Don’t downsize till you’ve read this: PETER MILLER shares his tips for a successful move in your later years

Peter Miller and his wife, Hilary Kingsley, downsized four years ago years ago from a large family home in South-West London that they had lived in for decades, to a smaller house just down the road. 

Although they are happy with their move, the process was not without its problems. Here, Peter shares what he wishes he’d known before they’d started. 

We knew the time had come to downsize when we received a quote to repair the roof. It was more than we’d paid for the house. After 35 years and, fearing worse was to come, we decided to move. So learn from our mistakes, and you just might find new vitality in your new home.

Downsizing is not for the faint-hearted and the first rule is don’t leave it so long that you’re both too doddery to pack a suitcase, let alone box up the contents of all those rooms you once thought you needed. Or your final move could be in a box.

Don’t rush into choosing an estate agent. It may be a long time since you last moved so keep them at bay until you’ve done your research. Beware the pushy one who, before you’ve agreed terms, is on the phone telling you he’s got ‘a chain-free cash buyer who is prepared to complete in four weeks’.

Spend time looking in agents’ windows and online to get an idea of what your home is worth so you can get the balance right: what to spend on the new house and how much you want left in the bank for self-care, a world cruise and/or a contribution to the children or even grandchildren’s home-buying fund.

Calculate carefully what moving is going to cost. There will be the agent’s fees, conveyancing fees, removal firm costs and possibly Stamp Duty to pay on the house purchase. And don’t forget what you might want to spend on renovating your new home. It could add up to a formidable sum.

We bought our old (then dilapidated) house in a sought-after area of Wimbledon in 1984. My mother-in-law was appalled and pleaded with us to find somewhere else.

‘You’ll be moving into a derelict house,’ she wailed. It wasn’t quite that bad and it ticked all the boxes when it came to the ultimate commandment for property buying: ‘Location, location, location’.

Besides having to renew all the utilities and decorate throughout, we also had to bag up and remove a vast quantity of coal from the cellar and demolish a rusty oil tank in the front garden.

But we created a home that was right for working parents, three children, a succession of au pairs and a widowed parent.

It was a prime location and benefited from a series of unprecedented property booms. But where and into what should we downsize?

It’s easier to say where not to go. Don’t risk somewhere you’re unsure of simply because properties in that area are cheaper and you’ll end up with more in the bank. There’s always a reason they are cheaper. Think twice about moving to that pretty country village or the seaside town you’ve been to on holiday. Living there year round will be very different.

Unless you’re certain you’ll thrive somewhere new, stay in the same area to be close to the friends, shops and bars you know. But you don’t have to go to quite the extreme we did — and only move 800 yards.

Decide on the minimum number of bedrooms you’ll need. We settled on three: one for us, one for guests and one to compensate for lost storage space. Then make sure there’s enough living space. You may need space for two TVs, if one of you is a sports fan and the other binges Netflix.

Draw up a list of ‘must haves’. Ours included separate bathrooms to ensure that our marriage, if it survived the move, wouldn’t end in divorce over fears at the prospect of the other’s wet towels on the same floor. If like us, you have a cat, make sure a cat flap can be fitted and have someone ready to install one. Decide if off-street parking is a priority. A driveway will avoid paying for a parking permit and stop the frustration of competing with the neighbours when a spot is free.

Probably the best thing we did at the new house was to insulate the loft and fit a ladder that came down at the press of a button.

It is easy to store our suitcases, Christmas decorations, picnic stuff and boxes of things we won’t throw away.

Don’t underestimate the space you’ll need, especially if you’ve been rattling around in a large house for decades. We underestimated — and ended up building an extension.

Ready to put up the ‘For Sale’ sign? That’s when it starts to get boring and tense. Boring because we had to keep the house clean and tidy 24/7 and tense because after every viewing we anguished if it was going to produce the buyer.

We signed up with an agent we knew well and there was a lot of interest but no realistic offers so we brought in a second agent on a joint agency deal which meant they shared the commission. Inevitably, the first agent still found us a buyer. But it was on condition it could be independently valued by another agent.

They brought in a posh London firm and their representative turned up with someone from the local office and that person then contacted our buyer offering to show her all the ‘better value properties’ on their books.

Then they allegedly found a bat dropping in the loft and used this to justify a price reduction. Strong words were exchanged.

Delighted though we were at the prospect of a ‘sold’ sign, we still hadn’t found a property we liked. But our buyer was prepared to wait and proposed we exchange contracts and complete within a year.

So we had a year to find a new house and, assuming we did, we could give the buyer four weeks’ notice to complete.

Even so we found a smaller place we liked quite quickly. The snag was it was let and the tenancy had four months to run. So we agreed with the seller to exchange contracts immediately and complete four weeks after the tenants left.

I wouldn’t recommend such a complex deal — but thanks to our lawyer it worked.

They say that old age isn’t for wimps. Nor is downsizing. Those intervening four months proved extremely stressful and you might have even less time to prepare. Be ruthless. We told our children to ‘yellow sticker’ anything they wanted that we weren’t taking and we would dump the rest. But we still weren’t ruthless enough and ended up renting a garage. Decluttering is vital before the removal van arrives.

You’ll find you’ve acquired at least twice as many clothes, shoes and accessories than you need. Too many beds, chests of drawers, rugs? Our fussy kids turned their noses up. In good time, think about calling The British Heart Foundation, which sends out vans with helpful, strong men who will remove and display your unwanted goods at their furniture shops.

Don’t try to do the actual move on the cheap. If you’re a serious downsizer then pay for a proper removal firm even if you’re only moving a short distance. And on the big day, tip the removal men in advance. Ours were so grateful they even helped hang the curtains. Be prepared for the task of changing all your standing orders and direct debits for utility bills and other household payments. Try to stay calm during the inevitable ‘you’re in a queue’ messages. And don’t expect the wi-fi to be working the day you move.

Do we regret moving? Not at all and nor do our children but we all miss the large dining room where we enjoyed Christmas lunch. We discovered too late that the new owner was going to gut the place otherwise we would have asked about the three marble fireplaces that probably ended up in a skip or the back of a builder’s van.

I accept there would only have been room for one in the new house. But we could have kept the other two in the loft!

A final word of warning: if you’re moving after decades in the same house, don’t get alarmed if you continue to get off the bus at what used to be your stop or regularly drive home from work to the old house.

A friend of ours who had just moved, parked outside his old house out of habit when he met friends for a drink.

At the end of the evening, he walked home to his new house, woke up the next morning and — when he couldn’t see the car on the drive — nearly called the police fearing it had been stolen. Then he remembered.