Mortgage cheaper than rent?

But for commercial properties the market rent is the market rent. If the going rate is £15 a square foot in an area than you can’t just charge more because you feel like it. Or rather you can, but you’ll have a void. It’s exactly like the residential property market. Although in fact many commercial landlords will offer a rent free period to make their property more attractive, and to avoid reducing the rent because that might impact their banking covenants. They’ll sometime rent at below ‘market’ so they don’t have to carry the can for business rates either, which is a cost that also sits with the tenant if there is one, like council tax but many multiples of the cost. In some respects a commercial property lease is more akin to buying a house because maintenance and insurance is the responsibility of the occupier…

I wasnt trying to compare them. Im just saying he could no way afford a home in Surrey so he decided to move so he could become a home owner.
A mortgage in Surrey was unaffordable.

Yeah this. I know a few people who finished paying their mortgage off at 50-60, and were terribly smug and condesending towards people (roughly the same age) who were renting from the council/a housing association, because they had to keep paying rent - even when when they were retired. (And they - the smug ones - didn't have a mortgage OR rent...)

The smile has been wiped off their face this past few years, after the renters started to get the rent paid via housing benefit when they retired, whilst having absolutely no repairs and maintenance to bother with/pay for.. And even the ones paying rent (because they have an income that exceeds housing benefit payments) are only paying £450 or so a month rent, and again they have no repairs or maintenance to worry about.

Meanwhile the mortgage-free people have been shelling out 10s of 1000s over past 4-5 years for either: a new roof, problems with subsidence, new central heating system/radiators/boilers, new electrics, drainage issues, damp issues, knotweed removal, new windows, new bathroom, new kitchen, new soffits, etc etc. And then ongoing insurances for bricks and mortar and the gas or electric system ..... etc.... (In some cases, quite a few of the above!) All included in the rent when you have social housing.

At the end of the day, many people who own their home at retirement - or thereabouts - are not necessarily better off financially than people who rent social housing!

Similar to my DC and their DP. They were renting a one bed flat worth about £180K, for £1500 a month. They have bought a house for £325K, and the mortgage is around £1100 a month. £400 less a month, and a property worth almost twice as much.

IGNORE. I quoted the wrong post!

Obviously, at the risk of being accused of trollhunting, because they are on a windup.

You're hilarious & U turn more than Starmer.

Your question/statement keeps changing.

very few people are agreeing with you & even those that are, aren't actually agreeing with your initial post.

its all a bit mad tbh.

To rent a similar house to ours in the same area would cost about £3000pm, our mortage is £1000, in the house about 10 years.

I agree with what you're saying. We are currently renting privately and if we were to get a mortgage for a house in the same area and same size, we would be paying roughly the same or higher in many cases each month (based on a 10% deposit). Obviously it will be worthwhile in the long run, but it's hard to see the benefits short-term.

Presumably it depends on the size of your mortgage and amount of deposit. Our rent is £1295, it's a 3 to 4 bedrooms property with floor space of approx 110 square metres. They sell for around £380,000. If I borrowed £240,000 the repayments would be about the same as the rent. Small flats excluded, since we are a family with kids, we couldn't get on the property ladder here without paying more than our rent. That obviously doesn't consider that rent is dead money and over the time mortgage payments drop and you gain equity.

I think it probably true in many areas. however when you factor in the maintenance and upkeep of a mortgaged house with the option of passing on maintenance and upkeep issues of a rented house to a landlord the difference decreases.

And then there is the sunk cost argument about rent versus the increased value of an owned property over time. It’s not a simple yes or no.

I’ve been a landlord for 29 years. Rents have not gone up four fold in that time. Rent started £550 for a new tenant. Now around £1250 for a new tenant so little more than double.

I've just done a quick calculation based on our rental property, worth about 400k. It's rented at 18k per year and a 90% mortgage at 4.2% is less then 16k per year. Obviously you would need to find the 40% deposit but that amount would potentially drop every year and even more with overpayment.

