Love new-builds? Have your say...

I have moved many times in my life but find I can not settle anywhere! I have had mainly new houses but although you get the guarentees they are getting smaller and smaller. Every new property I have lived in are ok to begin with but after a couple of years they change hands and the estate seems to go down. I am now living in a older house but unbeknown to me had not been maintained properly by it's previous owners and not shown up on the survey so has cost thousands of £'s to put right! But at least I am living in a lovely quiet cul-de-sac and in the corner house thats until the kids come out of a weekend and school hollidays and use the outside of my property as a football and cricket pitch! This Easter I shall be property hunting, I think I shall be looking for some land in the middle of a field and willl be designing my dream home, yeh right in my dreams!

I bought a new house four years ago and absolutely love it. Small garden, so no worries about having to get someone to help maintain it. Light, bright, large rooms with smooth walls. A toilet on each of the three floors! Yes, there were some minor snags at first but it was just a question of allerting the builders and it got sorted - no having to find your own tradesmen in a new area. The sound insulation is great - I am mid-terrace but do not hear the neighbours from either side (both have dogs and one has young children!). Built in wardrobes are great and I have now been introduced to dishwashers - so much nicer than having to cajole the children to washup or even having to do it myself!

I disagree that energy efficiency is a question of build style. We moved from a modern highly insulated efficient home to a Victorian 3 storey terrace with gas fired aga which is on all the time and warms the whole house and costs a third less than my previous house (also 3 storey terrace) which had only central heating. Annual bill for the older house is estimated at £850. Conclusion: chimneys save you money on fuel bills; insulation costs more through not retaining heat (so its cold as soon as the heating is off).

I've just moved in to a new house and I love it. It is energy efficient, clean, and I am loving putting my own stamp on it. No hidden "quirks" that end up costing a fortune to put right. After 35 years of character houses, it will be new for me every timefrom now on.

From the experience of owning several new, nearly new and old properties:-
Buy nearly new if you want a low maintenance, efficient property where most snags have been sorted, if you don't mind overcoming someone else's decor choices.
Buy new if you are prepared to live in a building site for a while and put up with a few snags waiting to be poorly rectified or do it yourself in the meantime.
Buy an older property with lots of style, problems, maintenance and running costs.
Simple isn't it

New build properties are built to a higher standard because of planning regulations, therefore they are much more energy efficient saving more than £200 on energy bills per annum as compared to an older house. Important considering the average energy bill in the UK is now running at £1,000.

I Purchased a new build from a very reputable builder charles church. It was the biggest mistake I have ever made. I had the property for two years and could only sell it when they had finished the snagging list. Cutting it short the house was 90% rebuilt. Obviously mistakes happen, but I have heard of many more problems on our so called exclusive development. Not to mention the chichester development that was torn down and started again due to bad buiding work.
I have met alot of people through this builders, solicitors etc and my reason for writing this is a reputable name is not alway what you think.
The big building companies are buying up the smaller companies with the good reputations and using there names. Charls church is actually Persimmon who where on television last year for bad building. Plus they use the same tradesmen and sell charles church for alot more.
If only I had more space the stories we could tell.
I have now purchased an 1890-1900 property and yes there is work to do, but at least I know the standard of my property.

Having had two of my kids buy victorian starter homes with lots of character but enough DIY jobs to keep me busy for 20 years I was glad when the next one bought a brand new maisonette. What I hadn't bargained for was that brand new homes come without curtain rails, cupboards, picture rails, TV antenae, washing machine plumbing connections, loft boarding.....etc and to top it all, plasterboard walls that you can not drill into!

I would never have dreamt of moving into a new build until I met my partner. The biggest plus point is that we moved about 5 years ago and have had virtually nil repair & decoration costs to date - which is pretty important in the early years when you're mortgaged up to the hilt. Mind you everything is starting to show signs of wear and tear so I guess it will all fall apart at the same time.
Most new developments lack space and, if you're lucky enough to have one, have micro-gardens so my advice would be to shop around.

I think older building have an undeniable style, but the engery efficiency of even slightly old buildings in the UK is appauling. If the UK is ever going to take the environment seriously, it's got to do something about issues such as thermal conductivity, electricity consumption etc.

Newer buildings are also desined to be maintained, which makes them much more pleasant for builders to work on.