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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

I should have the right to buy from my my to let landlord after 6 years here

533 replies

chocolatekatie · 17/05/2015 07:19

No government will ever do it as loads of them are into buy to let hence why they do all they can to prop up the bubble.

My landlord thinks he's some businessman doing me a favour by letting me live here. Actually he's the problem, he just had money so can afford to buy up property - push up the price and force people like me to rent.

OP posts:
BearFoxBear · 17/05/2015 11:17

MN seems to be this weird bubble where it's perfectly acceptable to look down your nose at renters as people who simply aren't willing to sacrifice or work hard. It pisses me right off.

My dh, ds and I are living in a 1 bed flat and saving like crazy for a deposit. But seeing as the exact same flat next door to us sold for £250k last year, we're not expecting to have enough any time soon. We will need to move to a bigger place soon too, because ds needs more space. That will put our rent up by about £2-300 per month which will have a massive impact on our ability to save.

We have no family nearby, no support, and so we can't just move in with anyone else. Our jobs are very specialised, so we can't just move somewhere cheaper or we'd be out of work. I was offered another job somewhere marginally cheaper a few months ago and we considered moving, but our current landlord wouldn't let us out of our lease so I had to turn the job down (or pay him £4.5k, the remainder of the lease to get out of it) as it wasn't commutable.

Our friends who have bought have all been given large lump sums in order to do so. We don't have that luxury so it's difficult to see that we'll ever be in a position to buy. We can't save any more, our childcare costs aren't going to go down, we can't work any more hours, or get any financial help so basically we're screwed. But don't let any of that knock you high and mighty homeowners off your golden pedestals.

mintpoppet · 17/05/2015 11:23

High and mighty homeowners? Are you kidding? Many will have worked their guts out to buy. They are not saying you aren't doing that too. Awful attitude.

BearFoxBear · 17/05/2015 11:29

Have you read some of the comments here about renters just not being willing to make sacrifices? It's not my attitude that's the problem, I'm simply responding to some of the comments above which you clearly haven't cared to read or absorb.

JassyRadlett · 17/05/2015 11:31

They are not saying you aren't doing that too. Awful attitude.

Some of them are. Explicitly. On this thread.

mintpoppet · 17/05/2015 11:40

I'll admit I hadn't read the whole thread. Their attitudes stinks too BUT so does yours. Absolutely stinks. I am one of those homeowners you appear to hate so much. I am not high and mighty. I've rented in the past, as I'd imagine most owners have at some point in their lives. I own a house...so what? Many have nicer homes than me, better cars, nicer areas to live in etc but I don't have a chip on my shoulder about it. In life there will always be people who have way more than you. Some will have worked their socks off for it and others will have inherited or been helped by family. That's just the way life is. It will always be that way so you can learn to live with it or you can let it make you bitter.

suzannecanthecan · 17/05/2015 11:44

?
I have no issue with homeowners, the problem is the government's failure to address the housing crisis, fobbing us off with measures which only exacerbate it?

RagstheInvincible · 17/05/2015 11:51

This is a total non-starter.

As I see it, introducing a right to buy after 6 years in the private sector would mean that no rental agreement would run for more than 5 years and there would be no chance of renewing it once it expired. All you'd get OP is the sweat of moving every 5 years and I'm prepared to bet that each time the rent would go up.

BearFoxBear · 17/05/2015 11:55

OK at first you just annoyed me, but now you're just amusing me. I'm not bitter and I don't hate homeowners ( I'm an intelligent woman and realise that such anger isn't productive so I don't waste my time on that) - but again if you'd bothered to actually my comment in the context of the whole thread and applied a modicum of IQ to your reading of it, you'd get that.

The point I'm making is that every single time we have a thread along these lines there's a litany of comments from homeowners telling how they managed it, so people in our position should just suck it up, work harder, save more, move somewhere cheaper etc. But the fact is that for a lot of people there is literally no way of getting to the point where home ownership is achievable be a useful they can't do these things. No way. That's unfair, no doubt. But it also doesn't help when people who bought at a time when it was a bit easier, or had help, or just don't get how it is now if you have to rent, talk down to current renters.

Seasilverdollar · 17/05/2015 12:03

Well said BearFoxBear

LotusLight · 17/05/2015 12:08

Bear, I've never said it was easy. I've said I had it pretty tough in the past in order to buy too (no maternity leaves etc) but I've also talked about how people do it and mortgage brokers. I think that kind of useful guidance really does help renters. Eg if your child "needs more space" soon why not not bother with that and tolerate the less space whilst saving?

Presumably a mortgage would be cheaper than rent for you? So do you between you have enough income to borrow 95% of a sum and therefore the problem is the typical one of how you each save up 2.5% deposit each or that you have to have 10%?

