Our homes have been so much more than homes in 2020. We’ve worked from them, exercised in them and stood outside them and clapped the NHS. We’ve put our children’s drawings of rainbows in our windows and shared doorstep drinks with our neighbours. We’ve cleared out cupboards, painted walls and grown our own vegetables. In this series of blogs, we celebrate some of the ways our homes have helped us through the year – even if it wasn’t quite the year we were planning.

Saved by our house of horrors 

All the signs said ‘DON’T BUY THIS HOUSE!!’. It had been rented for years, was on a busy road, had a garden even Alan Titchmarsh would struggle with and was way out of our budget. Added to which was the looming General Election and floundering Brexit talks.

So what do you think we did? Yes, of course we did. We stretched ourselves and went against the tide of opinion and bought the house.

When I bought my first home, a good friend of mine, a financial advisor, said to me: ‘always stretch yourself because a year later you’ll think you could have gone higher’. With that in mind we have never regretted any of our house purchases and despite numerous economic shocks, have always come out with more than we put in.

What followed wasn’t exactly in the script. Covid-19 was about the biggest swerve ball we’ve ever experienced but if it weren’t for the house of horrors and enormous overgrown garden we wouldn’t have known what to do with ourselves this year.

First there was the central heating system which leaked and sounded like an orchestra when it started up so, in order to investigate the issue we had to lift all of the carpets and floors to expose the pipe work. Upon doing so it was apparent that the plumber who fitted the system was either drunk or lazy (or both) as it was a patchwork of pipes which predominantly rested on nails and random bits of wood. We even discovered a bird’s nest under our bedroom floor which was a surprise!

Thankfully we have a number of tradespeople in the village who were willing to work in closed rooms and with materials they had in their own reserves as supplies were very hard to come by during the first lockdown. We were also able to find a landscape gardener prepared to help us tackle the garden, but my wife and I did most of the labour, attacking beds full of nettles and brambles that reminded us of a scene from a fairytale. 

Having extensively used our network of local trades and supplies, it has made us even more aware of their importance. For months we really didn’t leave the village, except for an occasional trip to a garden centre or DIY store where queues were inevitable but not as bad as reported. The whole experience has been challenging, frustrating but ultimately highly rewarding.

Six months on, we have painted a total of eight rooms (and counting), replaced plumbing, electrics, laid flooring and tackled the jungle…but it’s given us an enormous sense of achievement and we’ve enjoyed every minute of it. Well almost. ES, Yorkshire

Further information

This series of blogs is inspired by Savills new advertising campaign, To Every Home That's Been So Much More Than A Home – Thank You and Merry Christmas. Over the next few weeks a selection of guest bloggers will reveal just how much their homes have meant to them this year.