To hate this Kind of sneering attitude to places outside London

[wasonthelist]

"many things in life would be better and cheaper if we all just gave up and moved to that six-bed detached in Ashby De La Zouch. But could you really subsist in a place where the height of culinary pleasure is unlimited smarties on your ice cream at the local carvery?"

I am not sure if the author, Caroline Mginn, who wrote that in Time Out -
a) Really believes that Ashby has such limited culinary offerings (it doesn't)?
b) Thought she was preaching to the converted and no-one outside London would read it?

I'm suggesting that it can be done. Naive? Oh thats why I own London property is it (actually 2!) ?

If its really not acceptable for a couple to spend half their income on rent and bills they could live in other places, I did say that flat was in a sought after area.

Oh and many people spend half their income on rent and bills, especially in London, sorry who did you say was naive?

Many banks will give you a mortgage on 5% btw.

I never said it was desirable, but that it was possible to get mortgages and save up and not be destitute at the same time.

Its quite feasible for a couple both earning London median wages to save for a deposit in a relatively short space of time. People just want the moon on a stick.

Ashby de la Zouch cannot be a real place.

The circumstances you have listed to buy somewhere are naive - factoring in all the other costs it would be almost impossible to buy in that situation. The mortgage repayments would be considerably higher at such a low deposit, if you could even get it. It's not responsible lending and certainly not an answer for the majority of first time buyers in London.

Congrats on your two properties in zone two!! I hear you're the only buyer in London! Well done!

Ashby de la Zouch cannot be a real place.

Have you never eaten a packet on Nik Naks?

Never said that I was the only buyer in London, I said it was doable on a duel salary, and it is, I have friends and realtives who have done it.

The "its not possible" crowd all want cheap property in zone 2 as it is now, not in 1991 when interest rates 10% plus, when some houses down our road were squats and the police used to raid them on a weekly basis.

BTw: www.moneysupermarket.com/mortgages/search/results/?ltv=95.0&goal=MOR_FTB

Shows that you could buy a £300,000 house with £15k deposit and the repayments per month would be £1,335 pcm.

Lower than many rents in London on 2 bed flats.

Blah, blah, blah naive. Do your homework.

Never heard of Nik Naks.

Your original example is £12k deposit.

The example you have found is £15k. Plus 5k stamp duty on a £300k property. Plus lawyers fees and moving costs takes it easily to £22k or so, not to mention the money needed to furnish the place, appliances etc.

So even in best case scenario these people need twice what your original deposit gave. All the time they're saving, property prices increase. And that's how people quickly get priced out of properties they could formerly afford.

Fwiw, when I bought a London flat 2 years ago I was refused anything below a 15% deposit mortgage. Providers are a lot more strict than they used to be.

I think London sounds fab. I've not been for over a decade. But, according to what I've read here & many other places, it also sounds dirty & like many of the people don't care about anyone but themselves. I like my little Northen town, with friendly people & lichen growing on the buildings on the high street.

I'm sure most towns aren't like the stereotype.

I gave the example of 12k as what it was possible to save up in a year. In two that would be 24K and more than enough.

Also I think I was fairly generous in giving the "couple" £1000 discretionary income, once youve paid your rent and bills if you worked hard it at you could get by on a lot less for a period of time while you save up.

You can get quickly priced out of the market its true, but far too many first time buyers come at it having not saved anything for years and are shocked that they can't get something within a year. If you had some savings to start with the targets are not impossible.

And I'm not being preachy, there are loads of younger people I work with who have better holidays than I ever had at that age, more often, drive better cars, spend huge amounts of money on socialising, yet all whine about it being impossible to get on the housing ladder. It is possible if you cut your cloth in terms of saving and where you are prepared to live.

Lenders also are now using HTB which allows for a 5% deposit, there are plenty of people who have got on the lader like this in London.

Our theoretical couple could easily buy in areas like Enfield, Colindale, Neasden, Harrow, Hatch End, Edmonton, Green Lanes, Dollis Hill (in some cases) on this kind of money. Could even get new builds in Palmers Green:

www.moneysupermarket.com/mortgages/search/results/?ltv=95.0&goal=MOR_FTB

Sorry that should have been:

www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/find.html?locationIdentifier=REGION%5E85429&maxBedrooms=2&minBedrooms=2&numberOfPropertiesPerPage=24&radius=0.0&sortType=1&index=0&viewType=LIST

Never heard of Nik Naks

You've never heard of Nik Naks or Ashby De La Zouch.
I can only assume you are not in the UK then.
If you are go to your nearest corner shop as soon as you are able and buy some Nik Naks.

