Going from renting to buying a house

[Newuswr]

to homeowners that rented privately before buying a house - did your living costs generally increase once you bought a house?

asking as my bills are around £1700-£2000 per month. I rent a one-bed upmarket apartment in a desirable area so wonder if my rent is overpriced as it has all the bells and whistles. Some of my colleagues pay less towards their mortgages than I do in rent, for example, for larger properties.

Mortgage payments may well be less but you can end up paying more in other ways.

Our mortgage payments were roughly the same as our rent, but the council decided to change the band for our council tax after we moved in, so that was an extra we weren't expecting.

Plus life insurance for mortgage for both of us.

Added to that, you are financially responsible for all maintenance or anything that goes wrong etc.

Pros and cons to both.

I bought last year and pay a lot more now.
But my flat was crap, whereas my house is nice, so I don’t mind.

Last year in crappy 1 bed flat:
Rent: £590 pcm incl. heating, water and wifi.
Electricity: £26 pcm
Council tax: £88pcm

This year in nice 2 bed house:
Mortgage: £695 pcm
Dual fuel: £120 pcm
Water: £27 pcm
Wifi: £24 pcm
Council tax £105 pcm

Thank you both!

Oh dear, my (new build) apartment also changed bands once it was properly assessed. Luckily in my favour! Don’t currently have life insurance so that is an extra expense.

currently no bills are included in my rent. It’s also an all electric property so hopefully dual fuel in a house could lead to cheaper bills. I feel like mine would be the other way around where the apartment might be nicer than a house I can afford haha, but at least I’d have more space!

I opted to rent a bit of a dive in order to be able to save for the house (although had I known about the moth infestation I might have swerved it tbh!)

The flat was absolutely overpriced for what it is though. Three years ago it would’ve likely cost an absolute maximum of £500pcm. After I moved out they let it to the next tenants for £675 (moths and all!)
Rent is absolutely ridiculous right now, everywhere.

Bigger space bigger bills
Maintenance
New boiler
redecoration
Insurance for building
Furniture
Commuting or travel costs

Wondering about this too as currently trying to buy. People talk a lot about maintenance and I don’t actually know what they mean - not sure how much is routine preventative stuff (maybe clearing gutters, that kind of thing?) and how much is repairs.

Does your bought flat have a monthly service charge for communal areas?

The thing with owning is, it's yours to do with what you like which is brilliant, one day you will pay it off and own it out right, so you won't be having to find rent money when you're a pensioner!

But when things go wrong you either have to find the money of live with out. In the past few years Ive had no heating as the boiler broke and I didn't have the money to replace it, my roof will need replacing in the next few year.. god knows where that money is coming from! In the past storms destroyed fence on the side that's my responsibility which cost me a fortune.
Little things like to front door lock broke, cost me money for a locksmith on a weekend. All this stuff is what as a tenant you expect the landlord to resolve sharpish. When you own if you haven't got the money you live without. When I first bought in 2008 the only thing I could afford to get me on the property ladder was a mid terrace with NO central heating. I lived for 5 years with and electric blanket and plug in electric heater in the bedroom and a single gas fire in the lounge. No heating at all in bathroom and kitchen, because I couldn't afford the new boiler to put in central heating.
Now I'm glad I did it as it got me on the property ladder in my early 20's, but it wasn't fun! However friends at the time we're renting lovely city centre apartments. Now I've climbed the property ladder and several of them are still renting moaning that they can't afford to buy. They could but just not to the standard they are used to as renters... they're choice but the moaning annoys me when they're not willing to make any sacrifices to get on the ladder.

I've gone off on a tangent rant, but in summary, there will be expenses and frustration but totally worth it.

We bought our house last yesr after 20 years of renting . Tbh the costs we have to spend have stayed the sane BUT we have spent more because we WANT to suddenly i care about raised beds and hallway decoration 😀

If you don't have any dependents you don't need life insurance. If you die, the house is sold to pay off the mortgage.

Obviously you'll be responsible for maintenance and improvements that are currently covered by the landlord but most of the other costs are related to the size, efficiency etc of the property and how you run it, not whether it is owner occupied or rented.