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

Re the higher interest when someone gets only 5% deposit.
It is sometimes really worth it. It was in my case. I bought cheaper house, and when I compared spending on rent longer vs higher interest mortgage for 2 years, it actually worked out so much better to just get the mortgage and then get new deal in few years. I managed to get good price (couple of thousands but it makes bog difference on cheap house) so my equity rose quite well.
But I don't think it could work out for everyone so it depends on each case's circumstances.

Pure luck of our circumstances xxx our rent was only £650 (in Wilmslow so a nice area) and we basically did without any big luxuries for a couple of years, we also only needed to maintain one car between us because we lived in walking distance from our office (where we both work) our joint income at the time was also over £50k before tax and no children. We did it by 2013 aswell and houseprices and rent has absolutley soared locally since then. My Mum also agreed to be the guarantor for our mortgage and my FIL lent us £5k (which we managed to pay back within a year, and managed to remortgage after 2 years taking my Mum off as guarantor) these are all circumstances that make us lucky and I think people who managed to buy forget that sometimes.

I see people struggling much more now then we did only 7 years ago, so sending hugs, its a vicious cycle with ever raising rent. I hope house prices stop bloating and stay stagnant for a while so people's wages can catch up. Xxx I think a rent cap needs introducing too but don't see that happening.

In the meantime try checking out moneysaving expert to see if there's any tips there to shave anything off your outgoings especially things like CC debt. X

Bought my house well before the house prices went crazy. I was living at home, had a 'good' main job and worked in a hotel bar evenings and weekends. I bought it on my own as a single woman way before it was the norm.

Also we downsized our rent from a place that was £850 a month rent to £650 and it went down 2 council tax bands so that helped too.

Worked 2 jobs from when I was 15, saved most of my earnings. Kept doing that all the way through uni to post grad (didn't go out, batch cooked and froze our food for the month with my housemate who did the same). Bought our first house right after I finished uni as soon as I had my first job. I was young and committed to the cause of buying my own house. Took me 6 years to save on min wage jobs working back to back shifts (hubby didn't have anything to contribute at that time re:deposit). Obviously some of that time I was at home.

Now I have a family and I'm on house number 3...I have no idea how people start to save now. My sister is currently saving but I think it gets more difficult as you get older. Bascially I think it takes years of commitment and cutting corners financially as much as possible; for example my husband and I shared a car from when we were 18 for maybe 10 years, we hardly ate out, both don't drink, walked places where we could to avoid parking / petrol costs etc.

Just cutting down on 'luxuries' isn't enough, unless you've had a really extravagant lifestyle - it just isn't enough money for a deposit.
I only managed it by buying with a partner, but saving gradually over the years by living in houseshares. Eg typical houseshare at the time £350-450 pcm including utilities, while earning £1200-1600pcm in wages allowed for me to always put money aside, and still have enough to deal with extra expenses (I didn't buy until I was 34, I wasn't going to live all that time without ever having a holiday/going to a wedding etc)

I have a few friends who have bought in their twenties but that's because they got well paid jobs straight from uni, so were putting money aside before they had much in the way of responsibilities, had access to parents cars etc.

Borrowed 10k off family 😩

Unfortunately I had DC young so there was no chance of buying before they came along!! Met DH a few years ago, have now gone to uni to retrain, and rather than killing ourselves with trying to save quickly we have just made it part of our ten year plan. In terms of affordability we would struggle to get a mortgage while I'm studying anyway, so we have run figures and are putting x amount per year away so that in 10 years we will have enough for a decent family home. We are lucky in that we have found a pretty secure tenancy but with DC already here we can't scrimp as much as we would have done were it the two of us - I'd happily have eaten beans on toast and not bought new clothes for 4 years but with children in the mix there are expenses that are unavoidable.

A few years ago I never thought it would even be remotely feasible to consider buying so I'm proud that it's now part of our long term plans.

both of us worked full full time and took every over-time possible.

lived on potato soups lentil stews etc

very little spending on new clothes, usually ebay bargains

no holidays, no socialising, no going out.
to be honest we worked so may hours it would have been impossible to go out and drink anyway

Took a job which gave me free accommodation and then worked as much overtime as I could.
Spent as little as possible, I wrote down everything I spent to keep an eye on it.
Opened a savings account and put as much of my wages in there and didn't touch it.
Took about 5 years.

Worked abroad in my twenties and managed to save 10k despite living a fabulous life of travelling, eating out etc. Moved back to the uk and met DH immediately, fell pregnant and bought our first house within the first year back

I'm not recommending my way but letting you know you shouldn't feel bad about not having a deposit saved because many people buy a house in different ways.

I was renting and decided that I was fed up with my car that had no issues and would have ran well for another few years. Took out a bank loan and used most of it to buy a nice car. Decided it would be sensible to use the remaining £5k for a house!

I've scraped £2-3k together in the last few months making changes I should have done years ago such as less shopping and making my own lunch for work etc This will cover my survey, solicitor etc.

Borrowing £5k from relatives so with the loan I have £10k which is 5% deposit on a decent house with mortgage payments less than rent as I'm also using help to buy loan.

I don't recommend this but my whole life I've been better at paying debt than saving. I earn a decent salary, always pay bills on time but just never been a saver. I'll be happy once I have my house to just have that and work pension as my savings and carry on my quite frivolous life even knowing it's risky!

