movement was limited. 

When I came to cook supper I discovered that they had emptied my kitchen cupboards of everything apart from a drawer of cutlery, a shelf of crockery & a cupboard of cereals. Even my bread bin had gone! No sharp knives, cooking utensils, trays or oven gloves. No food, other than what was in the fridge freezer. I thought that the rental stuff would wait till the day of the actual move so I could use it in the 2 intervening days (3 suppers, lunches & breakfasts). 

When I went to bed I realised that my bedroom curtains had gone. Fortunately I have an eye mask.

Today was moving stuff to storage - A hugely time consuming process. Big yellow is extremely well organised & the 3 men I spoke to were really helpful & lovely with it. But lots of information to go through & paperwork, even though I had done a lot in advance online. Then the keypad code didn't work so a lot of hanging around again. But everything went into the unit. It was very tight though. No chance of being able to get at anything now although technically I do have access. Given how tightly the removers must have packed it I do wonder what state things will come out again. I didn't see it go into the lorry or going into the store. I don't know how protected things like leather settees are protected. The facility is amazing - a little village of different sized storage units with streets!

Now peace reigns. I am about to tidy up & vacuum all the dust up so that I feel tidy & organised. Nothing is happening tomorrow. I just have to go to the rental to let BT in.

Thursday is actually moving to the rental. 

I will be so glad when this is over.

 

 

Data Overload

I have a sheet of A4 with actions I need to take on moving house. Each organisation has their own way of dealing with change of contact details. If you are techie & lucky you can do it on line. Doing it on the phone is often safer because you are talking to a human being who actually understands what needs to be done. The ones I have spoken too - eventually - have been really helpful.

The worst organisations are the insurers. Hours wasted coping with menus & selecting from up to 6 options. Holding on. Dreadful music. Repeating information because the people who answer the phone & the underwriters don't have the same information on their system.The most helpful have been Thames Water & Octopus Energy. British Gas & SSE are uncontactable on the phone. Either too many phone calls or too few people, or both. 

Many organisations don't have the facility to notify a move in advance, banks for example. So you have to wait until you have actually moved & then change your details. As if you haven't got enough to do unpacking & settling in!

I am so fed up with it. In this technological age you would think that it would be possible to have some centralised website with a list of all the people anyone needs to notify. You then tick as appropriate, inpout your old details & the new ones, then everyone gets the information.

Well there is - sort of. But I've only just discovered it.

www.iammoving.com 

It takes a while to get the hang of it & in my case because I am selling, buying & renting it's a lot more complicated. It isn't possible to do it for some organisations. I only ended up with 9. But it shows it can be done. There just need to be more options.

Moving is getting closer & I've hardly started the packing!

 

Ducks in a Row 2

Well things are progressing, but I have a very long list. Ducks everywhere, but some aligned. I either can't get to sleep, or I wake up in the middle of the night & my brain churns. Going to try meditating on a meaningless word. Your brain can't think of more than one thing at once - fact.

Finally exchanged  on Tuesday. Completion on the 21st. Rental ready on the 15th. So needed to do the important things first. Buildings & Contents insurance, Removals & Storage, Phone & Broadband transfer. A file of documents relating to this house for my buyer, who is coming on Wednesday. Still lots of other people to inform.....Stuff to go to charity shop.

Then there is the exhausting & time consuming packing to be done. With the added complication of half of my stuff going to store & half going to the rental. I have made a list of furniture & where it is going. I have a plan of the furniture in the rental. But I know, with absolute certainty, that there will be things I store that I should have taken with me. The good news is that I have access to my storage.

The whole process is very expensive - the temporary rental / contents insurance, stuff for the rental, insurance on the house I'm buying, storage...Then there are the costs of buying & doing up the new house - estate agent, solicitor, surveyor, removers, stamp duty... / architect, structural engineer, party wall surveyor, planning dept, builder, fixtures & fittings....

