Time to upsize your home

Do you find yourself longing for extra space when you’re at home? It might be that you need more bedrooms to house your growing family, that you want to get a pet that will require a garden or that being able to reach the kitchen without leaving your sofa now feels too cramped. Before you begin to feel too claustrophobic it’s probably a wise idea to consider upsizing your home.

No small decision, planning to upsize is a serious consideration financially both in purchasing a larger property and then maintaining it thereafter.

When to upsize your property

There are many signs that it might be time for you to move to a bigger property, one of the most obvious being growing your family. Whilst your two bedroom apartment might suffice when you first start a family you’ll likely soon feel as though you’re bursting at the seams and desperately need more space – it might be wise to plan ahead to avoid upheaval with small children.

If you live quite some distance from your family or friends who then come and visit for extended periods you might also find more space to be useful to avoid being on top of one another during their stays.

Not always defined by having more internal space, it might be that you want to upgrade the quality of your outside space. Whether it’s for your furry friend; dog, cat, rabbit or guinea pig a garden is usually a good idea when you have a pet or that you dream of having a beautiful garden to enjoy through the summer months, you might even want to grow your own fruit and vegetables.

Deciding where to live

For many it is likely that upsizing will mean finding a home in an entirely new area, whether it’s because bigger properties simply don’t exist in the central city spot they currently live in or that to afford a bigger property they’ll need to consider new locations.

Relocating to a new area can be daunting, be sure to factor in your commute to work, if you have or plan to start a family consider schooling options and consider the resale value for the future.

More room to live

The benefits of a larger home can be great. For a growing family the additional space is likely to be thoroughly enjoyed by the children both physically and also socially with more room for play dates.

As adults having extra entertaining space can seriously boost your social life or it might even be that you plan to rent out your new spare room occasionally on Airbnb or more permanently renting to a lodger.

The additional space might also prove useful for those who work from home, having a dedicated room for working might improve productivity or give you the ability to start a business that you didn’t have space to do before.

Financial impact of upsizing

Larger properties quite often cost more money than smaller ones, unless your moving away from the location of your current home to somewhere where property prices are less. One of the first considerations when upsizing is, understandably, the cost of the property but what other factors should you consider financially.

Stamp Duty Land Tax increases with the value of the property so be sure to factor this figure into your financial planning. Along with the usual costs of selling your current property such as agent fees and the legal fees for buying and selling a property.

A larger property will likely cost more to run, heating and electricity are generally more expensive for bigger dwellings – the current owner might be able to give you an idea of their outgoings and the EPC will also show the property’s current energy efficiency.

Along with energy bills you should expect your new property to have higher maintenance costs. You’ll be looking after a bigger space and by nature that means it’ll take more time and more materials to do any works resulting in a higher bill. Not just indoors but outdoors too, have you got the time to maintain a large garden or will you need to hire help?

Planning for the future

Whilst immediately you might only need one additional bedroom or simply only see the need for a garden in addition to the square footage of your current property. With the costs of selling and buying property you might want to buy a property that won’t just work for the near future but that will hopefully be fit for purpose in a few years. It might also be that a property has the potential to extend in the future.

With associated costs such as Stamp Duty Land Tax payable each time you move making less moves is more cost effective, where possible it’s sensible to buy a property that has the ability to grow with you.

Upsizing

If you’re considering purchasing a larger property we would be delighted to discuss our property finding service with you, without obligation. Please, contact us to learn more about how we can assist.