How to choose one house over another

Hey all, would value your opinions on this:
I'm just about to buy my first house and am in the happy position of being able to bid on 2 houses in the same estate and in the unhappy position of trying to decide which is the better value so any help would be great.

House 1: Selling for 300k
Carpet throughout,needs replacing
D/stairs bedroom ensuite
Utility room and smaller kitchen
Larger garden w possibility of building driveway round house
Partially overlooked but not significantly so
Upstairs 3 bedrooms

House 2:Selling for 275k
Wooden floors in most rooms
D/stairs bedroom not ensuite,no wc d/stairs
No utility room but expanded kitchen instead
Smaller garden
Backing onto playing field,floodlights not bad @nite

Upstairs 2bedrooms,boxroom added to master b/room


Both houses are of identical design and overall condition is the same in both


So, which would you go for?and importantly why?
Any thoughts, thinking out of the box?


A new estate is planned for beside this estate and a side boundary of that new estate will run alongside the side boundary of both houses.
Any questions I should ask the estate agents?
The prices I've been told are non-negotiable and to be honest I'd believe it as demand is quite high.

Many thanks

If I could not decide between 2 houses I would buy the one that gets the most sun. I love a sunny house and especially a sunny back garden.

I agree with Woods. Go with the one which is most likely to induce a spring in your step as you leave the house for work each morning! Also you don't mention things like whether either house is over-looked. This would be a big factor for me in deciding.

Great to hear of someone being in that rare position.

Look at the parking situation & levels of traffic on one v's the other. Does someone park their 40 ft truck outside one of them at night. Notice anyone with a barking dog in one v's the other.

How's the view?

ninsaga

Both houses have the same aspect so same amount of sun.
The first house is partially overlooked from a dsitance behind but is quite minor and has a house across the road but it is offset and some distance away.
The second house has no house across the road but has a playing pitch behind it and this has floodlights until well after 10PM, they are not very powerful floodlights. The view from the second house is nicer but the question is whether the playing pitch is an asset as it means little chance of building or if it is a problem as it means kids on Saturday morning. Not much chance of many balls coming over the wall though.
Hope that adds more info

there is obvious implications of choosing one over the other, one has an extra bedroom. assuming you dont need all those rooms now or possibly not into the future, i would be inclined to go for extended kitchen and enlarged master bedroom! Of course, if its a buy now sell later venture, sounds like no 2 has it all done so not as much scope for raising the value through alterations! the 2nd price though maybe reflects the fact that it is short a bed room! Aspect would be important to me also. Which one has the football pitch.....screaming 8 years olds saturday morning??

Have you any idea what new depelopment will be like, if the plans area available I would make sure that none of the new houses will overlook either house.

I always thought that in that instance you would feel more at home in one over the other.

Personally all other things being equal. I hate bathrooms and bedrooms on different floor levels, and downstairs bedrooms are just not right unless its a bungalow

good luck

Are any of the houses attached to the 2 mentioned Rented ?

Who actually owns the land behind the house that back onto the playing field. Is it possible it could be sold for development. If so the developer could initially get planning permission for 3 story developments Duplex sytle or apply and get planning permission for apartments 3-4 stories and then subsequently re apply for apartments 5-6 stories.

Thanks all for your replies so far - some great stuff and thought provoking!

In relation to the advice so far:
Parking not an issue - a very settled neighbourhood
The pitch is very unlikely to be sold as it is a club and the members (of which I'm about to become one) wouldn;t like to lose the facility or move
I'll check out plans for the development behind the houses and see what they look like
The extra bedroom is just a boxroom and it should be cheap enough to reconvert house 2 by putting back in the original wall that was removed when knocking the box room into the master bedroom - overall seems thaat the box room adds value when compared to the extended bedroom
The overall view seems to favour having a utility room
The larger site seems like an advantage
Any way of assessing the actual numerical, financial value of these things

Any advice on how to proceed with auctioneer - has said that owner happy to wait for money - wants 300k and will take nothing less and will wait until gets it

Many thanks

HI all,

As promised - update - first a very sincere thanks for all your advice. My offer of 300k for house 1 has been accepted, contents included! Yippee! Lucky anyway as it was as high as I could go.

Next step it to sort mortgage - no problem getting one, am approved by a good few lenders. Specifically, am looking for a 30 year annuity mortgage, tracker, will be borrowing around 250k, maybe 240k. Will be able to repay every forthnight and thus would look to have that factored in interest repayments. Need to be able to make early and additional repayments at no additional cost. Any idea what is best value on this? Have looked at the key posts but they are dated Feb so not sure if anyone has more recent experience. Going to give the home buy home sell solicitor service a go. Any feedback on this.
Think the last thing I need to do is sort out an engineer and then sort out life assurance and thats it then basically.

Any further advice welcome

All the best

You're going to get a slightly better tracker rate at €250,000 (ECB + 1.1% as opposed to ECB + 1.15%) - all lenders allow you to make overpayments without penalty. Can't comment on homebuy/homesell but with REA the legal fees are €499 + VAT and outlays for mortgages of €250,000 or more. A basic mortgage valution will cost you €96 - a full structural survey in the region of €325 (not mandatory for mortgage purposes).

Sarah

www.rea.ie