To be honest I'm trying not to think about the money. I'm focussing on my vision of what my house will be, hopefully by Christmas. It's a project - The closest I will get to building my own home. Future proof for the aged, senile, me. But also a house as sympathetic to eco needs as possible.

It's a challenge & there will be problems. I will get fed up with it all. But at the end of it I hope I will be pleased with what I have achieved, (with the help of a lot of people), & happy in my new home.

It's all a risk. The house might throw up problems I haven't envisaged. The house may not be worth what I have paid for it & then spent on it. But it isn't just property. I won't be taking it with me when I go.

It will be my home. My creation. The extension isn't going to be a pitched roof copy of the 1930's house. It's going to be a modern, 21st century annexe, made of 21st century materials. It's going to have a sedum & wildflower roof! I am so excited about that.

Ducks in a Row

My ducks have minds of their own & won't conform in any way at all. I'm trying to juggle buying, selling, renting & renovating three houses. It's just taken over my life. I still haven't exchanged contracts.

My brilliant idea of buying a caravan to live in on site probably won't work. I would possibly be in the way of the builders & getting WiFi, electricity, water & emptying the loo sorted would be difficult. Well beyond my capabilities to solve. I wouldn't know where to start.

Rental landlords are very reluctant to do a contract with a 6 month break clause, but I know I'll probably only be there for about 8 months. A year at most. Almost everything is tied into the academic year in Oxford. Once again I am surprised & appalled at the mass of paperwork involved in renting a property. It's pages & pages to plough through & try to assimilate. Have they never heard of "Key Facts"  summaries?

Life at the moment seems very complicated. 

I suppose the positive aspect is that at least I have had a project to occupy me for the last 19 months. I've mentally moved into 3 completely different houses now. I've not been bored while shielding, too much to do! Currently designing a sympathetic & Eco extension & complete internal renovation of a 1930's house is very interesting.

I just want those pesky ducks to stop messing about & line up nicely.

Renovating a House

 I'm 76, so am into the phase of life when you know, with absolute certainty, that "the end is nigh". I would quite like to retain my independence, so I need to "future proof" the next however many years. My current house isn't appropriate for me. So I'm moving.

The house I'm buying is a mid wars 30's semi. It has had very little done to it since it was built & it doesn't have cavity walling. So there are quite a few issues. I need to have quite a lot of structural work done. Most of the ground floor walls will be removed to make an open plan family room & kitchen. I will possibly extend out the full width of the rear for 1 - 2 meters. There is no insulation which is a big issue. The front & back gardens need to be cleared. A garage will have to be underpinned or demolished.....I care about climate change so I'd like the house to be as eco as possible without going to "passive house" standards.

Quite a few friends either think I'm mad or are horrified at the time, disruption & cost of what I'm proposing to do. I'm a bit peeved that the government has just pulled the plug on the Green Homes Grant scheme. But I'm actually quite enjoying having a project.

It's a bit like quicksilver though. Things change all the time - eg - I don't need any planning involvement -> I just need to comply with "permitted development" rules -> I do need planning consent. Or, I only need a structural engineer -> I actually need an architect. 

 

I'm on the computer researching for hours every day. Windows, doors, insulation, materials, flooring, heating, kitchens, bathrooms, electrics, smart homes......  It's a bit like travelling. Planning the journey is just as interesting as actually going away.

I notice things. I have high standards. So the quality of the work matters to me. A lot. The builder needs to be someone I can rely on & trust to do a good job. That means he has to use good sub contractors too. All the professionals need to be good - the surveyor, the structural engineer, the architect. 

I've done a lot of work on two previous homes, so I do know what I'm in for. But I managed to live in them whilst the work was going on. This time I have to rent which increases the cost. Effectively I'll be moving twice. 

I feel I'm jumping into a void. I don't know where I will live, what will happen, how much it will cost, how long it will take, whether my plans will work out. Yet strangely I just plod on, one day at a time. I assume it will all work out in the end.

Can't imagine why I'm so optimistic!

Moving - Not Moving

I lived in 2 houses as a child. As an adult I have moved 6 times. My next move was to be the final one. The home you leave to go into care or in a box. 

