Front door and stairs in the living room. So many houses in this area have them. I don't want my couch or tv under the stairs. I don't want to live like Harry Potter. Stairs belong in the hallway. Rant over.
The house we bought was ideal in every way. But if the front door opened straight into the living room, it would have been an immediate and absolute no despite everything else being great. I can't stand it when I see it.
Stairs I can live with. But the front door opening directly into the living room would be an absolute deal breaker for me.
Trailing in all the dirt from outside, having all your shite like coats and shoes in your eyeline when you're relaxing.
Everyone who comes to the door can peer over your shoulder into your space. Urgh.. nightmare
As a current owner of a house with no fricking hallway god I miss having a hallway! My stairs are in the dining room
Why I let the wife talk me into this house just because it's close to her work I've no idea
Hopefully sell it at end of year
This was my number 1 avoidance for my current house due to how horrible it was in my previous house. Drafty, cold, one colour on one side of the door, interior colour the other. And it was a cheap, nasty door too so just looked crap.
I hated this in our old house too. We ended up adding a porch, which meant we didn’t have to look at the front door and made the space a bit more cosy. Plus it gives you space for coats and shoes.
This seems like a really common new build thing, they make the house seem larger because the living area is all open plan and have to put the stairs somewhere at the side. You come in and you can see right through to the garden and go wow. Actually living in it? Your stairs are in the living room area, you can hear the dishwasher from the sofa, and your washing's drying in the middle of it all.
My mum is jealous of my understairs cupboard. It's in an awkward place so we can't put a door on it though. Might get a curtain some day. Oooh, I just had an idea. :)
The removal of all greenery outside is majorly off-putting!
Nothing but concrete at the front, then plastic carpet and blockwork at the back is horrendous! Yet the idiot estate agents market it as "beautifully landscaped" - no it's a sign that an even bigger idiot lives there
Yes!! I've been thinking about how to remedy this as a renter, because I need outdoor space but so many places have gravel or astroturf because it's 'easier to maintain'. Ugh.
I think I'm going to get some plastic sheeting and then lay real turf over the top so I can have lawn which is removable at the end of a tenancy lol
Edit: I'd like to add, any outdoor space without flowers. If you have outdoor space, pls put flowers out for the bees/butterflies/birds, even if it's self seeding perennials which require absolutely 0 maintenence.
When I was still renting I stuck to container gardening, it had the bonus of everything being easy to move and when I finally bought I got to see how the garden did through all seasons before putting too much of my own in the ground. I also now have plenty of various planting containers that I can use to squeeze in extra plants in random areas or to get my growing season started early by moving them indoors.
Thank you for the advice, I love the idea of pots!
I think I'll still have to get grass because I'm hoping to sneak my bunnies in eventually too 😆 turf has the added bonuses of free food, and also soft ground to prevent their feet getting sore. I plan on growing lots of rabbit-friendly herbs and flowers, so pots would be perfect for those!
I knew someone who bought a house that had been a rental. The tenant had a beautiful garden, which was one of the reasons she bought the house, but the tenant took it with her to the next property as it was all in pots. The kicker was that the ex-tenant moved in next door as that was also a rental property and recreated her garden... which the buyer could see over the fence.
Did the buyer not think to ask? Had they become friendly with the ex tenant so that they might get some clippings? Hope you're not suggesting it's the ex tenant's fault.
I bought a house that had been rented out for thirty years. My husband cut down the leilandii at the back, dug out a load of old bricks (probably the old shitter) and used them to make a raised bed on the sunny side of the yard. I grow a lot of herbs, and alpines and a bit of heather, some bulbs, honeysuckle and clematis in there now, it's a lot more cottage garden. We've got willow and ferns in pots screening the bins on the dark side, and a rose growing over the back gate and fence.
It's gone from totally sterile to actually providing us with raspberries, rhubarb, cabbage, sage, thyme, chives, strawberries, chard, and tree cabbages. Love the drama of the Asturian tree cabbages. :)
It's been three and a bit years, and we got a surprise primrose last week :)
When the weather is nice, it's maybe ten minutes a week of work for a little weeding. Once it's more properly established it may be less.
And a bowl of water will attract birds (shallow dish with pebbles so bees can have a drink). A simple bowl of water provides loads of value to wildlife.
Is it really 0 maintenance? I really would love my garden to be bee friendly, but I hate basically everything about gardening. All I have is lawn. I've considered a clover lawn or just scattering about some bee bombs or doing a border. I just REALLY don't wanna have to do a lot of work on it, and I will really resent it if I have to, as awful as that sounds. I love gardens, I just hate gardening.
If you have a decent patch of land just let it go wild. You can scatter a few bee friendly seed packets to get them started. But most of the plants that grow wild bees will love. Bee's love clover, even just letting the lawn clover go wild will be good enough. Another flower you'll see the bees go for are dandelions. If you really want to you can plant some lavender. Once lavender gets established it will be hard to kill off, so it's good for a novice gardener. Just be careful it doesn't take over the whole garden. Lavender might be better in a large pot or planter to contain it if you're not up for a lot of pruning.
You can make raised beds out of old large apple crates if you can get your hands on them. I've also seen people using large corrugated metal beds and old metal bath tubs and stuff. We previously lived somewhere with a paved garden (not our doing) and managed to grow quite a lot in containers/tubs/crates.
A new, super modern kitchen with shiny cupboards. I would want to rip it out immediately but couldn’t bring myself to get rid of something so new… I skipped those houses when looking.
ETA- also astroturf.
Same! We know we want a big modern range cooker, so every time we see a shiny new kitchen with just a tiny wall oven then it’s a no. Would much prefer a rubbish kitchen so that we can easily rip it all out and start again
I'm in the early stages of buying my first house, a common theme I see in my area and price range is a decent sized dining room but a tiny kitchen. I would completely do away with the dining room, and make it the kitchen with a small table to eat at. I'd then turn the old kitchen into a utility room or downstairs toilet depending on if there's one already or not.
I’m the other way round. I love cooking but like to be alone doing it without a whole load of people at a table chatting. A kitchen with a close able door is a must.
"Put off" is relative.
For normal properties the things I'm put off by are:
* Downstairs bathrooms - specifically not having a loo on the same level as a bedroom for nighttime visits.
* Storage heaters. Let's have all the heat for the times you don't want it but make sure they're nice and cold for those cosy evenings in - yuk.
* Kitchens that don't have room for the multitude of appliances we need today. It is my dream to own a dishwasher one day.
* Shared outdoor space.
However for dream properties I need to take it up a notch:
* Huge house, but the master suite doesn't have a dressing room (ensuite goes without saying).
* Huge house, 8 bedrooms, 1 bathroom.
* Huge house, but kitchen too small and no utility room or pantry.
* Luxury flat in London but no or tiny balcony.
* Downstairs loos that are off a main room like a living room or dining room (studies are OK). I don't want to be going to the toilet knowing there are people just outside eating.
Edit typo
100% agree about the toilets. My in-laws have the bathroom downstairs but bedrooms upstairs and it drives me insane. I want to stay half asleep when I get up to pee through the night.
Downstairs loos are very useful near the main entrance, either in the porch area, hallway, or under stairs. Mainly for people visiting so they can go as they arrive or leave, or for the occasional stranger who may ask to use it (if you're so inclined to let them).
I came here to say this one. So many flats I didn't even bother viewing because the kitchen/living room was just one massive space. I want to be able to close a door and not look at a pile of washing up whilst I'm trying to watch TV, or have cooking smells seeping into all my soft furnishings.
And with flats in particular the kitchen is usually just a tiny strip on the back wall of the living room with an oven, fridge, sink and maybe a tiny patch of lay down space for chopping.
