Thinking about the bungalow, I remember way back when the floor plans were shown on GG. They have been absolutely swindled, £1.3 million for a 3 bed bungalow with a big window and a bit of forest in the "grounds". The house should never have been sold for more than £700-800k and I wonder why it was. Maybe because it is next to a wedding venue? They absolutely saw these two coming. Lyds claims it's over 6000sq ft+ but when you go on Google Earth and measure out the property footprint it is only 3100sq ft-ish , so she must be adding both floors together ! What do we think happened? What the hell made them think that this was a good investment? Just look on Rightmove at properties in the area, all these just a stones throw away from her bungalow.. for the same money (or less) they could have got something like this:
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-71623866.html £1.25m an old rectory to outdo Josie, a kitchen garden and orchard ! plenty of grounds. bit of a doer upper but Lyds likes to redecorate
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-68188341.html £1.25m an absolute dream property, inclusive of kitchen garden too
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-76737271.html £1.1m another dream property, with fancy conservatory/greenhouse
There are similar grand and character properties with 5+ bedrooms, ready made kitchen gardens and "grounds" even less than this at 600-800k around south Northamptonshire.
I was thinking maybe they didn't want to invest in a character property because of the renovating, too much redecorating or upgrading, running cost.. but the amount of constant decorating and remodelling of the bungalow has probably surpassed that now. Plus they could have begged for it all. So why don't they just sell up and get something decent for their money?
I think the main problem and the real reason why they ended up with the bungalow is because they didn’t agree about the style of the house. Ali wanted something modern and Lydia something with a “character” so they compromised and ended with neither.
And it’s the reason why Lydia keeps doing all those renovations that don’t make any sense coz she’d probably love all the properties you posted but I guess Ali would not agree.
And I think they were sold on that “private” driveway / road that leads to the house and I can imagine it is probably quite beautiful but for safety reasons she never shows it even tho anyone who dedicates five minutes to that can figure out her address.