I have always had to do work on the houses I have bought, apart from one. Two of my houses had to have very major work done. One we completely re-configured and extended by a third. One was severely damaged by a mains water escape from the loft whilst we were on holiday abroad. Two thirds of it had to be re-built & everything in the rooms had to be replaced. In both cases I ended up project managing the work. So I do know a bit about building work.

This time the first house I intended to buy was brand new. I felt I deserved that at the age of 76. Somewhere sparkling & new & covered by a 10 year guarantee. I had mentally moved in when I had to withdraw from the sale on the advice of my solicitor.

The second try was a completely different proposition. The owners lived abroad so it had had not been occupied for months. It had not been maintained. For example the boiler, installed in 2019, had never been serviced so the guarantee was null & void. The open fire chimney had never been swept since they bought the house in 2013.....Paperwork, which is required on sale, was missing...

The survey revealed much worse than that, there is asbestos in the house. Probably throughout, from ground floor to attic. Apparently that is normal for houses built in the 60's & 70's. Even worse it has been damaged & is exposed. There is also boring beetle in the roof joists in two places & possibly also hidden between the floors. Then there are 3 big trees, one very close to the house & two close to boundary walls. The problem is the surveyor revealed that the house is in a conservation area. So you have to go through planning to get permission to chop them down. Who knew? Not me. 

The lesson is that is really important to get a good survey done if you are buying an older house. It is worth every penny. Even if, like me, you have to withdraw & lose the money.

Equally as important - the whole selling & buying process is fatally flawed. It should be reformed. Everyone knows that. There have been efforts at reform. It's always kicked into the long grass by politicians.

 https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn06980/

"The most recent attempt to reform the home buying and selling process was the introduction of Home Information Packs (HIPs) by the last Labour Government. HIPs provided property information ‘upfront’ and were intended to speed up the home buying process, lead to fewer sales falling through and reduce the opportunity for gazumping and gazundering. Following a phased implementation, HIPs were fully introduced by April 2009. However, they were widely criticised and suspended by the incoming Coalition Government in May 2010".

Nothing has been done since. Complete & utter failure of Government.

"25% to 33% of all home buying transactions fail, and some 25% of buyers and sellers who experience a failed transaction incur costs of more than £1,000. The Government estimates that the total losses incurred by buyers and sellers through failed transactions amounts to hundreds of millions of pounds each year".

Well, now I have experienced that in the worst possible way. So has my very patient buyer, who is a really nice man to deal with. I don't know what will happen now. It depends on my buyer. I could try to buy for the third time. I could try to find a suitable rental. I certainly can't go through the process of selling my house again. One & a half years of my life has been focussed on this & I am no further forward. 

I just need to get on living my life. So does my buyer.

 

Moving House & Making Decisions

Moving House is the 3rd most stressful thing in life after Death & Divorce. I've experienced 1 & 3 several times. It's stressful because it involves having to cope with a transition in life. It's about change & unfamiliarity & for many people that causes stress & anxiety. You have no control over anything.

I put my house on the market at the beginning of September in 2019. It's been a long, difficult road. Trying to move when Brexit had devastated the house market & then Covid changed life for us all has not been an easy experience. My house did sell, but one buyer withdrew at the beginning of Covid because he had a house in Italy. Several supposedly keen buyers weren't proceedable & couldn't sell their houses. My current buyer has been extraordinarily patient & has stuck with me, for which I am very grateful.

Finding an appropriate house to buy has also been difficult. I want to downsize in a particular location where most houses have 4-5 bedrooms on 3 floors. Because of the shortage of this type of house I've always been in competition with someone else. So the houses have gone to "best & final" offers. My current prospective house is the only one I have won. Every suitable house I have considered has been in need of a lot of work, which would be expensive & time consuming. Most would not be livable in while the work was going on. So I have to be prepared to rent. Renting for a couple of months is also difficult.

