Just as the title saids really. I’m sure there are, but how hard it is?
I’m 24 and single, no kids. Currently rent a flat at £450 a month. I earn 20k a year but salary is roughly around 17k after deductions so not high I know. I take home around £1425 a month plus mileage costs and expenses as I do a lot of driving for work.
I would say I’m good with money and budgeting and don’t spend a lot on luxuries but with rent and bills it’s hard to put money away. I have savings but not a lot (around 2k). I also have an isa account which currently has £100 in 😂 I try to put a bit in every month.
Normally once all my rent and bills are paid which includes the basics such as council tax, water rates (I get single persons discount on both of these), home insurance, car tax plus car finance (I needed a decent car for work and had to get rid of my older cheap one due to an oil leak that would have cost an arm and a leg to fix). My little luxuries are amazon prime and iTunes which come to around £18 a month. I paid my phone off last year so one less bill to worry about. After food (I shop in Aldi and Lidl), gas, electric and petrol I would say I probably have around £250-350 disposable income so again not a lot in the grand scheme of things.
I have rented for the last 4 years and as much as I love my flat I just can’t imagine renting forever. I feel like I’m just throwing money away by paying someone else’s mortgage off, although I appreciate this is the only option for many people. I was interested to see if my landlord would ever sell to me (another conversation to be had) as it’s a great flat and I’d gladly stay here, but even if I were to ask it would probably be many years down the line once I’d had a decent deposit saved up.
I would say house prices around here vary. (Not an expensive area to live in but not cheap either. It’s a lovely small village not far from the city centre). There’s a new build 2 bed apartment just down the road for 110k as where my landlord bought my flat off the council for only 69k so as I said prices vary massively.
I always think I might meet someone a few years down the line and things would obviously be a lot easier financially, especially with getting a mortgage but that could be years away and I’ve always been quite an independent person and I’m quite proud of all the things I’ve been able to achieve without a man in my life.
So, after rambling on (thank you if you’ve got this far) please could you share your experiences with me? If you did manage to do it how long did it take you? Did you have to move away to a cheaper area to be able to afford it etc? Thank you 😊