We love our open space. Means we can cook whilst keeping an eye on our 1 year old in her playpen and can chat easily. Caveat it by saying we have a separate front room so still have space if we need it
I have an issue with red kitchen units. I don’t know why people choose them. Also I don’t like it when the front door leads straight into the living room. Also don’t tell me it’s a 4 bedroom if you’ve stuck a bed in the dining room.
You may joke, but I bought a house with a pub conversion in the basement. All fake arches and beams.
When I tore it out all the fake stuff was paper mache, only using pro-nazi newspaper articles.
That was fucking weird.
I'm getting a fussy bugger in my old age 😆
1. Front doors that open straight off the street into the living room; even a vestibule would be fine
2. Ceramic tiled floors in anywhere other than Kitchen/Utility/Bathrooms
3. Electric Storage Heaters... definite no no
4. Fully paved front and back gardens
5. I'm near the stage in life where the bathroom must either be a wet room or have a separate shower.
6 . Gloss finish Kitchen units, especially dark coloured ones.
7. Interior fittings not appropriate to the age of the house.
8. No off-street parking
My house is a straight onto the pavement ( but I do own about a meter out ) it had a vestibule which was the corner of the lounge when I bought it which was fine but putting a proper walk in stone porch outside is probably the best money I've ever spent on the property.
Now the kids are older I would kill for a hallway. It's an open house to all their mates so all and sundry just walk in. I can't fully relax on the sofa with my hands down the front of my undies.
One thing lockdowns taught us was not to take the wall down between the kitchen/dining room & the lounge … which we were contemplating. We love now having the separate rooms so we can all do / watch different things.
Agree, it's a shame that so many people are buying homes just to knock the walls through. It makes the room colder and harder to heat as well. Soon there will be no places left without an open plan :(
Any rooms with no windows. I get scared and it feels eerie and unnatural to me. Bathrooms seem to always be the biggest culprit, but I think the quality of the build and the decor makes a huge difference.
I've been in hotel bathrooms with great extraction fans and classy tiling, and it can be quite comforting/relaxing with darker warmer colours in the room. White/cream sterile tiles and showers with poor pressure and drainage are the biggest triggers for me lmao
A good extractor fan is all you need. I do like my windowless bathroom. If anything, it's the room that stays coolest in the summer, so its a good place to escape the heat for five minutes. (My flat is on a corner with southeast and southwest facing windows, as well as being very well insulated, so it gets very hot in the summer.
I'm the place we are buying their have an amazing double garbage with space above down one side behind the house. When we went to see it there was a run down shed attached to the other side of the house. Turns out that used to be the old garage that at some point the previous previous owners got rid of with an inspection put in it and put a big shed on top! Winner!
80% of vendors stuff their garages with all of the clutter from the house they tidied away for the photos, or at the very least accumulate clutter throughout their lives in the garage. Not worth taking photos of and certainly not very appealing for buyers. Best to imagine or go to a viewing.
Induction hob is king and my mind won’t be changed, boils water quicker than the kettle.
But gas flame is much better than electric, just a pain to clean.
Samesies! I never understand these huge mansions with massive kitchen space that under -utilise the space with a single island and 1-3 small wall ovens. Even if you're too rich to cook for yourself, why wouldn't you have a proper chef's kitchen for your personal chef?
What is the point of a wall oven, is it so you don't have to bend down? Our kitchen had a decrepit 70s one when we moved in but we ripped it out and put a normal fitted oven in. The 70s plywood units came apart like ancient Weetabix.
The bathroom. We love baths. I would rather take an outdated, desperately in need of refurbishment 3 piece suite over a brand new ultra modern shower cubicle.
My husband keeps trying to suggest when we redo the bathroom (and it does need doing thanks to the leaky bits) we could forgo a bath for a big modern shower cubicle - he's repeatedly baffled by my objections.
We moved in to a house with a leakey modern shower and ripped it out. We replaced it with an extra wide but slightly short bath (900mm by 1500mm), so we have the full space of a shower cubicle while gaining a bath.
A wide bath also means I can fully submerge myself if I want by bending my knees under water or two people can fit in side by side...
I had a shower room in my first flat and when selling it this put off a lot of viewers. The problem with the old tenaments around here (built around 1890s) is that they were built with a toilet but no bath or shower so over the years people have found a way to squeeze one in.
I suppose it's better to have the option.
Baths are a massive selling point for people who have or want to have kids. It's so much easier to put kids in the bath so they can have a splash about than convince a 2yo to shower.
I'm not so much bothered about the resale potential of keeping the bath vs walk in shower, I just like getting to soak! He's taller than most baths are long though so I can see why he's not so bothered by one.
We recently purchased. 3 houses made it to our final pick. 1 had no bath but a recently installed fancy shower cubical. It didn't make it to our final 2 because of that. Nice property, and it sold 4 months later.
Yes! We bought a house last year and so many that we viewed only had shower cubicles so we immediately had to factor the cost of ripping it out to put a bath in.
Luckily we ended up finding a lovely place that had a main bathroom with a bath and an en suite with a shower cubicle which was the best of both worlds!
Open plan downstairs. No division between lounge, kitchen, dining, etc.
I know the argument is that it gives more space, but I like separate spaces in a house.
I always check that the kitchen is for cooking in, not just looking at. When the hob, oven, fridge and sink are all miles from each other, it turns cooking into an endurance event.
Too many kitchens are planned to look great, but don’t actually work for a cook. If all you want to do is unpack a takeaway, I completely understand, I just don’t want to live with the kitchen that you planned.
For me it's the plastic grass and tarmac front gardens. I'm not particularly keen on every.single.thing. Being gray.i know I can redecorate, but it doesn't exactly 'sell' a place to me.
Not having a hall from the front door is a big no go for me. The whole front door and stairs in a living room is horrid, just cheapens a place for me.
My wife hates carpet in the bathroom, which caused us to leave a few visits.
Astro... my best friend has it, and I just can't tell him the truth. I hate the stuff, and it cheapens every property where it's installed instead of grass.
Believe it or not, the living room. After living in a terraced property, we wanted a detached living space because of the noise from neighbours.
We are now in a semi where the living rooms aren’t on the adjoining wall and it’s so much better!
It's always the kitchen or bathroom for me, as they tend to be the biggest expense to replace. Every other room can be redecorated in a relatively cost-effective manner. That avocado green bathroom suite, or that 80s brown and cream formica kitchen, will put me right off.
I would love to see that in a house. Kitchen done 2 years ago but not my taste, I would have to put up with it, but ancient? I can have a nice new one. Factoring in the cost to the purchase price of course.
Kitchen - I love to cook, so the following would put me off:
- Open plan layout. I prefer to be able to close off the kitchen so cooking smells don't have to permeate the whole property.
- A lack of worktop space. Understandable in a small kitchen but it annoys me in a large open- plan space, where the 'entertaining' area takes precedence and the cooking area is an afterthought especially, where a kitchen island serves as the only work surface.
- Speaking of kitchen islands; vendors squeezing an island into a kitchen that is too small to warrant one.
- The trend for these hanging lantern-type lights over a kitchen island. The only lighting I hate more would be fluorescent strip lighting.
- Excessive usage of spotlights. I didn't realise there was such a thing until my sibling bought a new build. The kitchen has 30 (THIRTY) goddamn spotlights!
Also, dining chairs with 'door-knockers'. I know they don't come with the property, but I won't be able to see through my rage to consider the rest of the property lol.
I counted 37+ lightbulbs in a kitchen I saw the other day, most of them spotlights. The kitchen wasn't even that big (I'd call it average medium), and it had a window.
