Should I afford a house?

250 sqm is only suitable for a terraced middle house, so with a towel garden in the front or back. For a semi-detached house, it must be over 300 sqm. At least, that was the case for the offers in our densely built-up area. Usually, you have to keep a 3 m distance on each side, and often even 5 m to the street.

Hello everyone,

We went through different phases: 1. The naive searching phase: looked for existing properties and found nothing...
2. The naive "We build phase" :

Then we are probably just in the transition from phase 1 to phase 2. That’s why I also registered here in the forum and wanted to approach the project slowly. And such a realization of course hits pretty sobering.

The desired property would have been a 90-110m² bungalow. But with a total budget of €250k (including the bottle of champagne for the project completion) I probably shouldn’t think any further about it and can thus end phase 2 early.

3. The purified existing property search: Now we took our time, viewed houses, informed ourselves a lot and really looked for a house where everything fits

How long did you search in total? And did you hire a real estate agent or find the house privately?

Best regards,
Andreas

Hello everyone,

Then we must currently be transitioning from Phase 1 to Phase 2 . That’s why I also signed up here in the forum and wanted to take the project slowly. And such an insight of course hits quite sobering.

The desired property would have been a 90-110m² bungalow. But with a total budget of €250k (including the bottle of champagne for the project completion), I probably don’t need to think about it any further and can thus end Phase 2 early .

This was roughly our wish and budget as well, but we realized that making things look nice on paper doesn’t help New construction was not feasible, but now I’m actually quite glad that our house is already standing... we’ve been renovating for 2 days now and it’s pretty exhausting—why do some people have to glue their carpets down??? I mean, maybe the budget fits in your area after all... getting information costs nothing, but don’t let anyone sugarcoat or miscalculate things for you... that always ends up costing more than they write down or tell you...

How long did you search in total? And did you hire a real estate agent or find the house privately?

Best regards,
Andreas

We looked privately via real estate platforms and kept viewing a few houses over and over. It’s definitely good to look at multiple properties... you start to see quite a few differences.
With our house, it was like this: we viewed another house with the agent that didn’t suit us. We then talked a bit and by luck he said he was just getting a house that would suit us. He contacted us immediately, and we were allowed to view it first (luckily, because a house like that doesn’t stay on the market here for long) – and then basically everything was clear... The property wasn’t even put online anymore...
We started searching again in January and found the house in May... You definitely shouldn’t be discouraged if you can’t find suitable houses for a while... eventually you get lucky.

I mean, maybe it does fit your budget in your area after all... getting information doesn't cost anything,

Of course I continue to inform myself. On the one hand, it’s interesting and you don’t get any dumber from it . And indeed, in our area it wouldn’t be that expensive either. For example, we had a plot in mind for about €80/m², 8 km from Lüneburg.

However, the thing with "it might fit after all" would rather end up being more like "it just barely fits." And can you really build a house relaxed with that feeling? Let something go wrong and the catastrophe is there...

Maybe a question for the experts: How much of a financial cushion in € would you recommend to really be able to build relaxed? Of course, it always depends on what actually goes wrong during construction. But maybe there are some experience values (e.g. in % of the original calculation) with which one can still catch the usual nightmares?

Best regards,
Andreas