I went through months thinking that I was buying a perfect house in a retirement property, but had to withdraw because of problems with the Management & the Lease. I had to start all over again after making the hard decision to withdraw.

All through this process I have tried to remain calm & positive. I'm hardly living in bad conditions. I have a lovely house in a very good location. So my fall back position has been I can stay here & hope that my physical condition doesn't deteriorate.

Making decisions when you are single isn't as easy as doing it when you have a partner. I've always found that the old adage " two heads are better than one" works. Someone else's perspective & experience is always good, however hard you try to research & be informed. But at the end of the day you are the one who has to decide.

 

So much rides on these decisions. It is literally your life, your home, your happiness & comfort. 

I have no idea whether the decisions I have made will be the right ones. What I do know is that:- 

• I do want to downsize
• My new house has great potential
• Re furbishing will be expensive & time consuming
• The interim period will be difficult - I may be a 76 year old sofa surfer! 

It is a challenge & a project. Maybe my last one. I really hope that it works.

 

Not Moving

Yesterday was my birthday - 76 young👵

It wasn't what I expected. I withdrew from the purchase of a house in a retirement community after 4 months & spent all day dealing with the aftermath. After the morning chat with my lovely solicitor, which helped make the decision, phone calls, texts & emails all day long. Very sorry for my buyer, but I will proceed when I find somewhere to live & for the moment he is prepared to wait. I am very lucky. 

Because of the type of property it is, (leasehold), I didn't realise quite what a different ball game it is. I've always bought freehold. The set up of the retirement development was complex - 3 separate companies - C / Y T & C P. Communication was an issue, as was residents ability to have any say or control. The lease document was huge & written in a different language! There were also issues about negotiated changes to the lease itself, which only related to me personally & could well lead to sale problems down the line. The Plain English Campaign could have a field day on legal documents, including my Lease document. They certainly wouldn't give it a Crystal Mark!

http://www.plainenglish.co.uk/campaigning.html 

The whole set up was messy.

Moving house is a big deal. There is a lot of money involved, but more importantly you have to be happy & feel the property is right for you. It's a home, not an investment. You will never get a property that is perfect. You do always have to compromise on something. Generally you have to be prepared to do things to it after moving to make it really yours. I can cope with all of that.

What I can't cope with is the current way leasehold property works in the UK. It simply isn't fair to leaseholders. There has been a strong movement for years to change the law & the Government seem to have finally decided to do something about it.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-reforms-make-it-easier-and-cheaper-for-leaseholders-to-buy-their-homes

Add to that the whole situation around retirement developments & you have to have a certain type of personality to be happy with it. Generally speaking I imagine that many elderly people are relieved to hand over control to someone else & pay for the privilege. So I accept that I might be in the minority wanting to have a say & a measure of control.

I wish I'd realised all that 4 months ago!

So now I have to find somewhere to live - Quickly.

Moving House - Again?

I'm currently living in the 6th house since I got married at 21, having lived in 2 houses before going away to college. So, 8 houses in total in my life. That apparently is roughly the average, which is 7 in the UK.

Most of my life I lived with my nuclear family of 3 in four of those houses. For the last 10 years I've lived alone in 2 houses. Although I think women have the biggest say in which houses are purchased at any stage, this current house is the only one that has been truly mine.

The process of moving is time consuming, stressful & costly at the best of times. It is far more difficult if you are doing it alone. You have to have the energy & confidence to do it. As you age the energy, unsurprisingly, diminishes a lot.

Currently the British house market is dead on it's feet & has been for about 3 years. Over the last year property prices have fallen, even in the hitherto "special" bubble of North Oxford. Houses are languishing for sale with very little footfall of prospective buyers. Setting a realistic price is difficult & buyers expect to be able to offer much lower than the agents price. Sellers, especially those who have only owned a house for a couple of years, don't want to accept that their home may not be worth what they paid for it.

There needed to be a re-adjustment in property values, but so long as you are buying & selling at the same time it probably doesn't matter much. There is so much political instability & market volatility that you have to be brave to risk renting for any length of time before buying. Property prices can go up as well as down.