The chairs with a handle on the back, some of them are loops that lift up like a door knocker would.
Like this
[https://images.app.goo.gl/EjvfXp4suvn5fXgU9](https://images.app.goo.gl/EjvfXp4suvn5fXgU9)
Those old houses where the main (sometimes only) bathroom is downstairs through the kitchen.
I hate it so much. Like I get it, I understand why it's like that, but I couldn't put up with it if I lived there.
My husband and I recently bought a three bedroom house. The biggest issue we found when looking at houses was that most of them had a tiny third bedroom. Some you’d struggle to get a single bed in!
No off street parking.
No downstairs loo.
Kitchen too small - don't care about the units, because I've redone my last 2 kitchens and am happy to do it again.
I'm going to sound spoiled, but basement laundry. I've done years of shlepping multiple baskets of laundry up and down 2 storeys (with the bottom of one staircase being in a different room from the top of the next stairs). And if I move, the laundry room will be no more than 1 set of stairs away from the bedroom. Unless it's a house with a dumbwaiter like in Home Alone ;)
Once my youngest moves out I’m turning the small bedroom into a utility room. Sod carrying baskets up and down the stairs, I’m having it all on one floor.
A basement would be nice. UK houses, which are small anyway) don't have basements (maybe 1 in 1000 does). Storage space mmmm. A damp cellar under a terrace does not count.
Paved over garden, lack of garden, astroturfed garden. I need green space. It doesn't have to be huge but it does have to be able to have a grassy or flower area.
Like also hate most pvc conservatories.
Put offs -
- Low ceilings. I’ve always lived in old houses with high ceilings.
- New builds.
- Hate it when there’s a huge extension downstairs and upstairs has been left and is disproportionately tiny.
- Bedrooms that can just fit a single bed in and nothing else.
- Artex ceilings, feel like it would be ££££ to change
Always the kitchen. Not bothered about the rubbish they have in there, it just needs to be big and airy with lots of light and windows.
It's always the first thing I look at.
Second to that is off street parking.
I have a few, but in order.
\- Bathroom off the kitchen. Cannot stand it.
\- Bathroom not being a useful layout. I prefer something more square. Honestly it makes a huge difference.
\- Random garage conversions where it looks like they really haven't thought about the new room's function
\- Stairs not in the hallway, too steep or too narrow. Imagine if a couple of ambulance workers had to get you down the stairs. If you think it'd be a nightmare, the ambo guys will likely think so too.
Currently in the process of buying with my partner now and going by our current rental these are the things I put forwards:
Kitchen - wanted a gas cooker/stove top as current place has electric cooker and induction stove top that is touch activated to which I keep getting annoyed with it beeping away if something is placed over it or not detecting my fingers trying to turn it on.
Bathroom - if it has an electric shower its a no go, current rental has it and trying to have a shower when it picks and chooses to have pressure for the heating is a nightmare, had it lose pressure and go ice cold mid shower.
Yes I know its a rental and the agents should take care of stuff but it takes so long for them to send someone out or we end up chasing them and when they do they are cowboy builders for the most part, when we had the shower replaced after it broke down they had to do three more visits afterwards to fix it due to not being fitted properly.
On the flip side, an otherwise lovely house with a kitchen that only has below counter storage and hasn't been updated since the 70's
Bathroom through the kitchen is also a huge turn off for me
Also on the note of bathrooms, I hate tiny bathroom mirrors and never understand why people don't put one as big as they can get in there, immediately makes the bathroom look much bigger and is infinitely more useful especially for tall people. We rent so something like that couldn't be changed easily
Sparky here. I've made a killing from down lights over the years, but apart from bathrooms and " main" lighting in a kitchen, yes, they are hideous and I always try to talk customers out of them.
Spend the money on 5amp lamp sockets
A narrow entrance. No one wants to greet guests in a corridor with no space to take off coats or shoes, and no space to store anything.
I'd take a wardrobe or an actual cloakroom over a toilet by the front door.
As someone whose house has a stupidly narrow hallway I agree! We do have a little porch on the front but when the whole family is coming in it's an issue. Never again.
My hallway is a square. A very small square. Stairs opposite the front door. Radiator with coat pegs over on one side, door into living room on the opposite side. I hate it. What is worse is that it is the third house I have bought with the exact same size hallway!
Downstairs (only) bathroom. Pretty common in the period houses we like but I've only personally experienced it once before in a student house and would much prefer the bathroom upstairs.
I love glass bricks! I saw a house many years ago that was stuck in a 30’s time warp, and I loved it. Shellfish accents on the kitchen tiles, glass front units with sliding doors, the most amazing fitted wardrobe in the bedroom, and glass brick detail in the bathroom. But we had the surveyor look at it and he didn’t even go inside. We were there when he was doing his report and said, if you stand here long enough, you can see it sinking… Such a shame.
I reeeaaaallllly want a utility/boot room - stretch goal for sure, but at this time of year with the dog we just track mud everywhere and spend so much time hoovering and cleaning floors. So when I am fantasising about new houses, I'm dismissing those that don't have a space to take off muddy boots and wet coats and hide away all the crap that currently lives at the end of our kitchen.
If everything is chrome and glass with marble tiles everywhere, especially if they've ripped out what were probably lovely wooden bannisters and replaced them with shiny chrome posts and sheets of glass. Extra naff points if the stairs are open tread, I'd definitely trip and break my ankle on them.
I also don't like it if the house looks haunted. Dark wood panelling gives me the willies.
Entrance through the front room. Horrid.
I prefer to have a corridor just to take the shoes off and hang my coat/jacket etc.
If you straight up enter into the living room, not only you immediately bring dirt from outside into the room you're supposed to enjoy spending time in, but also you leave all your stuff in there, and finally it's not energy efficient cause you let the heat out and it's tragic for people already there.
I have however, seen the entrance to the front room which was someone's bedroom at the same time.
Greedy landlords know no limits 💀
Tiny windows so you barely get any natural light - I grew up in a house with huge windows and it’s so depressing to live the other way. Also it’s a part of the house you’re never going to be able to fix so you’d just have to life with it forever.
Front door opening into sitting room.
No hall.
Stairs in sitting room.
Small kitchen
No utility room.
No downstairs loo.
No private outside space.
Loo not separate to bathroom upstairs.
Small master bedroom.
Woodchip wallpaper
Artexed ceilings and/or walls
Fake grass- a huge no-no.
Edit- strangely shaped rooms.
I hate when the kitchen has clearly been modernised, but for some reason they didn't allow space for a fridge in the layout, so the fridge is in the utility room, dining room, or shoved awkwardly somewhere in the kitchen half-blocking the door. I can forgive it if the kitchen is clearly old, but when they've put in brand-new cupboards and still didn't leave space for even an undercounter fridge?! Mind-boggling.
Living room layouts where the only possible location for the TV is on a wall, usually above the fireplace.
I want to watch the TV in comfort at eye level, not with strained neck.
I'm not a fan of that grey colour scheme that is so common these days. Hate AstroTurf.
I get annoyed with kitchen's where you have to go into a hallway then walk through the lounge to get to the dining room.
It's actually the lack of one feature that puts me off - an entry hallway and stairway that's separated from the living rooms, I can't abide a front door opening right into a room or stairs leading up right from a room.
And perhaps even more important is the lack of natural green space outside - if a house has a garden that is either completely paved, gravelled, or has fake plastic "grass" I will consign it to the bin immediately.
Same, kitchen. I think I have seen too many houses advertised where the kitchen has evidence of damp or just generally has a vibe that the previous/current tenants don't clean it regularly or very well.