Oooh nice and spicy Nik Naks used to be the snack of choice in this house, DD2 is a bit health concious for that now and I can't make up the excuse the DS eats them anymore (sob).

When it comes it restaurants there just is a wider range of food from different cultures, near me we have Ethopian, Braziliian, Polish, Caribbean. Afghan, Phillipino and many more as well as your common/garden Chinese, Indian, Chicken, Pizza. This is not zone 1 either, so lets be honest when you compare the cullinary choice there is just simply more in London by nature of it being more diverse and much larger than any other city in the U.K. Lots of other cities are diverse yes, but not as many cultures/backgrounds as London has.

So now we have it. Multicultural just means lots of restaurants.

I really cringe at this attitude that people from other cultures are either just pretty window dressing or exist solely to provide "exotic" foodstuffs for people to fill their vapid faces with.

We're currently based in Paris, but I've lived in London all my life so I don't really have an excuse.

But I think it makes the point that Londoners need to get out more.

No, the thread was about restaurant started about culinary choices available inside and outside of London, I never said multiculturalism was about restuarants, obviously its a lot more than that, stop conflating the argument for your own purposes.

Tbh lurked the theoritical couple in your example don't exactly save hard. That flat is really lovely and Islington is very expensive. And then they will expect to also buy in the same area and moan if they can not.
In order to move fast and not be priced out you have imo to rent very cheap -maybe even just a room- in a cheaper area.
But tell this to young trendy couples and they will stone you.

Lurked, I know about averages. I also know that plenty of normal jobs in London don't pay £34k and plenty of people would find it very difficult to scrape together a £12k deposit.

If you need to have two people earning the median wage to be able to afford the cheapest flat in London, that is a bit of a problem for the 50% of people earning below the median wage.

You are also looking at the maximum amount somebody would be allowed to borrow, not the amount that would be wise to borrow given that interest rates will rise.

The "its not possible" crowd all want cheap property in zone 2 as it is now, not in 1991 when interest rates 10% plus

You do realise that interest rates could rise to 10% again don't you?

I don't care about the whiny people you work with. I care about teachers and nurses and firemen and paramedics being able to live and bring up a family in London.

I know Laq, I didn't make them save very hard at all really, that flat is way better than anything I'd rent if I was in the position of saving, a year in a shared house/flat maybe or a cheaper studio?

I agree with the fact that younger people will stone you for saying stuff about maybe cutting your cloth.

Merry, if you listen to economic rumblings its really unlikely that interest rates will rise in the next two years and that we will be at 1% and below for the next decade.

I used median salary because its lower than the average salary, yes there are many people who can't afford to buy in London but that has always been the case. We do need to do something about protecting rents here and build more social housing.

Oh merry, I'm a teacher btw so the people I work with are the people you care about. Most are on the median or something around that.

Interest rates will most likely never go back to 10% levels of the 90's. Historically the average is about 5% and as I said the economic situation we are in its unlikely that rates will go up beyond 1 % in the next ten years.

Mind you, you know what they say about making economic predictions !

No, it has not always been the case that it was difficult to live in London. More expensive than the rest of the country in some areas, yes, but not out of the reach of people on low to middle incomes and not out of the reach of people working in essential occupations.

There are no economic guarantees. It's true that successive governments will probably be frightened of raising interest rates because of the effect on their voters. In the same way they don't like to mention lack of care provision for the aging population and lack of pension provision.

However, that doesn't mean that they are in control of the economy.

It has however always been the case that it is very easy to suggest that people are just whining and need to cut their clothes according to their cloth. Plenty of historical precedent for that.

Meryy, London was still more expensive than everywhere else in the country in the past, even when it had a falling population between 1945 and 1991, it has always been more difficult to buy here. Yes it is harder now, but when I was younger teachers and nurses etc bought in areas that would not have been in demand.

Now the city has a rising population, rising affluence and is part of a globalised economy that benefits the country as a whole, prices are going up!

As I said, people who were "naice" areas back in the 1990's were shocked when we moved to where we did, cause we cut our cloth, like everyone did.

So most of the teachers you work with earn around £36k and you think the best a teacher (degree + post grad training) should be able to aspire to is a flat?

Where do you think people earning less money should live?

Can you not see that this is a problem?

I don't think there's anything wrong with buying a flat for a FTB no I don't think aiming to have a flat in a big city shows lack of aspiration either.

As previously said I think we need to sort more social housing for lower income people.

Lots of the teachers I work with will be on 30k plus, an NQT in inner London will start on £27, 819, outer starts at about 25,819. So after a couple of years and a responsibility so yes, most teachers will be on the London median.