OP - rent has risen by just over 39% in ten years. So yes a mortgage is cheaper in the end, plus you have rent control (or mortgage control rather) because you can adjust the terms of the loan each time you come up for renewal you can add years to keep the cost consistent. Eventually (took us only 5 years of owning) you have 60/40 with the bank and the rates fall sharply. Rent is generally only adjusted upward, though I don’t know where you are based. This is particularly true of London, we couldn’t afford to rent the house we live in, currently it would rent for £3,500 per month, but is only £1,900 to mortgage.

You haven't been clear in any of your posts, let alone your OP.

Never paid more than 500 a month mortgage, had two houses now mortgage free. 3 bedroom owned outright. Rent for similar style house is 850 - 1150 a month. Know most people are in the rent trap because can’t raise a deposit. In my experience everyone with kids own not rent. I only know someone who rents due to living in London.

I’ve done the sums on the below properties as if we were a FTB. The house for sale is actually down the road from one we looked at as FTB. I’ve used figures from today and both houses are in the same area.

House for sale; 3 bed terraced about 30 years old. 1 parking space and smallish garden with a small conservatory. Kitchen and bathroom recently renovated, flooring is recent and neutral. Decor is neutral and easy to paint over. On the market for £200,000. I have assumed a 5% deposit and 30 year mortgage, which is what we took out as FTB. Deposit is £10,000 and mortgage amount is £963 per month with a 4.5% interest rate.

To rent: 3 bed semi detached, similar sized rooms, about 5-10 years old. 1 allocated parking space. Bathroom and kitchen still fine and flooring and decor also neutral. Smallish garden. Monthly rent is £1,300 per month and deposit is £1,673.

I have had to go for a 3 bed house on the rental as there are no 2 bed properties available to rent and so I have looked at properties to buy to match those to be comparable. There are cheaper 2 bed properties available, although admittedly they need more work. The expensive part is getting the deposit for the house to buy but the renters need over 15% of the deposit for the rental that they need to buy.

We were FTB 8 years ago. Once we’d got that deposit together, our mortgage was cheaper. We took some money out of the house to do it up but the mortgage was still cheaper than rent. The property increased in price and we sold that house and bought our current house. Our current mortgage is £1280 a month for a £300,000 mortgage. That is for a 5 bed detached. For £1,250 in rent we can rent a 3 bed semi-detached house, which is about the average for a 3 bed rental here. To get a 4 bed detached as a rental would be £1,625 per month.

Once you can get that initial deposit, it is cheaper. It then continues to get cheaper. People struggle to get the deposit together for a house because of high rents and high deposits for rent.

So why laugh at the person saying they can get a cheaper mortgage in 2026. It is literally quite possible in many areas even with 5-10% deposit

Ok, for fun; I have run the numbers and if I was to buy a £800k propert,y like the one near me that is rented out for £3,750 pcm, on 100% mortgage it would cost me £4,300 per month, plus stamp duty of £63k.
So yes, it would be cheaper to rent in year 1 and mabe in year 5, but what about year 15 when the rent is £9,000 and the mortgage is £4,300? That of course assumes that interest rates are constant and rent rises with inflation and inflation is steady. There are too many variables and you need to look at the total costs over 25 years for a true comparison and then also take into consideration the value of the property in year 25, at which point you can downsize and have some (tax free) cash in the bank. I think the answer is, it is cheaper to buy than rent over a lifetime.

My mortgage is 900.
To rent this would be £1350 a
month . We live in south east .

Our mortgage is much cheaper than average rents in our area.

Was renting a 2 bedroom house in my area for £950 per month. I now pay £550 a month on a mortgage for a 3 bedroom house that has a much bigger garden and driveway. That is with 90% mortgage. And we only bought last year so this is with current rates. All the properties in my area that are to rent are a lot more than my mortgage. Maybe Scotland is different but it is the norm here for renting to be more expensive than a mortgage, making it harder to save for a deposit.