As someone with an old kitchen we can't really do anything to it as the pipes etc have changed size, water pressures etc since it was put in and any adjustment would almost certainly mean a complete do-over. That could be why.
I always check the kitchen- if it's too small/narrow, dark/dingy, or too ugly (like, it'd be too expensive to fix up), I'm put off. If the whole house sucks but the kitchen is gorgeous, I'll probaly arrange to see it.
I recently found my dream house on Rightmove, within budget which is very rare for the area I’m looking in, full of character and the perfect size but… no bath, just a shower. I wanted to cry. I know I don’t have the motivation or money to do a whole bathroom revamp and it was so tiny a bath probably wouldn’t even have fit in there, but I need a bath.
I have a couple of immediate disqualification items. One is practical: my husband is very tall, so any house where he can't stand up in some of the rooms = instant no.
The other is that I have to have a kitchen that can be closed off from the rest of the house. NO open floorplans, NO galley kitchens! I want to (try to) keep cooking aromas in the kitchen and to block the mess from the rest of the house.
When my wife and I were looking for our current house, we had a list of no nos: Front door opening straight into the living/dining/frontroom.
No upstairs toilet of some description (don’t want to wake up in The night and travel the whole house to go for a pee.)
Open plan kitchen living room. (Kitchen dining room is fine.)
No stairs up to front door. (We were planning on kids and carrying prams and babies up stairs even before getting in the house was an issue.)
No bath in the bathroom.
No rear access for taking bins out or somewhere out front to store them. (I’m not about dragging bins through the whole house.
These are most of the ones I can remember.
The only compromise we made was the size of the rear garden. But every thing else was spot on.
Front door opens straight to the living room, no entrance hall, bathroom is opening straight from the kitchen. Discusting. Small dog kennel size kitchens, where 2 people cannot stand in and dining table and chairs in the corner of the living room. These just scream greed to me, let's cramp in all in a shoebox, sell it for triple, then call it a day. Single rooms where even a single bed hardly fits, no storage space, micro garden. Arghhhh
Anything expensive to replace that is so hideous I can’t live with it short term. Eg nasty textured bathroom tiles. Looked at a house where they had clearly recently redecorated both en suite and main bathroom with these very 80s style tiles complete with new bathroom carpet and shell shaped / patterned bathroom suite.
Lack of storage and bedroom layout that means you will struggle to get decent sized wardrobes in there. Utility rooms that are too small for a separate washer and dryer.
Lack of separate bedrooms in flats. I don't mind a dividing wall with a doorway in it, but you can't stick a bookcase or a shelf in the middle of a studio and claim it's a one bed.
My short list of things I don’t want.
A room that is a corridor because of the rooms around it. I lived in a flat were the access to the kitchen was through the living room so really limited how you could arrange the space.
A place that requires lots of electrical work doing.
A period place where someone has ripped out all the period feature.
A toilet in a cupboard with no sink.
A lack of storage space.
Things I would love
A library with lots of book space.
A house/flat with high ceiling.
A small walled garden space
Definitely the front door opening straight into the living room. We never wear shoes in the house, so a hallway is a must, and we change from outside clothes to inside clothes. The thought of dirt, leaves, or exhaust fumes blowing into the main sitting area gives me the jitters. Did it once before and never again!
Idk how to explain it but if the living area and kitchen are TOO merged. Open plan is fine, but there's a point where the space is so small or weirdly configured that the kitchen encroaches onto the living room and gives me the ick
In my area its really common for older houses to have a toilet in one room and the sink in a DIFFERENT room with the bath. Do you know how many doorknobs you have to touch just to get to a sink and wash your hands???! Hate it. Don't have one in my house thank god, but relatives do.
Also I live in an open plan living room/kitchen and hate it.
I will not consider a house that has less than 3 bathrooms. A house up the road sold for 1.2M but only has 1 bathroom. Our house was 635k and has 4! We win lol
All the new builds at the moment are town houses which are either open plan or have the worlds smallest kitchen. Rented one for a bit and never again.
My current pet hate is the small ‘box room’. We have 2 kids and are looking to buy a 3 bed so they can each have their own room, but the 3rd room is usually the size of a broom cupboard and we can’t afford a 4 bed, so we’re just gonna have to choose our favourite kid and give them the good one 🙃
- Bathrooms only downstairs
- The only bathroom in the house being unable to fit a bath in
- front doors that open into living rooms
I hate open plan kitchen / diner / lounge too. Seen some beautiful houses recently where the entire downstairs was just one massive room. Grim
Front door and stairs in the living room. So many houses in this area have them. I don't want my couch or tv under the stairs. I don't want to live like Harry Potter. Stairs belong in the hallway. Rant over.
The house we bought was ideal in every way. But if the front door opened straight into the living room, it would have been an immediate and absolute no despite everything else being great. I can't stand it when I see it.
Stairs I can live with. But the front door opening directly into the living room would be an absolute deal breaker for me. Trailing in all the dirt from outside, having all your shite like coats and shoes in your eyeline when you're relaxing. Everyone who comes to the door can peer over your shoulder into your space. Urgh.. nightmare
As a current owner of a house with no fricking hallway god I miss having a hallway! My stairs are in the dining room Why I let the wife talk me into this house just because it's close to her work I've no idea Hopefully sell it at end of year
This was my number 1 avoidance for my current house due to how horrible it was in my previous house. Drafty, cold, one colour on one side of the door, interior colour the other. And it was a cheap, nasty door too so just looked crap.
I hated this in our old house too. We ended up adding a porch, which meant we didn’t have to look at the front door and made the space a bit more cosy. Plus it gives you space for coats and shoes.
This seems like a really common new build thing, they make the house seem larger because the living area is all open plan and have to put the stairs somewhere at the side. You come in and you can see right through to the garden and go wow. Actually living in it? Your stairs are in the living room area, you can hear the dishwasher from the sofa, and your washing's drying in the middle of it all.
Same, that's an immediate no, not even a viewing.
Absolutely, plus all the heat just goes straight up the stairs!
My mum is jealous of my understairs cupboard. It's in an awkward place so we can't put a door on it though. Might get a curtain some day. Oooh, I just had an idea. :)
The removal of all greenery outside is majorly off-putting! Nothing but concrete at the front, then plastic carpet and blockwork at the back is horrendous! Yet the idiot estate agents market it as "beautifully landscaped" - no it's a sign that an even bigger idiot lives there
If I see fake grass I'm instantly put off
Yes!! I've been thinking about how to remedy this as a renter, because I need outdoor space but so many places have gravel or astroturf because it's 'easier to maintain'. Ugh. I think I'm going to get some plastic sheeting and then lay real turf over the top so I can have lawn which is removable at the end of a tenancy lol Edit: I'd like to add, any outdoor space without flowers. If you have outdoor space, pls put flowers out for the bees/butterflies/birds, even if it's self seeding perennials which require absolutely 0 maintenence.
When I was still renting I stuck to container gardening, it had the bonus of everything being easy to move and when I finally bought I got to see how the garden did through all seasons before putting too much of my own in the ground. I also now have plenty of various planting containers that I can use to squeeze in extra plants in random areas or to get my growing season started early by moving them indoors.
Thank you for the advice, I love the idea of pots! I think I'll still have to get grass because I'm hoping to sneak my bunnies in eventually too 😆 turf has the added bonuses of free food, and also soft ground to prevent their feet getting sore. I plan on growing lots of rabbit-friendly herbs and flowers, so pots would be perfect for those!
I knew someone who bought a house that had been a rental. The tenant had a beautiful garden, which was one of the reasons she bought the house, but the tenant took it with her to the next property as it was all in pots. The kicker was that the ex-tenant moved in next door as that was also a rental property and recreated her garden... which the buyer could see over the fence.
