The Lemon Fool

We are planning to sell our house and I am (for the agents particulars*) gathering advantages and disadvantages of ours compared to others on the market [*Carefully-placed words and phrases here and there.]

A brand new housing estate has come onto the market and allowing for the fact that a new house is a different market to second-hand, many buyers don't mind either way. On the new estate, the 4 bedroom houses have a single garage plus two parking spaces. The spaces are in tandem (which if you are unfamiliar with the terminology, means, for example, that when you have three cars and park one car in the garage and a car on each space, you'd have to first move the car abutting the garage before getting the car out of the garage). A friend tells me that tandem spaces are great fun when visitors park in your driveway. Also, the driveway to the garage is shared with the neighbouring property which means that if the neighbour's cars are parked on their driveway then when you drive to your space(s) your car(s) would have to be parked fairly straight.

Our house has a double garage (2 cars) and own drive (full width) for parking approximately another 6 cars (depending upon width/depth of vehicle). Although tandem spaces applies, it doesn't have to. Car outside a garage can be parked wherever one chooses: the terminology so i'm told is parallel spacing. As far as I am concerned, that is considerably better than on the new housing estate.

Given the choice, all other factors identical, which would you prefer? And if you'd prefer the double garage/own drive then approximately how much more would you pay for the benefit.

My view is that it's not possible to quantify individual pros and cons.

The entire package is the key issue, though location is a significant factor. This alone means an answer to your question can't be given a ££ figure. It would be significantly more in London than elsewhere, for example.

And folk with one car and few visitors might be very happy with tandem parking and consider a small garden a positive advantage.

But to try to be helpful, I'd much prefer a drive like yours, but would not put a significant premium on it.

It would just be part of the decision making process.

Does anybody actually keep cars in their garage these days?

John

redsturgeon wrote:Does anybody actually keep cars in their garage these days?

John

I guess not, but the tandem parking on the drive question is surely still relevent.

`Does anyone keep cars in their garage these day's ?

I hear people ask this question all the time. I am also aware that some convert the garage into living space or utility room or something they consider useful.

I would never buy a property that didn't have a usable garage. If you have an older, collectable, vintage car or if you have a convertible a garage is incredibly useful. During the winter I always garage a car instead of having to clear snow or ice from the windows. It's also a great place to keep all my other boys toys.......I could not live without a garage.

I certainly wouldn't buy anything with tandom parking.....it would drive me insane to have to keep juggling cars around to get in or out. Side by side parking would probably carry a small premium but it would more likely just make the property more attractive along with any other features.

I would vastly prefer parallel parking as an option if given the choice, even though for us it would make little difference.

We have tripledem parking (if that is a word) - a driveway 1 car wide but 3 cars long.

Plus a garage, but obviously that is for offcuts of wood, garden waste, and half empty paint tins as none of the cars will fit in and allow us to open the door wide enough to get out.

We did consider widening the drive as it is 'S' shaped, to allow 4 with 2 side by side. In the end we didn't bother.

We find 2 things happen....
1) you tend to just take the car at the front - not a problem as we aren't too fussy and we are both equally insured on all 3 cars (although obviously some are more suited to some tasks than others.)
2) When we do swap the cars around, it is reminiscent of a scene from "Butterfiles" [1]. Fortunately we live on a dead end road with only 2 houses past use, however generally someone does come past as we do the shuffle, usually someone lost looking for somewhere to turn around.

For us it is a minor inconvenience, which we could address by parking one car on the road all the time. In practice this is what you will find happens with the tandem drive layout - one on the drive and one in front of the house.

Paul

[1] Not that I'm old enough to remember it, but blimey hasn't Nicholas Lyndhurst got old.

richlist wrote:I would never buy a property that didn't have a usable garage. If you have an older, collectable, vintage car or if you have a convertible a garage is incredibly useful. During the winter I always garage a car instead of having to clear snow or ice from the windows. It's also a great place to keep all my other boys toys.......I could not live without a garage.

