{"id":7,"date":"2025-07-14T09:27:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-14T09:27:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/?page_id=7"},"modified":"2025-08-01T11:08:22","modified_gmt":"2025-08-01T11:08:22","slug":"my-story","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/my-story\/","title":{"rendered":"My Story"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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My Story <\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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First Impressions<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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When I began looking at buying my first home in 2012, my boyfriend (now husband) and I went to look at new build show homes. After we\u2019d poked around in one or two, we smugly decided they weren\u2019t for us. No character, they will depreciate like a new car, surely?! Who wants to live in a bland cookie-cutter box with a small garden anyway?<\/p>

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Well, fast forward nine years and yes, you\u2019ve guessed it, we bought a new build home after swearing they weren\u2019t for us.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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The Old Cottage<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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You see, we\u2019d spent the past nine years in our first home, a 150-year-old cottage with cobb walls, character, and a large garden. We had liked living there but couldn\u2019t deny that to maintain this beautiful old property took time and money that we just didn\u2019t have.\u00a0<\/p>

We now had two young children in tow, so no renovations, no extensions, and no knocking down walls, thank you very much! We wanted minimal maintenance and a blank canvas which we could add to as we got the money to do so.\u00a0<\/p>

So, once we\u2019d weighed it all up, we decided on a beautiful 1930s style, 4 bed Redrow home (a Stratford). I fell in love with the show home as soon as I walked into the kitchen\/diner and I\u2019ve been in love ever since.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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The Pandemic<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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We reserved our new build home in February 2020 and we all know what happened in March of that year! Yes, a global pandemic will really slow down the process of getting your home built. So, I had plenty of time to plan, and that\u2019s exactly what I did.<\/p>

Initially, I went on to Pinterest and fired up my old inspiration boards. However, it had been a couple of years since I\u2019d really added to them (I\u2019d been in a baby bubble for a while there) and the ideas didn\u2019t seem as exciting as they once did.\u00a0<\/p>

Some of them still made me sit up straighter but a lot of them just looked a bit outdated or not quite right for a new build, so I\u2019ll be honest, I gave up on Pinterest right there and then.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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Finding Instagram<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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For me, Instagram was where I went for my inspiration in the early days, and I still do! I started out just typing the developer and house type into the search bar (so \u2018Redrow Stratford\u2019) and I just couldn\u2019t believe the number of images that flooded my screen. I didn\u2019t know a huge amount about Instagram at the time and I didn\u2019t know people had Instagram accounts dedicated to their homes!<\/p>

I couldn\u2019t believe the amount of inspiration on offer on Instagram. Not only that but seeing these ideas played out in a home that would be identical to my own was fascinating.<\/p>

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Visit Me <\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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On a whim I decided to create my own \u2018home account\u2019 \u2013 you\u2019ll find me at\u00a0@new_build_forever_home<\/strong>. Come and say hi!<\/p>

I started the account to keep track of all the inspirational images I\u2019d come across. Then I thought,\u00a0Maybe I\u2019ll have a go at this myself<\/em>, and I uploaded the ups and downs of waiting for the house to be built. Eventually, I shared mood boards and ideas for my own home and finally, images of my home as I completed each room. Posting is now a full-blown hobby and I love it!<\/p>

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My Story First Impressions When I began looking at buying my first home in 2012, my boyfriend (now husband) and I went to look at new build show homes. After we\u2019d poked around in one or two, we smugly decided they weren\u2019t for us. No character, they will depreciate like a new car, surely?! Who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"elementor_header_footer","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-7","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7"}],"version-history":[{"count":114,"href":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":485,"href":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7\/revisions\/485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.tempomobile.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}