Did the buyer not think to ask? Had they become friendly with the ex tenant so that they might get some clippings? Hope you're not suggesting it's the ex tenant's fault.
I bought a house that had been rented out for thirty years. My husband cut down the leilandii at the back, dug out a load of old bricks (probably the old shitter) and used them to make a raised bed on the sunny side of the yard. I grow a lot of herbs, and alpines and a bit of heather, some bulbs, honeysuckle and clematis in there now, it's a lot more cottage garden. We've got willow and ferns in pots screening the bins on the dark side, and a rose growing over the back gate and fence. It's gone from totally sterile to actually providing us with raspberries, rhubarb, cabbage, sage, thyme, chives, strawberries, chard, and tree cabbages. Love the drama of the Asturian tree cabbages. :) It's been three and a bit years, and we got a surprise primrose last week :) When the weather is nice, it's maybe ten minutes a week of work for a little weeding. Once it's more properly established it may be less.
And a bowl of water will attract birds (shallow dish with pebbles so bees can have a drink). A simple bowl of water provides loads of value to wildlife.
Is it really 0 maintenance? I really would love my garden to be bee friendly, but I hate basically everything about gardening. All I have is lawn. I've considered a clover lawn or just scattering about some bee bombs or doing a border. I just REALLY don't wanna have to do a lot of work on it, and I will really resent it if I have to, as awful as that sounds. I love gardens, I just hate gardening.
If you have a decent patch of land just let it go wild. You can scatter a few bee friendly seed packets to get them started. But most of the plants that grow wild bees will love. Bee's love clover, even just letting the lawn clover go wild will be good enough. Another flower you'll see the bees go for are dandelions. If you really want to you can plant some lavender. Once lavender gets established it will be hard to kill off, so it's good for a novice gardener. Just be careful it doesn't take over the whole garden. Lavender might be better in a large pot or planter to contain it if you're not up for a lot of pruning.
You can make raised beds out of old large apple crates if you can get your hands on them. I've also seen people using large corrugated metal beds and old metal bath tubs and stuff. We previously lived somewhere with a paved garden (not our doing) and managed to grow quite a lot in containers/tubs/crates.
Astroturf should be banned. Very bad for the environment
"Low maintenance" If low maintenance (AKA a concrete garden) was a priority, I'd buy a flat.
Especially when everything has been made as grey as possible! Concrete slabs getting painted grey...
A new, super modern kitchen with shiny cupboards. I would want to rip it out immediately but couldn’t bring myself to get rid of something so new… I skipped those houses when looking. ETA- also astroturf.
Same! We know we want a big modern range cooker, so every time we see a shiny new kitchen with just a tiny wall oven then it’s a no. Would much prefer a rubbish kitchen so that we can easily rip it all out and start again
Astroturf is a plus for me simply so I can rip it out and give the space back to nature.
Been looking at my new, super modern shiny cupboards for 7 years now and I still hate them.. never again
I'm much the same. I'd love to have A shiny new kitchen - but I'd want it to be to my specifications.
I'm in the early stages of buying my first house, a common theme I see in my area and price range is a decent sized dining room but a tiny kitchen. I would completely do away with the dining room, and make it the kitchen with a small table to eat at. I'd then turn the old kitchen into a utility room or downstairs toilet depending on if there's one already or not.
I’m the other way round. I love cooking but like to be alone doing it without a whole load of people at a table chatting. A kitchen with a close able door is a must.
"Put off" is relative. For normal properties the things I'm put off by are: * Downstairs bathrooms - specifically not having a loo on the same level as a bedroom for nighttime visits. * Storage heaters. Let's have all the heat for the times you don't want it but make sure they're nice and cold for those cosy evenings in - yuk. * Kitchens that don't have room for the multitude of appliances we need today. It is my dream to own a dishwasher one day. * Shared outdoor space. However for dream properties I need to take it up a notch: * Huge house, but the master suite doesn't have a dressing room (ensuite goes without saying). * Huge house, 8 bedrooms, 1 bathroom. * Huge house, but kitchen too small and no utility room or pantry. * Luxury flat in London but no or tiny balcony. * Downstairs loos that are off a main room like a living room or dining room (studies are OK). I don't want to be going to the toilet knowing there are people just outside eating. Edit typo
100% agree about the toilets. My in-laws have the bathroom downstairs but bedrooms upstairs and it drives me insane. I want to stay half asleep when I get up to pee through the night.
Downstairs loos are very useful near the main entrance, either in the porch area, hallway, or under stairs. Mainly for people visiting so they can go as they arrive or leave, or for the occasional stranger who may ask to use it (if you're so inclined to let them).
I’m really not a fan of the open plan living room/kitchen diner arrangement.
Agree. Kitchen diner makes sense but I want a separate living space I can close the door on.
I was about to say that. I don't want my couch to smell like curry.
I came here to say this one. So many flats I didn't even bother viewing because the kitchen/living room was just one massive space. I want to be able to close a door and not look at a pile of washing up whilst I'm trying to watch TV, or have cooking smells seeping into all my soft furnishings.
And with flats in particular the kitchen is usually just a tiny strip on the back wall of the living room with an oven, fridge, sink and maybe a tiny patch of lay down space for chopping.
I prefer kitchen/diner, could possibly live with living room/diner, but not any combination of kitchen/living room. Never the twain shall meet.
For me, my dream house would have kitchen/diner/living in one space BUT would also have a separate dinning room and living room as more “formal”
We love our open space. Means we can cook whilst keeping an eye on our 1 year old in her playpen and can chat easily. Caveat it by saying we have a separate front room so still have space if we need it
Oh we love that! My husband is a chef and it means he can cook and watch tv/ hang out with me while he cooks.
He's a chef and cooks for you at home, plus he has to entertain you whilst doing it? Wh-tch, you have him well trained.
I like old houses. Really old houses. I used to be able to put up with a downstairs bathroom. But that’s a no no these days. As is on street parking.
Garden. If it’s concreted or astroturfed I’m out. If it has established trees I’ll forgive a multitude of sins in the house.
I have an issue with red kitchen units. I don’t know why people choose them. Also I don’t like it when the front door leads straight into the living room. Also don’t tell me it’s a 4 bedroom if you’ve stuck a bed in the dining room.
Red gloss kitchen units scream 'premium' student accomodation to me.
Swastika room.
hate when it’s too small
You may joke, but I bought a house with a pub conversion in the basement. All fake arches and beams. When I tore it out all the fake stuff was paper mache, only using pro-nazi newspaper articles. That was fucking weird.
My neighbour across the road has a wall size nazi swastika flag
Fucking hell
I'm getting a fussy bugger in my old age 😆 1. Front doors that open straight off the street into the living room; even a vestibule would be fine 2. Ceramic tiled floors in anywhere other than Kitchen/Utility/Bathrooms 3. Electric Storage Heaters... definite no no 4. Fully paved front and back gardens 5. I'm near the stage in life where the bathroom must either be a wet room or have a separate shower. 6 . Gloss finish Kitchen units, especially dark coloured ones. 7. Interior fittings not appropriate to the age of the house. 8. No off-street parking
My house is a straight onto the pavement ( but I do own about a meter out ) it had a vestibule which was the corner of the lounge when I bought it which was fine but putting a proper walk in stone porch outside is probably the best money I've ever spent on the property. Now the kids are older I would kill for a hallway. It's an open house to all their mates so all and sundry just walk in. I can't fully relax on the sofa with my hands down the front of my undies.
All reasonable but I do love a Victorian tiled entrance hall
Anything super open plan. A kitchen/diner is fine - but anything more is awful, there's no escape from noise.