Yes, using a garage is a must in the winter, unless you want to allow an extra ten minutes every morning for de-icing or demisting your vehicle, and I don't. The key to using a garage is to have an automatic door opener, so that you don't have to get out of the vehicle in the rain to open or close the door.

richlist wrote:I certainly wouldn't buy anything with tandom parking.....it would drive me insane to have to keep juggling cars around to get in or out. Side by side parking would probably carry a small premium but it would more likely just make the property more attractive along with any other features.

A particularly bad case of tandem parking is the situation I had when working a contract in the US. It was a 3-unit building, and there was tandem parking in the garage for the 3 vehicles. Whoever was in the front had to move the other two vehicles and then replace them afterwards. We all had keys for each others' vehicles but, even so, it was a royal pain in the rectum to do that.

Never again.

The key to using a garage is to have an automatic door opener, so that you don't have to get out of the vehicle in the rain to open or close the door.

Our two garage doors are each electrically-operated, a fob on our keyrings and from within the car. It takes approximately 20 seconds from the kerb to garage door for the latter to have opened or closed, as the case may be. Also, one door has a built-in personnel door for walking in and out of the garage without needing to open/close the entire door. I don't use the personnel door as much as expected: despite having a foot rest, it tends not to remain open if there's a breeze in the air.

The property we are planning to buy has double garage electrically-operated door (single door I think) and is wider than ours, also two parallel spaces alongside.

redsturgeon wrote:Does anybody actually keep cars in their garage these days?
John

Yes. In our street, some 22 houses, I estimate about 11 garages are used for cars.

I should think it depends a lot on where one lives and how much ''stuff' one has compared to the number of people residing and the number of rooms in the property. Also, standard of living.

brightncheerful wrote:

redsturgeon wrote:Does anybody actually keep cars in their garage these days?
John

Yes. In our street, some 22 houses, I estimate about 11 garages are used for cars.

I should think it depends a lot on where one lives and how much ''stuff' one has compared to the number of people residing and the number of rooms in the property. Also, standard of living.

Good point.
Some new housing can be quite small. No outbuildings, sheds or storage rooms therefore not enough room to store stuff, it all gets put in the garage so, no room for the car. People just generally have more and more stuff. Larger houses have bigger garages, more rooms inside and out therefore don't need to store unwanted stuff in their garage.

Is being unable to get your car in your garage a reflection of your wealth, your class and does it perhaps suggest you are living somewhere that is to small for you ?

richlist wrote:

brightncheerful wrote:

redsturgeon wrote:Does anybody actually keep cars in their garage these days?
John

Yes. In our street, some 22 houses, I estimate about 11 garages are used for cars.

I should think it depends a lot on where one lives and how much ''stuff' one has compared to the number of people residing and the number of rooms in the property. Also, standard of living.

Good point.
Some new housing can be quite small. No outbuildings, sheds or storage rooms therefore not enough room to store stuff, it all gets put in the garage so, no room for the car. People just generally have more and more stuff. Larger houses have bigger garages, more rooms inside and out therefore don't need to store unwanted stuff in their garage.

Is being unable to get your car in your garage a reflection of your wealth, your class and does it perhaps suggest you are living somewhere that is to small for you ?

Depends I guess.

I have six bedrooms, three bathrooms, 3000 sq ft of living space, three sheds in the garden. Only three of us live here but I have our bikes in the garage and no desire to put a car in there, not sure why anyone would want to really, too much hassle to get it in and out.

John

redsturgeon wrote:

richlist wrote:

brightncheerful wrote:
Yes. In our street, some 22 houses, I estimate about 11 garages are used for cars.

I should think it depends a lot on where one lives and how much ''stuff' one has compared to the number of people residing and the number of rooms in the property. Also, standard of living.

Good point.
Some new housing can be quite small. No outbuildings, sheds or storage rooms therefore not enough room to store stuff, it all gets put in the garage so, no room for the car. People just generally have more and more stuff. Larger houses have bigger garages, more rooms inside and out therefore don't need to store unwanted stuff in their garage.

Is being unable to get your car in your garage a reflection of your wealth, your class and does it perhaps suggest you are living somewhere that is to small for you ?

Depends I guess.

I have six bedrooms, three bathrooms, 3000 sq ft of living space, three sheds in the garden. Only three of us live here but I have our bikes in the garage and no desire to put a car in there, not sure why anyone would want to really, too much hassle to get it in and out.

