To ask how you saved for a deposit?

[Newmummy1234]

How on earth do you save for a deposit for a house when you are renting? Pay a small fortune in rent and just not enough money left to save. Don’t spend money on much and have really strict budget for food. No luxuries either :(
How do you do it? X

My husband and I did it by living in our parents homes for 2 years longer than we’d have liked. I don’t see how it’s possible renting OP I really don’t. Horrible system. Sorry I can’t be more helpful

As much overtime, extra shifts, zero luxuries, zero takeaways, zero holidays, zero alcohol, zero nights out.
I got a second then a third job and put every spare penny/pound into the savings.
We did this for 2 years.

I assume you've had a look at the help to buy accounts to get 25% from the government towards the purchase?
Are you looking to buy in a cheap area to get yourself on the ladder? I had to go for a very undesirable area. The plus side is I got a lot of house for my money.
It's very hard when you have all of the utilities and rent on top of trying to save. I had to move back home to do it too. Other than moving somewhere cheaper for rent or getting a second job I think moving in with parents is the only other way to do it

We lived in a tiny tiny flat and then a very inconvenient one (think way out of town). So basically cut our rent to the min.

DP (now DH) and I houseshared with a friend instead of renting our own place. We only had a 6% deposit for our first flat (bought in 2014) so our interest rate was really high for the first couple of years; it dropped a lot after that as our LTV improved.

70+ hours at work

We managed to do it whilst renting, but we were both in full-time work, was pre-DC and we rented a tiny two-bed flat. Also had the benefit of nice landlords who didn't put the rent up at all in the four years we lived there (they put it up by £200 when we moved out!).

Worked hard, all the overtime we could and did without so nothing expensive, old cars and no holidays while we saved. Couldn't afford to carpet the house we bought except for what we salvaged from a skip.

Everyone will have different views on what constitues 'going without', I think.

Started saving when young, rented the crappiest flat that didn't even have heating that worked properly and spent £25 a week on food shopping for 2 years. DH could get paid overtime so did as much as possible and I had a day job and did a few shifts in a pub evenings/weekends.

I think the issue for all lot of people is that they have kids and then want to buy, and with kids they can't live cheaply enough to make it work.

Worked a second job in a bar during the evenings.

Lived with my parents and worked other jobs (bar work, and babysitting) as well as my full time job.
Very strict with saving / doing without (plus, of course when you are working in the evenings, you can't be spending anything).

Wait till someone dies and leaves you some money or you have a small lottery win. Or borrow from parents. Otherwise it’s pretty much impossible.

We’re saving at the moment, for us it’s achievable by DH recently getting a massive payrise, plus Natwest offering 5% deposit mortgages.

Husband was made redundant and we used that as a deposit.

Don’t know how else we could have done it.

Lived in a house share for 4 years rather than rent my own place and then pooled with (now) DH.

Saved every spare penny while renting for two years, bought in a cheap, not particularly desirable part of town. We saved enough for a 5% deposit, our parents then got together and agreed to match it so we had 10%, but we hadn’t known this was coming, it was a lovely surprise

We lived with my parents for a bit, it was literally the only way. We also both did all the overtime we could, which was made harder with a toddler.

It was so hard as my mum is very difficult. But it was so worth it in the end.

We ended up moving somewhere completely different as it was the only place we could afford a house instead of a flat. It worked out brilliantly as there were many others in the same boat so we've made lots of new friends.

3.5 years now and no regrets!

Waited for a wealthy relative to die. Sorry, I know that’s not much help.

Husband and I rented a room in a shared house in the same town we both worked. This meant we saved money on rent, utilities (as they were split between 6 people) and the cost of running a second car (I had to have a car for work as I often work off site). The rooms we rented were unfurnished, as they were cheaper, so we got the furniture we needed from freecycle/Gumtree. The discomfort of sharing bathrooms with strangers and not having a lounge or decent sized kitchen was all made totally worthwhile when we finally moved into our own place! We then continued to live in "shared accomodation" for another 3 years by renting the spare rooms to lodgers, until I got pregnant, which helped build our savings back up again and make mortgage overpayments.

Paid ourselves first every payday, so it was non negotiable that £X went into savings. Increased this with every payrise, even if that was just the government increasing the tax free allowance by a fiver a month.

Didn't go in for car finance, iPhones, sky, expensive haircuts, loads of nights out etc. Challenged every bill: switching energy suppliers, haggling with internet providers etc, switched bank accounts to bag £100 incentives when we could. All the little stuff that adds up.

Used all government help e.g help to buy ISA, no stamp duty.

DH had a great aunt who totally unexpectedly left him £5k which was a huge help I can't lie, we'd have managed without it but it was a nice boost, sorry

My husband and I lived in a rented Anex for three years , £500 a month including bills, I was earning 1,600 and he was a student nurse at the time getting very little each month. I managed to put £1000 a month away give or take whilst my husband paid for food and we rarely went out (but he was full time student and did placements in Yorkshire so we had no time anyway) before that I lived at home with my parents whilst he stopped over at weekends etc but we knew we wanted to buy a house together and we just put any money we could away, but I appreciate our rent was very cheap compared to other places . Managed to save around £30,000 in about 4 years , some of which paid for our wedding when we got married last Feb, brought the house in December 2018. It was worth all the starving and lack of date nights lol!

Oh and neither of us have a car which saved us a bit of money ! And no children at the time . Our lifestyle sounds like it was quite boring (which it was) but worth it in the end . Good luck x

Was born at a time that meant I was buying before prices went mad, and by living in a place where housing is cheap.
So. £60pw rent included all bills for a house share, and a 55k 2 bed mid terrace.

I couldn't buy that house now on the current starting salary for my job.

We moved abroad for 3 years to a country where we made crazy money with accommodation paid and tax free! Then we came home and bought outright. Not for everyone but it worked out amazingly for us! We were very lucky!!

Lived in the cheapest place I could find (houseshare). Put money into savings religiously each month. Was strict about how many treats/ luxuries I allowed myself.