Finding Your Forever Home: 4 House Hunting Tips for New Parents

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If you’re a new or expectant parent, you have a lot of work ahead of you. Your life for the foreseeable future will be filled with midnight feedings, dirty nappies, and extreme fatigue 24/7. Your whole life will be turned upside down and you’ll undergo a great deal of stress, but ultimately these changes will be for the better. You have brought a new life into the world and you have a beautiful baby to love and cherish.

It’s amazing how much space a tiny newborn can take up, which is why many new parents find they need to move house in order to accommodate their tiny visitor. But house hunting is very different for a family compared to a couple as there are several additional features you will need to look for.

To help you find a property that is child-friendly, here are four tips for finding your forever home.

Do your research

Before you start booking property viewings, you should take a bit of time to conduct some extensive research. House hunting takes time and as new parents, you no doubt have very little of this precious commodity to spare. The last thing you want is to waste time looking at unsuitable properties. Take a good look at your finances and work out what you can afford. Narrow down your criteria to fit your budget. Start looking at real estate websites and make a list of all the properties within your financial means that catch your eye. Prioritize these in order of preference and visit them in that order.

Find the perfect location

Location is perhaps the most important factor in a family home. You could find the most beautiful, perfect house at a reasonable price but if it’s in the middle of nowhere with no facilities then your life will be a lot more difficult. You need to consider the area and how suitable it is for raising a child. Proximity to good schools is essential, so you can set your child up for the best education possible. You also want to live near neighbors with young kids so your child will have someone to play with. Also, look for a garden for your child to run around in, plenty of green space nearby, and local shops and entertainment within a short distance.

Consider accessibility

How easy is it to get to and from your new home? Your life as a new parent will be filled with trips to daycare and the grocery store, so you want to make your life as easy as you can. Ideally, you will want to find somewhere with plenty of parking close to the front door, to save you wrestling with heavy shopping bags and baby carriers.

Look for space to grow

You may well stop at one child, but what if you want to grow your family even more? You need to be thinking about the future and making sure your home is big enough to accommodate the family you want. Thinking ahead will save plenty of time and money as you won’t need to move home once you discover a second child is on their way.