John

Where do you keep your helicopter?

Howard

Howard wrote:
Where do you keep your helicopter?

Howard

That's down at the summer residence....

John

John, if you can't get your car in the garage because bicycles are stored there it does rather suggest your property is to small for your lifestyle. I'm sure you could arrange a bespoke storage elsewhere on your estate in which to keep your bicycles......perhaps with the helicopter.

I guess it's only me then who would feel very embarrassed at not having room in my garage for my car. Isn't it like not having room in a bedroom for a bed or not having room in a kitchen for a dishwasher etc.

Having a large house with lots of bathrooms doesn't help when there is a foot of snow or the beast from the east about to arrive and your car won't fit in the garage.

richlist wrote:John, if you can't get your car in the garage because bicycles are stored there it does rather suggest your property is to small for your lifestyle. I'm sure you could arrange a bespoke storage elsewhere on your estate in which to keep your bicycles......perhaps with the helicopter.

I guess it's only me then who would feel very embarrassed at not having room in my garage for my car. Isn't it like not having room in a bedroom for a bed or not having room in a kitchen for a dishwasher etc.

Having a large house with lots of bathrooms doesn't help when there is a foot of snow or the beast from the east about to arrive and your car won't fit in the garage.

Cars are quite able to cope with being outside on the drive whatever the weather. It saves me much time and effort not having to put the car to bed every night. We also have three cars in the family so how would we choose which ones to put away? I guess you would argue we need a three car garage. Unfortunately in my town the council are not in favour of mollycoddling cars in that fashion and most of the centrally based houses do no have garages or even drives on which to park them. I guess we should all move out to suburbia for the luxury of a garage space for each and every one of our four wheeled babies, see what that did to the landscape of the USA.

Anyway I guess we have drifted off topic. Back to the original point. Having a double drive/double garage is clearly more practical than a tandem arrangement but how much that affects the value of a home is probably not possible to determine without knowing the specific factors of that property.

Given a row of similar properties in one location the double garage option may attract a small premium in recognition of the convenience factor but trying to compare two different properties in different locations seems more problematical.

My original seemingly glib statement is also relevant, some people will be looking to buy your property for whom the benefit will be negligible while for others it could be valuable.

John

Putting a car to bed every night is very little effort & takes but a minute or two. In winter that time is paid back tenfold by not having to scrape ice off the windows etc.

6 bed houses in my area tend to have 2 or 3 car garages.

Of course cars can cope with being left outside.....they just cope far better when under cover.

As for who parks in the garage.......surely better to put one in the garage rather than none.

richlist wrote:Putting a car to bed every night is very little effort & takes but a minute or two. In winter that time is paid back tenfold by not having to scrape ice off the windows etc.

6 bed houses in my area tend to have 2 or 3 car garages.

Of course cars can cope with being left outside.....they just cope far better when under cover.

As for who parks in the garage.......surely better to put one in the garage rather than none.

I'm amazed at the indecision on this thread. Surely in any well run household the chauffeur should decide. And if there is any dispute, Carson the Butler has the final say.

Howard

A lot of people in our estate seem to value house extensions over keeping the car in a garage. Either converting the garage into an extension, or building an extension in the side driveway, leaving the garage stranded in the back garden.

In both cases leaving only the front garden to park their 1-3 cars.

Scott.

All of which assumes the garage doors are wide enough to take a car in the first place. I inherited a double garage but with two separate electrically operated doors with a solid pillar between. The daftest idea ever. I have looked at removing the pillar and installing one big door. perfectly feasible just not a priority so my car sits outside. How many days over the winter do we have snow? We either get no snow like last winter or so much of the stuff that I could not get the car out of the garage anyway so it is simply not an issue.

In a competition between identical houses I would be put off by my arrangements but in my street they are all individual houses so there are many more critical factors to consider and when we bought the garage arrangements were simply not an issue.

Dod

I accept days of snow, most years, are very few but low temperatures and ice are with us for many more. If you are happy to de-ice your car every day instead of putting it under cover.....that's your choice.

Many others, it seems, just don't have that choice because..
1. They don't have a garage or
2. Their garage is full of other stuff or converted to living space because the property is to small for them.