Kewcumber · 17/05/2015 12:15

I don;t think bashing landloards over the head (unless they're genuinely shit landlords) is particularly constructive.

I'm also not sure why it should be a particular right to own a home (it isn't in other countries)

Rather than make it a tax disadvantage to buy to let I think there should be tax breaks for landlords who offer assured tenancies - that would (provided the tenant takes care of the place) give an advantage to those who are unlikely to ever own a home and give them stability if they chose.

LotusLight · 17/05/2015 12:18

You could say no capital gains tax when you sell your property if you make it available for a 5 or 10 year lease. Mind you in our experience the tenants never want to be tied down to more than a year because they might break up with their partner, get a job in another city, find a nicer place to rent etc. It is allowed under current law to agree a longer tenancy if both sides agree.

Kewcumber · 17/05/2015 12:19

I trained in a professional field, earned a good salary, saved shed laods of bonuses to get a deposit and was helped by my parents (a little). I have not a fecking clue how someone on less money than me, without bonuses and without helpful parents in the london area today can buy a house.

My current house, 2 bed, and backs onto a railway line (about 30 feet away) is valued at £400k!

I think (certainly in the big metropolitan areas) the emphasis needs to be on providing stability of housing for families who can't afford to buy not shoehorning more housing into the private sector.

Kewcumber · 17/05/2015 12:21

Yes I know its allowed but there's no advantage in it.

I know a lot of younger people don;t want long term leases and that wouldn't change but I think we could probably have a stab at replicating a social housing model in the private sector - it would be a big shift though.

mintpoppet · 17/05/2015 12:37

You are talking drivel Bear. Why do you give a tiny rats backside if people say renters aren't working hard enough to buy. You know that's not true in the majority of cases and so do the majority of normal people. Why care about the idiots who say otherwise.

By the way my IQ is fine thanks.

HolgerDanske · 17/05/2015 12:39

What, why?!

And no, I haven't RTFT.

HolgerDanske · 17/05/2015 12:40

And that's not to say that I agree in any way with disparaging attitudes to tenants. I'm a tenant myself.

CactusAnnie · 17/05/2015 12:50

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

BearFoxBear · 17/05/2015 12:55

Lotus, helpful guidance is of course welcome.

The problem for us is the 10% - that equates to £30k. At this rate it will take us another 3 years to save that, and that's not taking into account how our ability to save will drop when we have to move because ds needs his own room, other increases in rent, or house prices rising in the intravening period. If the required deposits were lower we could easily afford to buy. We earn enough, and our rent is high so a mortgage would be lower. It's the deposit that's the issue and short of tripping over £20k in the street, we're quite likely always going to be just short of what we need.

BearFoxBear · 17/05/2015 12:59

Minipoppet, if you can't understand why it's necessary to challenge ridiculous, high-minded and outdated attitudes to renting when this is the reality for millions of people, then I'm afraid that I can be no further help to you here.

TTWK · 17/05/2015 13:27

You already have the right to buy. Make your landlord an offer. If he doesn't want to sell there are lots of other properties for sale.

^^This is the correct answer.

OP, you have the right to buy every privately owned house in the country. What more rights do you want??

mintpoppet · 17/05/2015 13:28

I don't need your help but thank you anyway.

LotusLight · 17/05/2015 13:34

So I think for some it's finding a 10% rather than a 5% deposit which is the massive problem and that seems to be what Bear is saying. Finding £15k each (£30k in total) is different from "only" £7500 each.

I don't know where people live but in the bit of outer London where I slum it (even 30 years ago we couldn't live further in by the way - this is not some new problem) a one bed flat is about £187k and most people would start in somewhere like that as soon as they could afford it and hope later to move to something bigger. I don't really want to pick on one person Bear but does it have to be a 2 bed flat you buy rather than one even just to get started?

PterodactylTeaParty · 17/05/2015 13:39

I love the implication that renters could afford to buy if they just made more of an effort.

For half my 20s I was making about £12,000 a year. I had three jobs (four sometimes when I could pick up extra summer work). I worked seven days a week. I didn't go on holidays, I didn't have a sparkling social life, I lived in the cheapest flats I could find, I walked three miles to work to save the 95p bus fare. All my contracts were part-time, short-term, fixed-term things - who'd have given me a mortgage on that? And as soon as I'd managed to save any money, my savings were knocked out again by having to move, which happens all the sodding time if you're privately renting.

I could likely afford to buy now (in my 30s, married, on better-paying full-time job). I am one of the lucky ones! But the idea that I could have afforded to buy back then if I'd just sacrificed more or worked harder or something is hopelessly clueless.

BearFoxBear · 17/05/2015 13:44

Lotus we have a child, so a 1 bed isn't really an option for much longer. We've managed in a 1 bed until now, but it's not feasible longterm.