How much have you got left on your mortgage?

[overthinkersanonnymus]

I'm considering increasing my mortgage to around £330k. The payments would be around £1650 per month which is doable between two of us. It would be an increase of £600 per month on my current mortgage.

The house I'm looking at doesn't really need anything doing to it right now. Just decorating and A new bathroom would be nice one day.

My salary is £35k and my husbands is around £50k. No children yet.

Am I mad to consider this?

Please could you tell me what's left on your mortgage so I can way up what's "normal".

DP and I early 40s. 95k left. Looking to borrow another 100 to 150ish K in the next couple of years to move somewhere a bit nicer. Combined gross income c. 130k. No kids.

I understand that as humans we like to fit in with the tribe, but you surely appreciate that house prices, wages and people’s overall circumstances vary widely.

As a comparison....

At early 30s we took out similar level of mortgage, at that time we had 2 young DCs and salaries of £35k and £40k - but we also benefited from low interest rate so our monthly payments have been just over £1k. We stretched to do that. Once children in nursery etc we were very very stretched, it was a painful few years. You are looking at a monthly payment nearly 60% more.

We are now in the last 2 years of low interest rate, and well aware it will likely jump up quite a lot on a new rate.

But our income has now changed a lot - £30k and £115k. Mortgage down to £265k ish. At least 50% equity.

A lot of whether it's a good or bad idea depends on how much your incomes may change over the years and at what rate and when and how many children you may go on to have (or not).

Mid 40s, 38k left (maybe a smidgen less). If all continues as is paid off in 2.5 years

We basically decided we both liked the security of our modest house and being able to save for pensions, university (or drama school!) And future stuff more aggressively

Dh earns 45k and I earn around 23/24k. We have 34 years left, as we have just moved house last year to a house in a nicer area. Now we owe £290k and payments were £1250 but due to one part of the mortgage fixed rate ending (the ported rate from our old house) it's now £1450 a month. We have one child and deciding whether to have a second although it would be tight for a couple of years if we do. When we moved, our new borrowing was on a 2 year rate at 5.2% so I'm hoping in December 2025 it will drop! Even a drop to 4% means around 150 off the monthly payment

58, and about £100k to go, salary £70k. Basic payment is £760pcm, with a very low interest rate for another two years, so saving as much as I can to be able to pay it all off before I retire. Will work, just, so long as jobs remain reasonable.

I'm 32, a solo buyer with 63.5k left on the mortgage. Very fortunate to have benefited from some inheritance and making a profit on my first property to bring my mortgage down.
My priority has always been being mortgage free over increasing it.

Paid our mortgage off in our early thirties, never had one since.

We have 125k on ours, 23 years left (only fairly recently bought!). It's £695 a month, and our take home is just shy of £4k a month between us, so a very manageable amount.

I’m 45, dh is 39. We’ve got 90k left on mortgage. But we only managed to by three years ago, and house was 170k as we had to move to a shithole of a place to be able to buy. Our mortgage was for 150k, but I had an inheritance so paid all that in, so 90k left.

3 kids, I don’t work and dh is now on 50k - he was on 38k when we bought this place.

We could move to a slightly nicer area now, but to be honest, our mortgage payments are about £400 pm. Neither of us want to go back to struggling if we had a bigger mortgage again. We can’t see the weed deelers abd wrong’uns when we shut the front door anyways.

11 yrs left on our mortgage and £70,000 still owing but we will be getting an inheritance early in the New Year so will be paying it off.

The plan is to then sell our house and with the remainder of the inheritance we’ll buy something in a different area without a mortgage.

Early 40s, household income £200k, we owe about £300k on a property worth £1m. DC both upper primary so out of the early childcare years. We are still on a low fixed rate until 2026 and overpay, so it's easily manageable.

In your shoes I would not stretch above £250 maximum. That's a little over 3 X joint income. It looked at KS like there could be a recession on the horizon after RR disastrous budget. One of you could lose your job. If you want DC nursery fees are expensive as are baby clothing/equipment and on maternity leave you earn less.

Age is the most vital thing and you’ve missed it out! £330k in your 20s/30s then it’ll be ok, if you’re 50s/60s then not ok.

You mention no kids yet so I assume you’re 20/30s.

we’re early 30s, income £120k ish, one child, 334k outstanding and it’s pretty comfortable

Late 30s with 485k left to pay. Household income of 155k with a 2300 / month repayment. We have a small child and partner works on slightly reduced hours so child not in nursery full time. We do however live in London so the mortgage to house price ratio is pretty good. 25 years left to pay but plan to reduce that down to 15 in 2027. We aren’t tight but not flush either. We decided a lovely home near good schools was worth the mortgage. Only you can decide whether it’s worth it for yourselves.

We have £360k left but are interest only so only pay £800 a month. We have 15 years to pay off and have a few other incomes that will enable this (she says!)

We are 55 & 49 and joint earnings are £170k, older kids at uni and starting finally to be able to stack money into ISA/ pensions and investments and enjoy the last 25+ years of slog.

I would always say make sure that one of you can cover the household outgoings, we've always managed during redundancy's and down times to just about cover, so if the £1600 can't be covered by one you may want to rethink, or make sure you have some rainy day savings.

The issue is, for sound financial planning, it is not just the mortgage that is of importance, but also things such as pension planning. What is your pension like? Are you contributing enough? Are you aware of how much you would need for a moderate lifestyle as a couple? That would be an annual income of around 43k a year in pension income for you both. Full state pension contributions can take care of some of that, but a lot would need to come from work pensions.

What about uni for future children? A uni degree now costs an average of 70k in fees and living costs. Shockingly pricey, especially if your kid requires accommodation. Some of which needs to come from parental contributions, if they earn enough. Most parents are not aware of the costs involved.

So don't look at the mortgage in isolation, also consider how it affects other life goals and financial goals, both for you, your partner and any kids you may want. For example, we try to save/invest for all these goals simultaneously.

And like PPs said, how exposed are you? What is your plan B if someone loses their job? What if it happens to the highest earner?

What mortgage rate would that be? You do realise you’d get any new borrowing at a new rate and not the rate of your existing mortgage? The payment you’ve mentioned seems low for that amount of borrowing at current rates.

A mortgage, you say?

One doesn't think that one has one of those things.

Hold on, maybe one does, if that is when you own huge swathes of countryside and people have to pay you to live there. Then if so, one has a number of those and jolly nice they are too.

Christ, I am 51. Just buying my first apartment now. I am in Australia so a quick exchange rate conversion means my mortgage is 258,130 pounds. Settlement should be in March.
I am on my own and will be paying my mortgage myself. I will be working until the age of 101.

We are both 45 and have paid ours off. Saving for possibly 3 sets of uni fees plus our pensions . Aiming to retire at 60 hopefully.

£1650 is high on your combined salary. Our mortgage is finishing soonish but is £1000.

About £200k left, 11 years and we’re early 40s. Hope to have it paid off by the time DD leaves school and needs help with university/moving/first home costs. I wouldn’t stretch now if you do want children any time in the foreseeable future though, I feel like our finances are only just recovering from the shock of maternity leave and childcare costs and she’s 7!

We're mid 40s, similar household income. Our mortgage has never been more than £130k on any of our houses. Currently it's £106k with 20yrs left. £498pm. I'd feel uncomfortable with repayments of over £1k.

Not useful info to compare against though as we're risk adverse (buy way under our max lending), we live in NW where property is cheaper and made large overpayments on previous mortgages before moving up to bigger houses.

£160k, but equity of at least £800k. We're 43 & 50.