To think it's good news about house prices falling

[brexitstolemyfuture]

The sentiment has really changed in comments sections all over the place.

It is a bubble, no way can something keep rising indefinitely. From my area in the south it's been 10% increases for years yet wages are the same. Average wage is 26k where I am, average house is over 300k.

A slow poping of them would be best for the economy and give hope to those not born when they were affordable. I speak as someone that owns.

No, people can't do what you did. It involved living rent and bill free and still sounds miserable as fuck

Two of my children lived at home or with friends very very cheaply whilst saving to buy. of course that depends on having a parent you can live with (although rooms in shared houses are no different from how students live and not that expensive in most parts of the country). A couple in a shared room in a shared house can usually save up.

If you buy at £200k and only need 5% deposit that is £5k per person in a couple. It is not impossible to save that if you work full time and buy before you have children. My parents, I, all my siblings and my 3 older children have all bought before we had children. If you can when you have 2 full time wages it certainly makes it easier.

Our house is worth half what we paid for it just before the crash. Not noticed much recovery in house prices in the area and I hope they don't drop lower as we already have £20,000 negative equity.

Okay. But not everyone can stay with their parents rent- and bills-free. Rent and bills are a massive part of outgoings for those who can't. If all you need to buy is clothes, (some) food and toiletries, because family are effectively paying the rest for you, you are fortunate.

What I/partner would have been paying in that position:

• Rent - for a shabby, dampish, small, far-from-work but basically okay 1-bedroom in the city where we lived: £575/mo
• Council tax on that flat (inc water and sewerage charges) - £125/mo
• Gas/electric - if you keep the heating off as much as possible all through winter, £30/mo minimum
• Travel costs because it's too expensive to live nearer work: £50/mo, probably more
• food - say an extra £40/mo on top of what you were paying, as nobody to share the load with
• Internet - let's say we'd have lived without internet.

So that's at least an extra £820/month to start. And that's not counting rental costs like deposits (4/6 weeks of rent down at the beginning of the year), letting agent fees, costs of having to move because your landlord hikes the rent or decides to sell (used to happen to me about every 12-18 months or so).

5% deposit isn't usual outside of help to buy incentives which also often involve a loan element on top of the mortgage

It is unbelievable

Someone else paid your bills for a year. It's hardly the norm

You didn't get it on a £18k salary though. It was 2 £18k salaries.

My rent at uni ( a room) was £400 a month. Now it would be £600-800 (it was 20'years ago!) so not sure how anyone could live 3 years on £3.5k unless at home

The key to this was moving out of London; and to an affordable area.

No, the key to that was moving to an area with people in it who housed you rent- and bills-free. It is great they were able to and I'm sure I'd do it for my children if needed. But you had a massive amount of help to do what you did, and it's just not fair to suggest that all the people who don't have that kind of help available to them could do the same.

If people want to believe it is impossible then all they are doing is doing themselves down really that's fine. Those who believe it is possible will go ahead and buy particularly in areas of the country where prices are cheaper. My daughter saved half her net salary when she first started work - I think her rent was £800 a month. She like I am is not a big spender at all and she was used to living on student income (or lack of income).

I think there are 5% deposit mortgages out there - Aldermore eg.
www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/mortgageshome/article-4084996/How-buy-home-5-deposit.html and then you pay almost 5% interest rate but it can still be cheaper than renting.

So a couple buying the £325k house my son bought at the end of a tube line last year would need to save £8125 each. I think most couples could save that over 4 years particuarly if they don't eat out or go on holidays for that time. (£2k a year)

But I am 100% sure we still would have got there if renting

Yes, but you're saying this never having rented yourself! You said you didn't pay rent to your partner's parents and you didn't pay rent as a student (and you wouldn't have been paying council tax then either). That's massive costs most people saving for a house are dealing with, that you haven't had to factor in to what you're saving. It's easy to be 100% confident you could do something that you've never actually had to try...

No one is saying it's not achieveable ffs. I mean bloody hell, it's even easier if you get a well paid job.

The point is gardengeek, you've had a lot of help, Still lived like a pauper for years, in order to to buy a cheap, heavily mortgaged house in an undesirable part of the country.