The house I wanted has finally gone, after months on the market, to a cash buyer. There doesn't seem to be anything much available,& certainly not anything that appeals to me. So what to do? I'm never going to be in a position to move if my house hasn't got a proceedable buyer. However I don't want to rent & have to effectively move twice.

There is absolutely nothing you can do to control buying & selling houses. You have to be prepared to accept the situation. I'm really lucky - I can do that. It isn't as if I have to move for employment reasons. There is little confidence around because of the political, economic, ecological world situation. It isn't just Brexit - Our world is in turmoil.

Downsizing & the Property Market

According to Zoopla, "the average Brit moves home every 23 years. Over the course of their lives, that means that people will move around 8 times". I don't quite get the maths of that - you would live for 184 years surely? Anyway, I've moved 8 times in 73 years so far.

My home isn't exactly ideal for someone single approaching old age - Too big, 3 floors, 2 flights of stairs & no facility to live on the ground floor. It is modern, light & airy, with a lovely courtyard & balcony, (but not the responsibility of looking after a garden), & in a very good location.

So many people will be in the situation I face of downsizing for the last time. Contemplating a move to a flat or some sort of  "retirement village". The reality, according to BBC "Money Box," is that "according to research, 51% of retirement properties built and sold between 2000 and 2010, and then sold again between 2006 and 2016, suffered a loss in value". The average was 17% but it could be more than 50%. I am amazed.

Add to that the fact that these properties are almost always leasehold, as are flats, & have a variable maintenance charge which you have no control over. It all begins to look like a bit of a poisoned chalice for the elderly.

My question is, given the huge housing problem we have in the UK, why the Government don't step in to give my ever increasing demographic a better option? We don't necessarily want to live in a ghetto for the elderly. Mixed communities are much better. What we need is to get away from the current mindset of a mini castle with it's own land for everyone. We need to look at different models for blocks of flats in Europe. Possibly a mixture of low & high rise, with a lot of accessible green space. Kevin Mc Cloud of Grand Designs has some good ideas about new build communities.
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2017/sep/04/grand-designs-presenter-kevin-mccloud-seeks-to-raise-50m-to-build-600-homes-a-year

People like me need to be able to free up family homes & move to somewhere better designed for their final home. The impact all the way down the housing chain would be really good. It won't be done well by profit driven private builders. Current new housing is generally badly designed & shoddy.

 

I wish my generation could be encouraged & facilitated to set up private co-ownership associations to convert or build. But that & any other option needs Government support. Think of the wealth we could put into this. We could help in the design process so that the accommodation was really well adapted for our needs, but also adaptable for anyone. An older example of what I'm thinking about is Ritchie Court in Oxford, which I have seen. www.ritchiecourt.com/

There needs to be new, creative thinking, about the property market & how it should meet the needs of real people of all ages. The old ways are clearly not working. I don't necessarily mean actual self build obviously, but self management & financing is posssible for all sorts of people, young & old.

Everyone would benefit - it seems a no brainer to me.

Leaving

What a lovely day to be doing the final pack before leaving tomorrow. Sun shining & beautiful views to remember.

The last chunk of money was in my account first thing & transferred to my extremely competent solicitor Gareth without a hitch. Huge sigh of relief.

Removal men came around 8am & just got on with everything. Fortunately I was up & dressed! My cleaner Sarah came & did horrible jobs like the oven, the freezer & the fridge while I got on with vacuuming up the spiders, dust & woodlice where furniture had been moved!

Several friends came round to offer help & say "au revoir". A good excuse to stop working, have a cup of tea, & a real pleasure to see them.

Now it's 5pm & I'll stop soon to go for supper with my friend Sarah. Then a last night here after 10 eventful years. It really feels it's happening now. Oddly, I'm not sad or particularly excited. It just seems the right thing to do at this point in my life.

One door closes & another door opens.

