James McDonald
It’s an old piece of wisdom that you should always live in a house before you renovate it. To be honest, I’ve never understood why. After all, my entire job is helping people renovate houses that I’ve never lived in. I make decisions about layouts, materials, lighting and finishes, sometimes having spent just a few hours in a house. So in the past, whenever I’ve read people’s earnest advice about ‘living somewhere first’ I’ve rolled my eyes a bit. Surely if you know what you’re doing, you don’t need to move in first.
And yet, I now find myself about to put that wisdom to the test. After selling our flat in London, my husband Will and I have now found what we hope will be our long-term home in London. We’ve bounced around for years (I wrote last month about how many times I’ve moved in my life, and now we are ready to settle down (at least for now…).
What drew us to our new home is that it was, to put it generously, a mess. The previous owner had lived there for sixty years. She had lodgers on the first floor and another tenant in the basement. The house hasn’t been maintained at all. Plaster on the façade is cracked and crumbling. The once-blue front door has faded into a tired dishwater colour, with splintered wood peeking through curling paint. Inside, windows rattle loosely in the sashes, broken cords hanging free, the carpets are moth-eaten, and watermarks creep across the ceiling and down the walls.
In short, it is exactly the kind of house that excites Will and me. We live for projects like this. And normally, they make me think: ‘Right. What are we going to turn this into, when can we start, and how long will it take?’
When we agreed the purchase last year, that was precisely the plan. Quick drawings. Planning application. A thorough scope of works followed by a one-year (or more) renovation during which we’d live elsewhere. We know the drill. We are comfortable with it. And there is something reassuring about heading straight for the end game. After all, these things take a long time. You only live once, and all that.
But then I started looking for somewhere to rent while the work took place. I scrolled through listing after listing for months. Nothing was right. Everything was such poor quality and too expensive. And it didn’t help that the last time we rented somewhere was during the Covid lockdowns, when landlords were desperate and we could just about name our price. Not the case anymore. And so we found ourselves toying with an idea that we never expected to entertain: what if we just moved into our new house as it is?
Comments are closed.