to not give a toss about getting on the <boak> property ladder?

[Headbanger]

Oooo, my first AIBU

The Old Man and I were brought up, like most Brits I guess, to believe that renting was the preserve of the flighty and irresponsible and ill-advised, and that the only sensible thing to do was to buy your own home.

You know where this is going (no points for originality here): we are professionals, married 10 years, hoping to start a family, but cursed with being Londoners, and of the generation that began being gently and discreetly screwed into student debt by the Government and then being savagely shafted thereafter.

We have a respectable income, but it is so eaten up by debts and the cost of London living that we are focusing all our efforts on paying the debts off, and there is little left over.

There is no hope of us ever buying our own property: our jobs are public sector and/or the arts, and we would need to save a deposit of around £40k, and get a mortgage of something like 8 times our combined income. We're from unwealthy backgrounds, and there will be no bequests or lump sums appearing on the horizon.

Of course we could leave our hometown, but kindly do not suggest this because I don't see why we bloody should: our families are Londoners for generations, we know its very stones, all our friends are here, etc.

So (get on with it woman): AIBU to ignore all this guff about home-owning being the be-all and end-all, and be quite content renting? Our monthly rent is less than a mortgage payment would be; someone else pays for the plumbing; a nice couple come and mow the lawns; if it all goes bent, or all goes better, we can up sticks in a month.

And I'm talking planning on renting long-term here - ten, fifteen years, with (hopefully) children, and all that that entails. Maybe forever, unless one of us gets that pesky half-million book deal.

Is this irresponsible? Should we eat spaghetti hoops on toast (erm, even more than currently )and go live in Zone 72 or parts of the country we know nothing about, and where our friends are hundreds of miles away, just to say 'Oh yes, we own our own home you know'?

Do any other MN'ers rent from choice? Are you happy with it? AYBU?!

Most importantly, do you think there will be a cultural change, and people will care less about that holy grail of the mortgage, and tenants will (like Germany f'rinstance) get lovely long-term leases, with security and permission to paint over the sodding magnolia paint?

I thank you.

thesecondcoming- in my experience as a housing/homelessness adviser, banks are a lot slower to reposses when you stop paying your mortgage than landlords (private and social). Although an advantage of renting is that you claim HB if you are on a low income unemployed.

Not sure if I'm qualified to post here, as we bought our first house six months ago. But I've been a renter for 10 years, so I'm going to wade in anyway!

Until we moved, we lived and worked in the same city and absolutely loved it - there was lots going on, we knew lots of people there, we could cycle to work, and so on. The rent on our house was very reasonable, but there was no way we could afford the inflated house prices in our city. However, we'd been saving up for 10 years and decided to buy in a small market town nearby (which was 40% cheaper ). We now have a lovely house and the town's ok, but there are many times when I regret having moved - especially as I've since got pregnant and I'm slightly dreading my impending isolation. Erm, I'm not quite sure what my point is here, except to say that, although it's nice to be able to paint the walls a different colour and muck about with the garden, renting did allow us to live exactly where we wanted at an affordable price.

(And for your stats, HB, we're both in our mid-thirties and work in arts/heritage/public sector jobs, so we're not exactly loaded.)

We are fortunate enough to have had the deposit to buy a london place. I really wouldn't want to pay rent each month - the cost would be the same in our area.
It would be interesting to look at long term costs but I do think about the long term gain we could have with owning our own home and the equity it might get.
But I do feel for the OP and there is nothing wrong with renting. We have a neighbour who has been renting that particular property for 32 years - how I wish that was my tenant!! and yes she has treated it like her own home and it looks better than most on the street.

Headbanger, I don't have any Cath Kidson nor would I dream of doing my own ironing
If you read my posts you will actually see that I have said I do understand that many people don't have the ability to buy right now. I am questioning why renting is a good idea long-term and I am asking what plans you have for your retirement. I am genuinly interested.

You were quite definitely inferring that renting = no pension: doubtless you are perceptive enough to see that that is, to say the least, tactless.

We have both been paying into pension schemes for years: 16 years in case of the OM, and 9 for me. I trust I have reassured you as to my comparative lack of utter blithering idiocy, and disinclination to spend my twilight years leeching off the state, and/or any offspring unfortunate enough to emerge from my thoughtless womb?

Of course you are right that renting is not the same as not paying into a pension plan. I am glad you have a pension Headbanger. Still think I have a valid point wondering who is going to look after all these people without property or pensions (eventhough they are of course not necessarily the same people). I don't see why renters feel secure at all. Surely you will all end up in poverty in old age?

I never want to buy. I am lucky enough to rent a housing association property. have a roomy 3 bedroomed semi detached with a big back garden and a decent sized front garden. That if i have any problems with I can just ring the housing association and they will come out free of charge. I had a new boiler in january Oh and the best part is, the rent is probably less than half the market rent for this area.

-smug cow emoticon-

'Yes, over years you will hopefully pay off the mortgage so you own your house or at least have a lot of equity in your house. What exactly are you planning to do when you are no longer earning? Let others pay for you, yes?'

Why, yes, Fairy Mum. You, for example. Ta. Your smuggery will serve me well in old age.

Another advantage of homeowning I haven't seen mentioned here yet is that it vastly improves your credit rating. This has saved me hundreds in interest over the years.