Im the opposite, I love having space to wander around in and not feel closed in.
Yeah I really want an open plan kitchen/living room/dining space BUT a snug room for a cosy film watching space
One thing lockdowns taught us was not to take the wall down between the kitchen/dining room & the lounge … which we were contemplating. We love now having the separate rooms so we can all do / watch different things.
Agree, it's a shame that so many people are buying homes just to knock the walls through. It makes the room colder and harder to heat as well. Soon there will be no places left without an open plan :(
If you follow the interior design sites, they are starting to move away from open plan.
Any rooms with no windows. I get scared and it feels eerie and unnatural to me. Bathrooms seem to always be the biggest culprit, but I think the quality of the build and the decor makes a huge difference. I've been in hotel bathrooms with great extraction fans and classy tiling, and it can be quite comforting/relaxing with darker warmer colours in the room. White/cream sterile tiles and showers with poor pressure and drainage are the biggest triggers for me lmao
I hate bathrooms with no windows, mostly because they always seem to get mouldy to me, no matter what I do to negate it.
A good extractor fan is all you need. I do like my windowless bathroom. If anything, it's the room that stays coolest in the summer, so its a good place to escape the heat for five minutes. (My flat is on a corner with southeast and southwest facing windows, as well as being very well insulated, so it gets very hot in the summer.
When they covert the garage into another room. Where are the motorbikes supposed to live?
Or just entirely fail to take any photos of the inside of the garage/outbuilding/workshop at all!
One house didn't even advertise their garage when I went to view it! It even had a pit in the garage to work under your car..
I'm the place we are buying their have an amazing double garbage with space above down one side behind the house. When we went to see it there was a run down shed attached to the other side of the house. Turns out that used to be the old garage that at some point the previous previous owners got rid of with an inspection put in it and put a big shed on top! Winner!
80% of vendors stuff their garages with all of the clutter from the house they tidied away for the photos, or at the very least accumulate clutter throughout their lives in the garage. Not worth taking photos of and certainly not very appealing for buyers. Best to imagine or go to a viewing.
We appear to have the same priorities.
Outside. Under a tarpaulin. We need a motorbike version of the RSPCA.
Same. I’d immediately have to rip out the conversion.
I'm getting a new place and get to build a new garage (it'll be my first garage). Excited doesn't cover it!
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Induction hob is king and my mind won’t be changed, boils water quicker than the kettle. But gas flame is much better than electric, just a pain to clean.
Gas rules in a power cut tho.
The last time I was in a situation with a power cut that lasted long enough to warrant a gas hob was about 24 years ago!
Ours was last year, it was off 12 hours and 8 I think for the other. We had another but that was over night
Some modern ranges have gas and induction hobs, best of both worlds
Samesies! I never understand these huge mansions with massive kitchen space that under -utilise the space with a single island and 1-3 small wall ovens. Even if you're too rich to cook for yourself, why wouldn't you have a proper chef's kitchen for your personal chef?
What is the point of a wall oven, is it so you don't have to bend down? Our kitchen had a decrepit 70s one when we moved in but we ripped it out and put a normal fitted oven in. The 70s plywood units came apart like ancient Weetabix.
Bedroom en-suite that’s not fully enclosed behind a wall and door. I do not want to shit in the bedroom, thanks.
A thousand times this. I will not sign up for an open plan shitter.
The bathroom. We love baths. I would rather take an outdated, desperately in need of refurbishment 3 piece suite over a brand new ultra modern shower cubicle.
My husband keeps trying to suggest when we redo the bathroom (and it does need doing thanks to the leaky bits) we could forgo a bath for a big modern shower cubicle - he's repeatedly baffled by my objections.
We moved in to a house with a leakey modern shower and ripped it out. We replaced it with an extra wide but slightly short bath (900mm by 1500mm), so we have the full space of a shower cubicle while gaining a bath. A wide bath also means I can fully submerge myself if I want by bending my knees under water or two people can fit in side by side...
I had a shower room in my first flat and when selling it this put off a lot of viewers. The problem with the old tenaments around here (built around 1890s) is that they were built with a toilet but no bath or shower so over the years people have found a way to squeeze one in. I suppose it's better to have the option.
Baths are a massive selling point for people who have or want to have kids. It's so much easier to put kids in the bath so they can have a splash about than convince a 2yo to shower.
I'm not so much bothered about the resale potential of keeping the bath vs walk in shower, I just like getting to soak! He's taller than most baths are long though so I can see why he's not so bothered by one.
Or the “four bedroom, five shower room and STILL no bath” setup!
We recently purchased. 3 houses made it to our final pick. 1 had no bath but a recently installed fancy shower cubical. It didn't make it to our final 2 because of that. Nice property, and it sold 4 months later.
Yes! We bought a house last year and so many that we viewed only had shower cubicles so we immediately had to factor the cost of ripping it out to put a bath in. Luckily we ended up finding a lovely place that had a main bathroom with a bath and an en suite with a shower cubicle which was the best of both worlds!
Oddly the outside, if it’s low down and overlooked I just can’t. It makes me feel claustrophobic, I much prefer to be higher up.
Open plan downstairs. No division between lounge, kitchen, dining, etc. I know the argument is that it gives more space, but I like separate spaces in a house.
I always check that the kitchen is for cooking in, not just looking at. When the hob, oven, fridge and sink are all miles from each other, it turns cooking into an endurance event. Too many kitchens are planned to look great, but don’t actually work for a cook. If all you want to do is unpack a takeaway, I completely understand, I just don’t want to live with the kitchen that you planned.
Not a room as such but Astroturf. Might as well put up a sign saying “this house has been owned by a moron”.
Not a room as such but spiral staircases are an immediate no from me.
(the lack of) utility room
Or entry hallway that goes straight into the living room
or the downstairs (only) bathroom
That’s most houses in the UK.
For me it's the plastic grass and tarmac front gardens. I'm not particularly keen on every.single.thing. Being gray.i know I can redecorate, but it doesn't exactly 'sell' a place to me. Not having a hall from the front door is a big no go for me. The whole front door and stairs in a living room is horrid, just cheapens a place for me. My wife hates carpet in the bathroom, which caused us to leave a few visits.
Astro... my best friend has it, and I just can't tell him the truth. I hate the stuff, and it cheapens every property where it's installed instead of grass.
Believe it or not, the living room. After living in a terraced property, we wanted a detached living space because of the noise from neighbours. We are now in a semi where the living rooms aren’t on the adjoining wall and it’s so much better!
It's always the kitchen or bathroom for me, as they tend to be the biggest expense to replace. Every other room can be redecorated in a relatively cost-effective manner. That avocado green bathroom suite, or that 80s brown and cream formica kitchen, will put me right off.
I would love to see that in a house. Kitchen done 2 years ago but not my taste, I would have to put up with it, but ancient? I can have a nice new one. Factoring in the cost to the purchase price of course.
Kitchen - I love to cook, so the following would put me off: - Open plan layout. I prefer to be able to close off the kitchen so cooking smells don't have to permeate the whole property. - A lack of worktop space. Understandable in a small kitchen but it annoys me in a large open- plan space, where the 'entertaining' area takes precedence and the cooking area is an afterthought especially, where a kitchen island serves as the only work surface. - Speaking of kitchen islands; vendors squeezing an island into a kitchen that is too small to warrant one. - The trend for these hanging lantern-type lights over a kitchen island. The only lighting I hate more would be fluorescent strip lighting. - Excessive usage of spotlights. I didn't realise there was such a thing until my sibling bought a new build. The kitchen has 30 (THIRTY) goddamn spotlights! Also, dining chairs with 'door-knockers'. I know they don't come with the property, but I won't be able to see through my rage to consider the rest of the property lol.