Little Boxes

Well, actually, quite big ones. I've started the process of packing up everything except for the fragile stuff like glass & china. I last did it in 2003, but there were two of us then. I had forgotten how completely exhausting it is. Maybe it's got something to do with the fact that I'm 10 years older - My pacemaker's working overtime - hope the battery doesn't pack in!

I've already sorted through quite a lot of stuff, so hopefully what is left is central to my existence. Despite that there still seems an awful lot to pack. I find getting rid of books really hard. I read a lot, both fiction and non- fiction. If I didn't have a book to move onto when I've just finished one I would be worried. Then there are all the "arty farty" books & materials. Am I ever going to have the time to be creative again?

Moving to a much smaller house with nothing like the storage does focus the mind. I sat down with the plan last night & tried to work out where furniture should go. It's going to be difficult even though a lot of furniture has gone. I'm trying to avoid packing and then unpacking stuff that I then find I haven't got room for / don't really need. It's beginning to feel like living in a transit camp. The boxes are piling up.

The really daunting thing about all of this is remembering, all to clearly, what a nightmare it was when we moved in here. It literally took months to get sorted because there wasn't any storage at all. Just one very small wardrobe. There's a bit more in the new house, but not much.

On the plus side I don't have to compromise with anyone else on what to take & what to ditch. On the minus side there is only one pair of hands & one brain. I suppose this will be the first place I've ever had that was truly mine, and everything in it will be what I have chosen to keep. It seems a long time to wait for that sort of independence, but there is a price to pay.

Exchange

Finally - It's happened. I exchanged contracts this afternoon. It feels oddly flat after all the trauma over so many months. I celebrated with a mug of tea & two chocolate digestives.

So, I will exchange my rural life, for city life. It's a really big step after 34 years in the country. The one thing I won't exchange is my friends who have been really supportive through all the ups & downs of this over about 16 months. I hope I will manage to keep all of them, even if I don't see them so often.

I have had a great team behind me too - my legal man Gareth & my money man Tim. Both have really gone out of their way to help and advise. My legal man took my file home with him at the weekends when things went pear shaped & phoned me in the evenings too. Not many lawyers will do that. In the case of my money man he even coped with the fact that I can't add up & was thousands adrift in my calculations of what I needed to find. Magically the cash will appear. The team at the vendors agents, Penny & Sinclair, were brilliant too, even though I'm not really their client. It felt as if they were interested in helping me personally, not just because they would get a hefty commission. There are really nice people in the world & I'm sure they outnumber the ones who aren't nice at all. They are just quiet about it.

Being a bit OCD my next move will be to do an accurate plan & scale furniture so I know where everything should go. I'll also know if I need to get rid of anything else before I move. But that part of it all is fun.

The serious point to emerge is that I'm really glad I did this now before I had to. It has been hard from the beginning, much worse than I anticipated in my optimistic way. I realise that I probably wouldn't have been able to do it in another 10 years or if my health deteriorated. I am hopefully young enough to be able to make a new life & some new friends.

Thank God it's sorted. Couldn't have stood it for much longer.

Keeping your word

It's a really odd saying when you look at it. Keeping it where? In a box? Up your sleeve? I'm beginning to think that it is fairly meaningless today. Things used to be done by agreement between two parties who undertook to do something. Unless there was a very good, unforeseen, reason to back out it was accepted that " your word was your bond".

This morning I had an early phone call from my solicitor alerting me to an email saying the owner of the house I'm supposed to be buying can't / won't complete on the day which has been agreed for weeks - ever since the offer was accepted. I tend to be someone who says "how high?" when someone else says "Jump!" So all through this process of buying and selling I haven't delayed anything. The vendors solicitor has.

Now, when my house is sold, the removal men are booked & my possessions are disappearing around me on a daily basis, suddenly everything is up in the air. Again.

Enough is enough. I have decided to walk away if this can't be resolved. It simply isn't worth the stress & distress. I'll pay the bills, rent & start all over again. It really shouldn't be like this though. I seem to have had real problems with both my buyer & my vendor. I must have done something really bad in a previous life!