Interest?

Once we get out of debt, which will now be in one year, we won't be paying anyone interest again.

And it's already done wonders for our credit rating, having shown we pay off commercial debt.

LOL @ expat's last but one post

I agree Expat is very witty. Personally don't see the difference between people who rather be on benefit than work now and people who will end up on benefits in their older age. And please note I have already said I know some people cannot afford it and I am talking about renting as a lifestyle choice with no aspirations to own their own house.

YANBU

I would have loved to rent long term - we've been renting now for 6 years fairly happily although frustrated that no landlord EVER wants to do any repairs without a fight!

However, we were given notice - absolutely shit when you have kids at the local school and rentals hardly ever come up in the area. We've had to borrow from parents to raise the deposit and buy the house so it couldn't be sold from under us. Funnily enough - our mortgage will be less than the rent

Renting with children isn't fun when you are served notice. This really needs to change although I can't see any government wanting to address this......

we rent and own
it's a weird english obsession, owning a house.
I can see no point in it but then i attach no sentiment to housing

enjoy your life and stop being manipulated by the dm and govt into an ideal that is no longer ideal for most

Fairymum. Seriously pull your head out of your arse.

I dont normally get wound up by people on this site. However your comments are rude and show extreme ignorance of the world around you.

Just because someone rents it does not mean they will spend their old age in poverty.

How do you explain those old people who refuse to sell their houses to pay for care?
How do you explain to those people who have had to go into debt just to pay off the death duties they owe on their parents estate?

If you can afford your mortagage then good for you. What about the thousands who have sent themselves into insolvency just to be a "homeowner".
Who pays for them????

'Personally don't see the difference between people who rather be on benefit than work now and people who will end up on benefits in their older age. '

So all those working poor people who slave away their entire adult lives and can never afford to buy any home of their own or save for a pension are right up there with people who never work a day in their lives and spend their entire lives on state benefits?

We rent and own as well.

I like renting, we have a small place in an brilliant area where homes rarely come up for sale, with none of the hassle of maintainance, DIY, etc. If the opportunity of a lifetime came up for either of us career wise, we could move easily and relatively cheaply. The downside is that if we were served notice, we would have a couple of months to move and it would be difficult to find another suitable place in the same area. Perhaps rental laws do need to change so families can have better security of tenure?

Fairymum you can end up on benefits for many reasons, not because you are renting. Many people have bought bigger than they need houses, then couldn't keep up payments, lost the house, needed social housing and benefits.

" but then I think, erm, I shall be paying for this until I'm 70 or something"

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiight, and who will be paying the rent when you're 70 then ? . You'll be paying for it when you're 70 whether you're an owner occupier or not. It may well just mean that you're a 70 year old with an asset rather than a 70yr old in a landlord property that could be whipped out from under from your feet at anytime.

Oh and talking about liking being able to upsticks at the drop of a hat, what about the flipside of that ? The insecure nature of shorthold tenancies ? The fact that your landlord can give you notice and tell you (in no uncertain terms) to offit and you have nowhere to go. Expat for one has frequently been seen bemoaning the appalling nature of the private rentals market.

As for maintenance costs being met by landlords..... The private rentals places I've lived in the past have been an uphill battle to get the landlord to do anything wrt maintenance - just look at how many "My boiler in my rented house is f*cked but my LL is ignoring my calls" type threads we have on here.

'Expat for one has frequently been seen bemoaning the appalling nature of the private rentals market.'

Nom, for many of us this isn't a choice. There is no way we can buy. Anything. So rather than be miserable it's best to make the best of what you've got.

I don't plan on making it to 70, tbh.

So yes, I think private rentals will need to be revised, because for more and more and more people, there will be no other option. Ever.

That does not make someone a feckless, short-sighted scrounger. I really, truly take exception to that notion.

The OP and others who cannot afford it, well there is no choice but to rent. That's fine, that's life.

But if someone CAN afford it but chooses renting as a lifestyle choice, I have reservations about the wisdom of that approach for all the reasons Fairymum and Nondeplume describe.

And Fairymum, those people you shit on from a great height are the ones wiping your loved ones' and later, your own arse for 10p over minimum wage, if that, in a care home.

Best not to treat them with so much contempt.

I need to understand more when people say renting costs less than a mortgage.

An interest only mortgage? Or a repayment mortgage, if so, over how many years. Then there is the interest rate and amount of deposit. All these affect the amount of monthly mortgage repayments.

Rental fluctuates as well.

So long as rental costs more than the interest component on a mortgage, a homeowner will be quids in, because the difference goes towards capital repayment, which acts like a form of savings.

Expat, you are clearly not reading my posts....sigh.....

But if they can afford to buy, blueshoes, and are putting by and building up savings, it goes to follow that when and if they retire, they'll likely be able to buy a bedsit or one-bed flat for themselves in cash.

As for people like us, we may as well go on the dole according to some, because we're just as bad as terminally unemployed scroungers for having to claim HB and pension tax credit on top of what will be left of state pension.

Like I said, it's a moot point for me, I'm a member of Exit International and will do what I feel is right if I have the good fortune to live past when my kids are grown and should I grow weary of this mortal coil and yearn to pass out of it.