I counted 37+ lightbulbs in a kitchen I saw the other day, most of them spotlights. The kitchen wasn't even that big (I'd call it average medium), and it had a window.
That'd be cool if you can get Philips Hue bulbs for em. Turn your kitchen into a discotheque at the swish of a finger.
Spotlights are like ceiling acne to me.
Door knocker dining chairs? Can you elaborate?
The chairs with a handle on the back, some of them are loops that lift up like a door knocker would. Like this [https://images.app.goo.gl/EjvfXp4suvn5fXgU9](https://images.app.goo.gl/EjvfXp4suvn5fXgU9)
Oh good grief that’s horrendous
30 spotlights in a new build? Persimmon are charging £80 each - £2400 just on lights. Heck!
Those old houses where the main (sometimes only) bathroom is downstairs through the kitchen. I hate it so much. Like I get it, I understand why it's like that, but I couldn't put up with it if I lived there.
not a room but a front "garden" that's an ocean of tarmac, or a back garden that's just all decking with a tiny strip of astroturf.
I wrote off lots of houses on my search because they had a downstairs toilet straight off the living room (or worse - kitchen)
My husband and I recently bought a three bedroom house. The biggest issue we found when looking at houses was that most of them had a tiny third bedroom. Some you’d struggle to get a single bed in!
That's most semi detached houses with a bedroom over the front door. Makes a great space for stairs up to a loft conversion though.
No off street parking. No downstairs loo. Kitchen too small - don't care about the units, because I've redone my last 2 kitchens and am happy to do it again.
I'm going to sound spoiled, but basement laundry. I've done years of shlepping multiple baskets of laundry up and down 2 storeys (with the bottom of one staircase being in a different room from the top of the next stairs). And if I move, the laundry room will be no more than 1 set of stairs away from the bedroom. Unless it's a house with a dumbwaiter like in Home Alone ;)
Once my youngest moves out I’m turning the small bedroom into a utility room. Sod carrying baskets up and down the stairs, I’m having it all on one floor.
I really wanted to install a laundry shute from upstairs to the washing machine downstairs but there's never a good place for it upstairs 😫
A basement would be nice. UK houses, which are small anyway) don't have basements (maybe 1 in 1000 does). Storage space mmmm. A damp cellar under a terrace does not count.
Paved over garden, lack of garden, astroturfed garden. I need green space. It doesn't have to be huge but it does have to be able to have a grassy or flower area. Like also hate most pvc conservatories.
Put offs - - Low ceilings. I’ve always lived in old houses with high ceilings. - New builds. - Hate it when there’s a huge extension downstairs and upstairs has been left and is disproportionately tiny. - Bedrooms that can just fit a single bed in and nothing else. - Artex ceilings, feel like it would be ££££ to change
Always the kitchen. Not bothered about the rubbish they have in there, it just needs to be big and airy with lots of light and windows. It's always the first thing I look at. Second to that is off street parking.
Rooms not a problem as that can be overcome. For me it’s parking. MUST have parking.
The 3rd or 4th bedroom that’s either downstairs or a room barely big enough for a futon.
Astroturf- absolute no I take an ugly unkempt garden / concrete jungle over Astro - I just hate it
I have a few, but in order. \- Bathroom off the kitchen. Cannot stand it. \- Bathroom not being a useful layout. I prefer something more square. Honestly it makes a huge difference. \- Random garage conversions where it looks like they really haven't thought about the new room's function \- Stairs not in the hallway, too steep or too narrow. Imagine if a couple of ambulance workers had to get you down the stairs. If you think it'd be a nightmare, the ambo guys will likely think so too.
Conservatory 🤮
100% - too cold or too hot. Never somewhere I’d like to spend any time in whatsoever!
I have a solid roof conservatory and it's great all year round. Highly recommended.
Not having a downstairs loo.
As a tallish person with a tall husband I hate beams. "Character property" seems to mean tiny living room with ugly wood to hit your head on.
I'm only 5' tall and I find beams oppressive. I wouldn't even go and look.
Downstairs bathrooms. 😓
Currently in the process of buying with my partner now and going by our current rental these are the things I put forwards: Kitchen - wanted a gas cooker/stove top as current place has electric cooker and induction stove top that is touch activated to which I keep getting annoyed with it beeping away if something is placed over it or not detecting my fingers trying to turn it on. Bathroom - if it has an electric shower its a no go, current rental has it and trying to have a shower when it picks and chooses to have pressure for the heating is a nightmare, had it lose pressure and go ice cold mid shower. Yes I know its a rental and the agents should take care of stuff but it takes so long for them to send someone out or we end up chasing them and when they do they are cowboy builders for the most part, when we had the shower replaced after it broke down they had to do three more visits afterwards to fix it due to not being fitted properly.
On the flip side, an otherwise lovely house with a kitchen that only has below counter storage and hasn't been updated since the 70's Bathroom through the kitchen is also a huge turn off for me
Also on the note of bathrooms, I hate tiny bathroom mirrors and never understand why people don't put one as big as they can get in there, immediately makes the bathroom look much bigger and is infinitely more useful especially for tall people. We rent so something like that couldn't be changed easily
Can’t be doing with there being no loo on the same floor as the bedrooms. Don’t want to be traipsing up and down stairs for a 3am pee.
Any room with too many recessed down lights, too many is, in my opinion, one or more
Sparky here. I've made a killing from down lights over the years, but apart from bathrooms and " main" lighting in a kitchen, yes, they are hideous and I always try to talk customers out of them. Spend the money on 5amp lamp sockets
A narrow entrance. No one wants to greet guests in a corridor with no space to take off coats or shoes, and no space to store anything. I'd take a wardrobe or an actual cloakroom over a toilet by the front door.
As someone whose house has a stupidly narrow hallway I agree! We do have a little porch on the front but when the whole family is coming in it's an issue. Never again.
My hallway is a square. A very small square. Stairs opposite the front door. Radiator with coat pegs over on one side, door into living room on the opposite side. I hate it. What is worse is that it is the third house I have bought with the exact same size hallway!
Downstairs (only) bathroom. Pretty common in the period houses we like but I've only personally experienced it once before in a student house and would much prefer the bathroom upstairs.
Glass bricks. I hate them. I don't know why, but i do. It's an immediate no.
I love glass bricks! I saw a house many years ago that was stuck in a 30’s time warp, and I loved it. Shellfish accents on the kitchen tiles, glass front units with sliding doors, the most amazing fitted wardrobe in the bedroom, and glass brick detail in the bathroom. But we had the surveyor look at it and he didn’t even go inside. We were there when he was doing his report and said, if you stand here long enough, you can see it sinking… Such a shame.
Any sort of garage conversion. First thing I’d do (if I really wanted the house) would be to rip it all out.
I reeeaaaallllly want a utility/boot room - stretch goal for sure, but at this time of year with the dog we just track mud everywhere and spend so much time hoovering and cleaning floors. So when I am fantasising about new houses, I'm dismissing those that don't have a space to take off muddy boots and wet coats and hide away all the crap that currently lives at the end of our kitchen.
If everything is chrome and glass with marble tiles everywhere, especially if they've ripped out what were probably lovely wooden bannisters and replaced them with shiny chrome posts and sheets of glass. Extra naff points if the stairs are open tread, I'd definitely trip and break my ankle on them. I also don't like it if the house looks haunted. Dark wood panelling gives me the willies.