I worked a job with very unsocial hours, which was well paid taking into account unsociable hours enhancement pay and the fact that I worked most weekends so wasn't out spending it. I saved about £12k in a year, which was possible by living in a houseshare and not doing much else in honesty. I wasn't particularly saving for a house, I just knew I wanted a nest egg in case. I added to it over the years when I could, and also had to use some when I was short as i moved into a lower paid job which I enjoyed more. When I fell unexpectedly pregnant we decided to buy, and were fortunately in a position to. If I hadn't of had that we would not have been able to save a substantial amount whilst renting even though we earn a decent amount between us- it's a rubbish system.

We managed it by using money given at our wedding, and living in a council flat at the time which had a reasonable rent. We also got a foot in the door by shared ownership. That was 25 years ago though. It would be highly unlikely we'd have a council flat now, and we'd need a much higher deposit.

Lived in house shares for the whole of my twenties and then chose to settle in the NW and not the much more expensive Bristol where I was based for a few years. Saved enough by 30 for a 10% deposit on a good two bed flat.

Bought in 2012. We spent years focussing on our careers/maximising our incomes, then bought a little flat in a shabbier and much less trendy part of our London than all our friends were renting in. We had very basic holidays (UK camping), crap phones, no sky etc, no gym memberships. I only had one cheap haircut a year and no "grooming at all.

We were determined to buy pre kids too & a it paid off long term.

I worked a lot of jobs. 6am-8am cleaned a pub Mon-Sat (Sunday off), 9-5 day job, 6-11 pub bar job Wed to Sunday night, and Fri Sat nights 11-3 night club next door job - the chap that owned the night club used to pop into the pub as was friends with the landlord and tried to pach me full time, so ended up with a pay rise from the pub & a better rate at the club. Did all of that for best part of 2 years, had no time to socialise and waste money, got fed on the pub shifts so barely spent anything on food, had no car no expenses other than renting a shared room & did do a bit of sofa surfing for 4 months for free, no holidays, no treats, just save save save = masses saved as deposit. Changed day job to a better paid one with commission and dropped the cleaning job, but kept up the pub/bar work at weekends as both paid really good tips for a few years, and overpaid mortgage.

Obviously if you choose to have a family you cannot do this, it was a killer, I used to catch up sleep on Sunday morning.

I think the same as lots of others have said, the key is to earn more. When it comes to saving money there is only so far you can make it stretch regardless of all the money saving tips. Getting another job for just a few hours a week will allow all that money to be saved. Make sure you are taking advantage of the lifetime ISA where the government add 25% bonus if the conditions suit you.

One major thing that jumps out is your rent costs. Rent costs are crazy in my part of the country too and this is the biggest drain on my income. Is there any chance you can downsize or stay with friends/relatives? I appreciate this isn't possible for everyone.

We have 50k in a savings account and a joint annual salary of 230k before tax (138k after tax).

2 kids in a large 2 bed flat near good schools in zone 3 London but another baby on the way so we HAVE to move which means paying even more rent for somewhere bigger so saving becomes hard. We have no parental help in terms of buying, all of my friends who have bought have had around 100k from parents or lived at home for many years to save.

Childcare and rent are so extortionate for us that it’s taking a really long time to save enough. A small 3 bed around here is around 800k (1100 sq ft) for which the stamp duty alone will be 30k which is most of what we’ve saved 😭 on our salary we can get a maximum mortgage of about 900k because childcare takes out a pretty big chunk. Kids in state schools so we’re not paying fees.

The “big family homes” around here 4-5 beds are 1.5-2.5m... it’s just so ridiculous. We are high earners but there’s no hope of having one of those ever - although we have age on our side at least...

However, house prices are falling here and if the Tories go ahead with the mansion tax that was in the telegraph this morning then nobody around here will be able to afford it and the houses will fall dramatically in value. Mostly it’s retired accountants, solicitors, senior charity workers etc who bought their houses for next to nothing and are now sitting on massive pots of gold with 4 spare bedrooms.

@Rhayader your right that it's very hard to do without parental help or benefiting from house prices rises. I have some colleagues a bit older than me who have made 700k plus when moving up the ladder. The same is not true for new buyers because the first step is now so high.

@stopshoutingd

We are in a good position financially as well with great jobs (although awkwardly about half of DHs salary is bonus which doesn’t help) so how are people on average London salaries meant to do it if it’s hard for us. We must be in the top 5% on London earners....

My in-laws have a large 6/7 bedroom home in the countryside that is worth about 550 that they bought for around 120. It’s the stamp duty that gets me, and because we need a family home none of the government schemes to help first time buyers are any good for us. We can’t do LISAs because you can’t buy anything big enough for the max cut off.

The market seems overdue a correction that I assume will happen when the baby boomers die 🤷‍♀️ But then a lot of the new build market here is propped up by foreign investors too so that’s a bit of an unknown.

no luxuries (this meant not eating out, no takeaways, Diy haircuts), no holidays, postponing having DC until we managed to buy the first home. Did this for a number of years. was quite a committment.

And we bought in an area that was more affordable rather than the swanky overpriced hipster suburb we were originally hankering after.

This is a tale as old as time.
I worked two jobs to save a deposit and I'm old (ish)!

Lived in a tiny 2-room mountain cabin for a year that cost us peanuts in rent. Worked my socks off, didn’t go overseas on holiday just stayed in the US, saved. After a year we had the deposit we needed.

Rhayader you can buy due to the high income even if it's not exactly where you want. You can also stay longer in your 2 bed place, new baby or not and you can save more on that high income to get to a decent deposit quicker. You actually have lots of options. Unless you are older then saving before kids would have been better.

However due to your income, you still have a lot of options that others don't necessarily have.