if you live in a big house, do you regret the size of your morgage

[Lardlizard]

Or are you glad ?

not a big house, but property in central London. It was a struggle in the early years, but now mortgage free.
it was a sound decision.

We live in a lovely 2 bed flat with a private garden and parking So a small property. Mortgage however is big £1000 a month as we didnt have a big deposit. So small place, big mortgage. Expensive area so the flat cost a lot.

I grew up in a massive house in a rural area. Always needed work doing to it, most never got done and I knew then I didnt want that.

Have friends who bought a huge house and it was lovely. We used to go and stay over with the kids and other friends would be able to stay over with their kids too. So nice for everyone to get together. They sold last year for a small place as they were sick of the big mortgage

Nope. I live in a modest 3 bed detached that has the mortgage paid off

Same here. It is a bit small (eg I would have liked to have hosted SIL and a single friend of DH at Christmas but just don't have the space with my mum and a friend of hers coming) but now I have the freedom to work freelance and not worry (too much) about money. It's just a roof over my head, not a status symbol.

I don’t know if we qualify as ‘big’ It’s a fairly large house with a lot of land, 7 downstairs rooms.
We have a pretty big mortgage, in fact the maximum we could get, we did have a large deposit as well.

We have stretched ourselves but if the absolute worse should happen we could just about afford it on one wage (would be eating rice and beans though)

I love our home and don’t regret pushing ourselves. It’s our dream home and everyday I think how lucky we are to have our house and land.

There are substantial downsides though, it costs an absolute fortune to heat and maintain. There is work that could do with being done to the house that we just can’t afford right now and probably not for the foreseeable (although it looks fine superficially there are a lot of hidden running costs/repairs when you scratch the surface). We really need a gardener and cleaner as we just don’t have enough time to get it all done and we can’t afford either (we might look at the option of a cleaner once a week in the new year).
It can be a worry to keep an eye on everything outside, there can be an issue in one part of the land that you don’t find for a few days which causes a bigger issue than it should’ve had we realised sooner there was an problem.

For all the downsides and occasional worries I wouldn’t give this house up in a hurry. It is absolutely worth it for us at the moment BUT I don’t doubt that when we are older we will downsize as it would be completely unmanageable from about 70 onwards.

I’m another one who had rose tinted glasses on and fell in love with an old house that needed a ton of work. I don’t necessarily regret the mortgage (it’s inline with our incomes) but it has needed/still needs so much work and costs a fortune to run. Still, I’m very emotionally attached and think it’d be very hard for me to sell.

DH and I live in a modest terraced house in zone 3 of London. Our mortgage is massive and takes a big chunk of our salaries every month. However, it was either that or move out of London entirely, which neither of us were prepared to do as we love it here. Most of our friends live in London and it’s a 10 minute journey from our area into the centre of town. So while I don’t like having such a big mortgage, I can’t say I regret it.

I think houses with high maintenance costs, needing lots of work done, are more of a problem because people don't really budget for that as much and it comes as a surprise. Also large hearing bills are sometimes not budgeted for. At least when you take on a mortgage you know what you're taking on. That's why is probably prefer a new house over a large Victorian semi all else being equal, although it's complicated by new houses usually being inconvenient locations!

Yes I regret it. Bought a 4 bed detached on private estate in 2016 just before the referendum when prices were high.
I didn’t want a big house, I wanted a 3 bed terrace closer to town but dh is South African and craves space.

Mortgage is big and a constant worry I would sell and downsize but we haven’t made any money on it yet. But that is my plan in another few years.

Yes. I've been ill and if we'd bought somewhere smaller it would have taken away a lot of the 'how will we cope if I cant work' worry. Also...its just too big for us really we have rooms we barely use which doesnt seem right. My husband fell in love with the house, and I hadn't seen any that I loved so i went along with it. I wish we'd held out tik we both found one we loved

Size of house doesn’t really correlate with mortgage though. There are plenty of people in the south east with mega mortgages and small properties. I love my house but it needs an extension and work doing so it’s expensive but isn’t a wow house. Our mortgage is massive and it does scare me that we have a huge financial commitment for the next 30 years. We’re trying to overpay to bring the term down but it is the monthly commitment of around 2500 that scares me. We are trying to make sure we have a savings buffer so we can meet the repayments if one of us lost our job. But, I don’t regret it one bit.

