to move or not to move - please help us make a decision!

As someone who bought a 2up2down as a first time buyer and then had kids I think you should definitely move! We were perfectly happy here, nice quiet cul de sac, quiet neighbours etc but our house is too small now. We have made a little bit of profit on our house but not enough to cover a move up and I'm not working full time now because of the kids so we're stuck for another couple of years at least in a house that is far too small. You seriously can not imagine just how much room a child takes up in your house, they take over! If you're struggling a bit for space now it will be much worse once you have a child.

I'd look at what you're using your spare bedroom for now. What would you do with the stuff in it or whatever you use it for once you had a baby?

Babies do have a lot of stuff and toys/stuff for babies in the first couple of years is quite bulky but if you didn't have space for it you'd have to be ruthless on the amount of things you got. One of my friends had two small children in a very small two bedroom terrace. The downstairs was basically one big room with a bathroom off the back plus two bedrooms upstairs. They were bursting at the seams but would have loved to move.

Also I'd look at schools, what are they like? Would you be horrified to send a child there? Its a bit in advance but that way you'd know whether you'd want to stay in the new house for some time.

Oh, and I'd also look at what your maternity benefits would be and consider what the repayments would be on the new house. Depending on whether you get a good deal from your work or not you could see your income cut to very little while on maternity leave. The would make a big difference to what you bring in and therefore what you can contribute to the household bills. And also whether you'd have to go back to work full time/part time/not at all, and whether you could afford the childcare costs.

Hi All, thanks for all of your replies they really did help - and I haven't had a chance to reply until now, sorry. A lot has happened since I last posted funnily enough - and we did think if we had doubts then that should be ringing alarm bells. I don't know if I said this before, but we had our house valued last Saturday - and we were told we'd get much more for it than we thought (We did go on one of those websites that compare the selling price of our neighbours and this is where our original estimate came from). My husband was not entirely happy with the back access - the way the houses were laid out meant that at least 12 of our new neighbours could see directly in our back garden and there was a dark alleyway in between. It is such a shame as the house itself seems near enough perfect (apart from a v old central heating system). Well we weighed up our options over that weekend, and decided that we were probably getting way ahead of ourselves - we don't need the extra bedroom at this moment in time plus what's to say we'll be fine conceiving straight away - plus all the upheaval of moving combined with the stress of my college exams is probably not a good idea. We are looking to move into the road that is literally a stone's throw from our existing one - and both are near a good school so that wouldn't be an issue. I don't know what my maternity benefits at work are - purely because if I ask it would arouse suspicion and would cause problems for me at work if you know what I mean - a catch 22 situation! So in summary, we decided that if another house comes up on the market we will have another look but for now we are content staying where we are. In short, we will not move for anything less than perfect. Thanks to you all for your sound advice though xx