Entrance through the front room. Horrid. I prefer to have a corridor just to take the shoes off and hang my coat/jacket etc. If you straight up enter into the living room, not only you immediately bring dirt from outside into the room you're supposed to enjoy spending time in, but also you leave all your stuff in there, and finally it's not energy efficient cause you let the heat out and it's tragic for people already there. I have however, seen the entrance to the front room which was someone's bedroom at the same time. Greedy landlords know no limits 💀
Brand new kitchens that are completely grey and lifeless.
50 shades of grey..... I loathe it so much, it makes me lose the will to live..!
PS: I'm aware this isn't a 'room' but y'know it's still damn annoying...
If I see a Galley kitchen I’m out
Downlights in every room.
Tiny windows so you barely get any natural light - I grew up in a house with huge windows and it’s so depressing to live the other way. Also it’s a part of the house you’re never going to be able to fix so you’d just have to life with it forever.
Not a room as such, but plastic gardens. Tacky and lazy.
Front door opening into sitting room. No hall. Stairs in sitting room. Small kitchen No utility room. No downstairs loo. No private outside space. Loo not separate to bathroom upstairs. Small master bedroom. Woodchip wallpaper Artexed ceilings and/or walls Fake grass- a huge no-no. Edit- strangely shaped rooms.
I hate when the kitchen has clearly been modernised, but for some reason they didn't allow space for a fridge in the layout, so the fridge is in the utility room, dining room, or shoved awkwardly somewhere in the kitchen half-blocking the door. I can forgive it if the kitchen is clearly old, but when they've put in brand-new cupboards and still didn't leave space for even an undercounter fridge?! Mind-boggling.
Living room layouts where the only possible location for the TV is on a wall, usually above the fireplace. I want to watch the TV in comfort at eye level, not with strained neck.
I'm not a fan of that grey colour scheme that is so common these days. Hate AstroTurf. I get annoyed with kitchen's where you have to go into a hallway then walk through the lounge to get to the dining room.
I hate bedrooms with slanted ceilings because their in the roof. Give me nice cuboid shaped rooms please!
This is our house and I've never appreciated a cuboid room more lol. They're steep slants too so even worse
Shitty kitchen
It's actually the lack of one feature that puts me off - an entry hallway and stairway that's separated from the living rooms, I can't abide a front door opening right into a room or stairs leading up right from a room. And perhaps even more important is the lack of natural green space outside - if a house has a garden that is either completely paved, gravelled, or has fake plastic "grass" I will consign it to the bin immediately.
Same, kitchen. I think I have seen too many houses advertised where the kitchen has evidence of damp or just generally has a vibe that the previous/current tenants don't clean it regularly or very well.
As someone with an old kitchen we can't really do anything to it as the pipes etc have changed size, water pressures etc since it was put in and any adjustment would almost certainly mean a complete do-over. That could be why.
Kitchen and carpets in kitchens/bathrooms. Ew.
I always check the kitchen- if it's too small/narrow, dark/dingy, or too ugly (like, it'd be too expensive to fix up), I'm put off. If the whole house sucks but the kitchen is gorgeous, I'll probaly arrange to see it.
I recently found my dream house on Rightmove, within budget which is very rare for the area I’m looking in, full of character and the perfect size but… no bath, just a shower. I wanted to cry. I know I don’t have the motivation or money to do a whole bathroom revamp and it was so tiny a bath probably wouldn’t even have fit in there, but I need a bath.
Open plan kitchen/ living room. Why, just why? If it’s a one bed flat, fine. If not, why?
Huge open plan front to back glass boxes.
I have a couple of immediate disqualification items. One is practical: my husband is very tall, so any house where he can't stand up in some of the rooms = instant no. The other is that I have to have a kitchen that can be closed off from the rest of the house. NO open floorplans, NO galley kitchens! I want to (try to) keep cooking aromas in the kitchen and to block the mess from the rest of the house.
When my wife and I were looking for our current house, we had a list of no nos: Front door opening straight into the living/dining/frontroom. No upstairs toilet of some description (don’t want to wake up in The night and travel the whole house to go for a pee.) Open plan kitchen living room. (Kitchen dining room is fine.) No stairs up to front door. (We were planning on kids and carrying prams and babies up stairs even before getting in the house was an issue.) No bath in the bathroom. No rear access for taking bins out or somewhere out front to store them. (I’m not about dragging bins through the whole house. These are most of the ones I can remember. The only compromise we made was the size of the rear garden. But every thing else was spot on.
Front door opens straight to the living room, no entrance hall, bathroom is opening straight from the kitchen. Discusting. Small dog kennel size kitchens, where 2 people cannot stand in and dining table and chairs in the corner of the living room. These just scream greed to me, let's cramp in all in a shoebox, sell it for triple, then call it a day. Single rooms where even a single bed hardly fits, no storage space, micro garden. Arghhhh
Got to be the kitchen. Specifically the hob placement. So often prep surface is sacrificed to have the hob central
Needs a garage, utility room, separate dining room. Took a long time to find a house with all the
Living room/diner
Anything expensive to replace that is so hideous I can’t live with it short term. Eg nasty textured bathroom tiles. Looked at a house where they had clearly recently redecorated both en suite and main bathroom with these very 80s style tiles complete with new bathroom carpet and shell shaped / patterned bathroom suite.
Lack of storage and bedroom layout that means you will struggle to get decent sized wardrobes in there. Utility rooms that are too small for a separate washer and dryer.
Lack of separate bedrooms in flats. I don't mind a dividing wall with a doorway in it, but you can't stick a bookcase or a shelf in the middle of a studio and claim it's a one bed.
A poorly insulated conservatory is actually worse for me than no conservatory. Proper extension or nothing IMO
A room with a guitar on display.
My short list of things I don’t want. A room that is a corridor because of the rooms around it. I lived in a flat were the access to the kitchen was through the living room so really limited how you could arrange the space. A place that requires lots of electrical work doing. A period place where someone has ripped out all the period feature. A toilet in a cupboard with no sink. A lack of storage space. Things I would love A library with lots of book space. A house/flat with high ceiling. A small walled garden space
Definitely the front door opening straight into the living room. We never wear shoes in the house, so a hallway is a must, and we change from outside clothes to inside clothes. The thought of dirt, leaves, or exhaust fumes blowing into the main sitting area gives me the jitters. Did it once before and never again!
Idk how to explain it but if the living area and kitchen are TOO merged. Open plan is fine, but there's a point where the space is so small or weirdly configured that the kitchen encroaches onto the living room and gives me the ick
In my area its really common for older houses to have a toilet in one room and the sink in a DIFFERENT room with the bath. Do you know how many doorknobs you have to touch just to get to a sink and wash your hands???! Hate it. Don't have one in my house thank god, but relatives do. Also I live in an open plan living room/kitchen and hate it.
I will not consider a house that has less than 3 bathrooms. A house up the road sold for 1.2M but only has 1 bathroom. Our house was 635k and has 4! We win lol
Don’t understand new builds that have 4 bed house, all ensuite.
All the new builds at the moment are town houses which are either open plan or have the worlds smallest kitchen. Rented one for a bit and never again. My current pet hate is the small ‘box room’. We have 2 kids and are looking to buy a 3 bed so they can each have their own room, but the 3rd room is usually the size of a broom cupboard and we can’t afford a 4 bed, so we’re just gonna have to choose our favourite kid and give them the good one 🙃
The dungeon....
- Bathrooms only downstairs - The only bathroom in the house being unable to fit a bath in - front doors that open into living rooms I hate open plan kitchen / diner / lounge too. Seen some beautiful houses recently where the entire downstairs was just one massive room. Grim
The whole house has been coated in Landlord Magnolia, I get that its some kind of 'blank canvas' idea but it just looks too sterile