I have a tiny house and a massive mortgage. I regret being too stubborn to move completely out of London (I'm barely in it now).

I live in a small house and have paid off my mortgage in full. If we'd taken out a bigger mortgage to buy a bigger house, we'd be really regretting it now as my role has been made redundant. So, so glad that we didn't overstretch ourselves and that our house is secure!

Big detached. Don't regret it. Moved here when I was 35 and with a very big mortgage but now paid off so all been very good. Having 5 children and working form home needing a separate office here etc a big house has always made a lot of sense.

Also I work for myself as a lawyer so always knew I could just work harder or generate more work and that way be able to afford the mortgage.

We did the opposite, bought a normal sized house in London, sold it after 5 years and moved out of town and was mortgage free at 30. Best decision ever.

@Warmfirechocolate

Make sure you get legal advice before you do anything, especially before you leave.

You may have a claim on the house, even if you aren’t married. If you move out your claim automatically reduces, as you have less need for housing.

Stay put and find out what you should do from a solicitor.

yes I`ve upgraded to a bigger house . we were 10 yrs off being paid off....now its 20 yrs.

oh the joy of more to clean, heat!

I miss our smaller house, easy to keep clean etc. closer to being mortgage free. we don`t need a toilet each in this house (3 toilets for 3 people lol!).

For me it's much more the location than the size so in terms of the location I'm grateful everyday. The size is a bonus.

We have a large mortgage and do not regret it. We bought quite a small rather run down house with land in a beautiful location and added a large extension and generally spent a lot of money on the place. It’s gone from dated and tiny to gorgeous and quite large. We have added a lot of value so if we need to sell we will hopefully make a profit.

We brought a small house 2 bed mid terrace. With garage. Could of got much bigger for the same money but we wanted a much nicer area for our daughter and we wanted the lifestyle of not having to spend tons of money on maintenance and running it like our MIL. who has a 4 bed detached, huge garden, huge one bed annex double garage. They are finally mortgage free at almost 60. Due to inheritance. They finally have it sort of finished after 15 years living in it and now refuse to move as they want to enjoy it but the running it is bankrupting them.

Yes. Complete waste of money

I'm the opposite, we went with a smaller house, could have had a bigger mortgage, but choose not to stretch ourselves at the time with a newborn etc. 4 years on I regret it. Really wished we just went for the bigger home!

Like everything it depends if you have a crystal ball. Like Ooh the stats upthread I became ill and was self employed and the mortgage has become a nightmare, it sucks every penny and is a constant source of stress. I have to watch every penny it has gobbled up my savings. No holidays, no clothes, no coffee shops, nothing spare, do all diy myself, pray every time it is stormy that nothing ill befalls the roof or boiler etc.

I'm moving when my youngest finishes his A levels in June. It will be a huge relief. However, I live in a lovely area, great state schools, open spaces, very safe etc and it is a fantastic, beautiful house. I can't afford a studio here from my equity so having to move to a smaller town and house in a not so nice area and town half an hour's drive away and feeling upset and trepidations about "moving down" in life and feeling like a failure.about So, it's not so just about having a big house but about the attendant environment that surrounds it
.
If I'd not got ill and had continued in my career, with earnings intact, I'd think it was the best decision ever and buying in a good area also means thehouse sells on easily and at a good price, despite Brexit, the economy etc. I know that it will continue to rise in value, they are only building flats here, no more nice houses. It will continue to be desirable.

I held on hoping for things to improve financially and as my large family were all embedded in the local schools and activities and we do use every room (the house isn't that big)

I guess you need to consider how much it would improve the quality of your life?

What about you LardLizard?

Not at all, we spend so much time at home that it's worth it. We live in a very expensive area so it's definitely not a mansion but it's big and our mortgage is big. We have been lucky though that my Husband's bonuses from this year have covered the new kitchen and things we wanted to do, otherwise I may have felt differently.

Really insightful thread. I've always wanted a massive home but some of the comments here are making me reconsider. Having got rid of loads of things and spending this year minimalising, it feels like we live in a bigger house anyway (3 bed 2 bath bungalow). I guess the big house dream was because I always imagined us throwing parties and having friends and family come stay. Whereas at the moment, we can only really accommodate 2 guests at a time.