If this were you would you move or build on

Dh and I have been boggled trying to decide whether to move or put an addition onto our home. We feel we are busting at the seems. These are some of the things that have us confused on what way to go.

* With our house now we love the lot we are on, neighbors are not to close and we have the room to add on. We are also concerned that if we move our backyard space would be much smaller. If we add on, the back yard space would really to affected, however i dont know if the room sizes would be as big as we would like them, bc of building codes and not being to close to the neighbors.

* The school district K-8 is pretty decent, the highschool however is not so good. If we add on this would turn into our forever home. Also the school is 1/2 block from our home.

*Dh and I are wondering if its worth putting on a 40,000 addition, and live thru that mess. We have looked at homes online that are only 10-15 thousand more then what we paid for our house with the extra room that we are looking for.

*We have only lived in our house for about 5 years and refinanced last year, and are thinking that couls hurt us.

Re: If this were you would you move or build on

I think you should give a think to what you're willing to compromise (or not.) IMO unless one has millions to spend, you'll never find a home that is absolutely perfect. Are you prepared to possibly take a loss on your house if you were to sell now? some people argue that you can make it up with a purchase - you'll get more for your money and a great interest rate. But if you don't have the down payment for that (and I'm not asking if you do - not our business), then it's a moot point. Selling a house is extremely stressful and this is an awful time of year to do it. But if you're prepared for that, I would wait until it warms up a bit and then put your house on the market/look for a new place.

Re: If this were you would you move or build on

We were faced with similar issues, SPACE.

We decided it would be cheaper to stay and do an extension

We have a "big" yard that can support an addition

All the houses in our area would be more $$ for the space we needed. More than the addition will cost us.

We are in a great location that we love. So convenient to the train station and major roads.

We went to several open houses to check out the market. What we found is that the bigger houses were outdated for our price range. At the top of our budget that would not allow remodel.

We already did 2 new bathrooms last year in our house and the addition would be brand new with no remodel needed like in the houses we saw

No moving expenses

No closing cost to add on.

I will add that we wanted to stay in our area. We could find a bigger house in Suffolk but we don't want to move there. This is not for us.

ETA: We also calculated that the addition will not make us be the most expensive house in the neighborood. The addition will keep us within our local market.

Message edited 12/26/2010 6:21:30 PM.

Re: If this were you would you move or build on

We were also in that place, except we weren't busting at the seems, I hated our layout and not really having a basement.

We went out and looked at houses that were 1k sq/ft more than ours with a basement and honestly it wasn't worth it for me. We put to much money into our house and we couldn't find anything that we were willing to put our house up for sale.

Then we thought about an addition and it was $55K for a small addition and in the long run it still wasn't what we wanted.

In the end, we just swapped some rooms around, painted again and I am in love with our home now.

Re: If this were you would you move or build on

I would move. Even if you spend all that money on an addition you will still have a "not so good highschool." If you have kids thats most important IMO. Sure you may get less than you want for your home but you're also going to be buying low. I just don't see spending that much on an addition that is going to make your yard smaller which you don't seem thrilled about and the addition is going to be smaller than you want anyway.

Re: If this were you would you move or build on

We are in a similar situation (although our SD is good, we're just in a small house). Other things we have considered - when we sell we will probably use a realtor and have to pay that fee, plus moving fees and we will be selling in a depressed market. We'll lose $ based on what we paid for the house, and especially based on what we put in.

So, for those reasons we are staying put for now. I am considering an extension, but considering that I don't think the extension will give me the house I really want, I am thinking we will probably eventually sell to get the size and layout of the house we want in the end.

Good luck!

Re: If this were you would you move or build on