Do you really think it should be that hard??

Surely there are decent jobs in other cities around the country? I live in a market town, within half an hours commute of Birmingham.

Looking on rightmove, currently for sale in my town- 2 bed houses start from £140k and 3 beds from £155k. There is a wide choice of houses for under £200k. Even renting would be MUCH cheaper than London.

My Husband and I don't have big salaries (£19k and £25k) and were FTBs 2 years ago. Saved our deposit whilst renting a little 1 bed flat (£500pcm) and now have a family sized home. We are millennials, it is definitely still possible for my generation outside of London.

So a couple buying the £325k house my son bought at the end of a tube line last year would need to save £8125 each.

Only if they earned enough that the bank was happy to lend them the rest, surely?

in your examples those are still life choices. You choose a career. You choose to have a child. You choose to stay near family. You choose to have only one income. You choose to take out a graduate loan. Etc.
If that means you also have to choose to stay in an area that you can't afford, yes it's absolutely fucking shit. But those choices are why you can't.

As I've already said. I CAN afford to buy a house in a lovely area. I'm very lucky.
It's also why I feel quite happy to stick up for people who work hard and can't manage it and get basically mocked and judged by people with the 'I did it so...' mentality.

But I love the idea of people being told 'don't worry about childcare, just move away from your support network otherwise you're just pick'
'If buying a house is important then sod caring for relatives so you don't send them to a care home. You're just being too picky and choosing to stay close'
'Yes you've got a career that secures yours and your family's future and moving away means that your travel will wipe most of your wages, but really you're just picky.'
'There's many areas of the country with cheaper houses, you're just being picky if you won't relocate'

I highly doubt most people would take any job so they can buy a house in a high crime area. Why would anyone want to buy a property when it's at risk of being criminally damaged etc?
Why would anyone try to buy a house when the job that pays the bills is over an hour away and taking, as you suggest, any old job would actually harm their future reference. Eg maternity, sick pay, pensions, future earning etc?

I hate this "I'm alright and did x y z so anyone else can fuck off and sort their life out before complaining" attitude.

There are many people who work hard who cannot manage it. The fact so many people on this thread can't seem to realise that makes me quite sad.

Mortgages are cheaper than renting, though. Renting is shit. It's expensive because a) you're usually paying enough for the landlord to pay the mortgage and maintain the property and make enough on top to make a profit or get them through tenant-free periods, and b) you have to pay deposits and (often) fees as well as that rent, and c) it's insecure and so you often have to move, and that really sucks your savings dry (because you're often paying rent on two places for a week or two, because you have to pay one deposit before you get the other back, because moving is expensive).

I can afford to buy now. So we'll be moving from a rented house to a house we own. Rent: just over £1000/mo. Mortgage: just over £700/mo, for a bigger house in a nicer area.

But that's life, maisy. look at the continent - lots of people rent there.

I'm lucky in that I earn enough to buy, but I lost my DM years before my DC was born, and in order to earn my current salary have to live 200 miles away from remaining family. so absolutely zero help with childcare. I could take a pay cut and relocate to be nearer family for that, but I have chosen not to, for the moment. oh and my commute often takes an hour!

It's about priorities. If your priorities mean that you can't buy a house where you want to live, I agree that's totally shit, but the priorities are why. It's not about being "picky". It's about prioritising other things in your life above home ownership.

I plan to, thanks! I can paint walls for the first time in my life... I am going to be over the moon.

Hello Garden

I am so proud of you, but you know that already.
People told us we were mad to be as frugal as we were back in the day, if they believed us in the first place
We managed it by sharing our friends home, a couple of rooms as we had ds1.
Yes, we paid rent and bills but we were so cheap and managed to save a deposit. We didn't have a pot to piss in.
Nothing by todays figures but still a lot to find when you have newt.

My sons are following in our footsteps they are young with projects and homes in their early/mid twenties. They do favour shells for some reason and we are the NW, which obviously helps a lot.

It is achievable, miserable whilst your in it, and it has to be your sole priority. I don't blame people who don't want to live like the frugal do.

No, it shouldn't be this hard, but it's never been easy, the numbers have just changed.