Home maintenance

[DanS]

In Asher's thread, it was mentioned by a few that home maintenance is a big downside of home ownership. I may move out of my condo in the next year or two and into a house. I'm prepared for a small increase in responsibilities, but am hoping to minimize things.

Q: Have you tried to minimize your time and money responsibilities with your house? If so, how have you done it? F.e., a low-maintenance lawn? Buy quality appliances? Should I lose all notion of minimizing these responsibilities and return to reality?

[Riesstiu IV]

I don't own a home but... try Xeriscaping? Doesn't look boring like a lawn and you spend less on water.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Lawn care service

[Zoetstofzoetje]

buy a modern house. ideally you're the first owner. otherwise you get the skeletons in the closet from the previous owner.

[DanS]

Lawn care service

Perhaps I'm too cheap...

[DaShi]

Isn't all this what the help is for?

[SpencerH]

Two words.

Rock Gardens.

[The Mad Monk]

I'm skilled and thrifty, but also lazy.

This has led to a maintenance style I call "just enough to get by".

[DanS]

Hmmm... Rock gardens... Are there plants in rock gardens? (Other than those in arid places.)

I think the Japanese are into those.

[Soltz]

Weeds can get into rock gardens too.

[ricketyclik]

buy a modern house. ideally you're the first owner. otherwise you get the skeletons in the closet from the previous owner.

My experience (in Australia) has been the opposite of this. A 40 year old house is likely to have had any serious faults that were going to arise arise and been dealt with (or not, and be obvious) while a new house has yet to go through that process. Also, and again this is the Australian perspective, tradesmen are much more rushed and less skilled than they were 40 years ago. I see a lot of quite young houses falling to pieces because of poor workmanship.

Quite apart from those issues, a premium is paid for a new house, which depreciates, while an older house has already done its depreciation so you're going to get much better overall capital gain from an older house.

[ricketyclik]

I'm skilled and thrifty, but also lazy.

This has led to a maintenance style I call "just enough to get by".

Amen.

[MikeH]

My experience (in Australia) has been the opposite of this. A 40 year old house is likely to have had any serious faults that were going to arise arise and been dealt with (or not, and be obvious) while a new house has yet to go through that process. Also, and again this is the Australian perspective, tradesmen are much more rushed and less skilled than they were 40 years ago. I see a lot of quite young houses falling to pieces because of poor workmanship.

Quite apart from those issues, a premium is paid for a new house, which depreciates, while an older house has already done its depreciation so you're going to get much better overall capital gain from an older house.

Agreed. Except here, there's little depreciation from a new house. Size and location drive the price, age is relatively irrelevant.

My house is ~ 100 years old. Mostly fine.

[ricketyclik]

Agreed. Except here, there's little depreciation from a new house. Size and location drive the price, age is relatively irrelevant.

My house is ~ 100 years old. Mostly fine.

No, overall little or no depreciation, but there is on the structural component. That's normally offset by the land appreciation, but if there's no structural depreciation then overall appreciation is at a higher rate.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

100 year old houses in the UK are a lot better than the new ones