To think rent is so bloody unfair

[Tar19891]

My rent is 800 per month. A mortgage on the same value flat would be 450 per month. Not in London obviously. It’s not fair is it?

@rugbunch

If you don't have the deposit, you can't afford it.

And these days most need family help for the deposit whether it's direct or indirect through living at home. Many are disadvantaged through no fault of their own.

I don't know anyone who has been able to buy their first property in the last 10-15 years without having help from family or from inheritance.

I bought my first house in 1982, with a 100% mortgage that was 4 times my salary. I had to have a lodger to help cover the mortgage. Interest rates then shot up, and at one time I had 2 p/t jobs on top of my f/t one, just so I could pay the mortgage. Thankfully, I wasn't one of those people who remortgage every time there's a tenner's worth of equity in it, so when the value fell by around 40% at the end of the 80s, I wasn't in negative equity.

I don't think there's ever been a time in my adult life when buying was easy for those on modest incomes, but I don't think it's ever been as hard as it is now.

The housing system in the UK is broken. Other countries have rental markets that have controlled rents and secure tenancies, and most people don't buy until they're middle-aged and start to inherit from parents/grandparents. If we had reasonable rents and secure tenancies, I don't think so many people would be bothered about buying. I certainly wouldn't have bothered, but I got sick of having to move frequently when tenancies ended and LL's who wouldn't do repairs.

Honestly where does this nonsense come from?

If you have not had luck or good fortune in terms of family helping or been old enough to buy a house before 2005 then it’s down to hard work and sacrifice.

How will hard work & sacrifice mitigate wage stagnation? Or the change in lending rules pre 08?

Have you waited to have kids or made the decision to have fewer or none at all in order to own a home?

Have you seen the birth rate & age of FTPs?

Moved to a cheap area / run down place in order to get on the housing ladder?

No one has thought of this but is your job always transferable &/or is the commute affordable?

Have you done everything possible to maximise earning potential including choosing a partner carefully who will help you achieve your goal?

So marry for money?

What about striving for a better job / wage. Working 2 or 3 jobs.

Again how easy is this? Many people work overtime already in 1 job so where do you fit in the other two? The salaries need to be high to buy so you will be losing a fair whack in tax by earning more plus pension deductions, student loan deductions. Jobs that naturally lend themselves to casual working tend to be insecure.

Because I can tell you, some people have done most of these things just to get on the housing ladder and it’s taken many years and much sacrifice.

I'm a millennial & I do not know anyone who has managed it without some form of help. Statistically it's never been easy to buy a house but it's become much harder.

Again more fairness around the system (because it isn't working & the economy needs more investment & higher productivity) doesn't equal communism.

@MrsTerryPratchett

I agree.

Singapore built government-owned, functional housing which people buy for an affordable price, based partly on income. Fair, affordable, safe and decent housing which is essential for a happy life and a productive economy.

If you're a gazillionaire you can still buy something bonkers. But low- and middle- income people aren't scrabbling to afford to pay a LL's equity. To make them wealthy.

And it's not communist.

From someone who doesn’t appreciate how lucky they have been I guess or happy to live with uncertainty

I do agree it’s definitely harder to buy property than it’s ever been any point in history my stepmother literally wasn’t even working in 1980’s was given a mortgage because she had a decent deposit (and a job offer) can you imagine that now.

Again though something will have to give, if people didn’t keep propping up the Ponzi pyramid scheme by getting involved in all these help to buy government props then perhaps the price would come down for everyone but of course that would involve some collective decision-making on mass which we’re not very good at as was proven during the pandemic.

@LakieLady I actually don't know many who have moved up the ladder without help eg loan of SD.

Completely agree with you re controlled rents/security. Better legislation & more social housing would make renting more appealing.

Not all landlords are greedy, obviously there are awful ones out there too though.
Some may have inherited a house and decided to rent it out, others may have brought it as an investment for their own future. Some couples may have their own home each, and decide to move in together and rent their extra property out. There are many reasons why people become landlords.
Obviously they and estate agents have power I’ve rake much they can charge , but not all of them make loads of money out of it.
I’ve seen that channel 5 program,” Don't pay, we’ll take it away”. It could put me off ever renting a house to anyone.
Even renting to good friends can cause issues- what if they lose their jobs and can’t afford to pay you?
The fault lies with decades of governments not doing enough to help the situation. The lack of housing crises has been kicked into the long grass for too long.

I worry that this generation can’t buy because without first time buyers, everyone is stuck surely?

And now with Brexit, it’s hard for British people to move abroad to buy cheaper homes- but that’s another story.

The biggest issue is that property is now seen as an investment for so many

I’m a landlord myself so I know that I benefit from this but we should be taxed (and we can take off all sorts of costs for that tax) and landlords should be restricted on how many properties they have

We also have the issue of second homes and properties purchased by overseas investors (more so in cities)

I should add, before the crash of 2007/2008 it was easier to lend money for mortgages.
People were lent money that they couldn’t really pay back.

People could at one time, get loans to put down a deposit. You can’t do this anymore.

Banks became much tougher on what they would lend to property buyers- quite understandably.

120K for a flat in North London. Seems very cheap to me and when we had a 120K mortgage we paid nearly 800 PM.

@Tynetime

120K for a flat in North London. Seems very cheap to me and when we had a 120K mortgage we paid nearly 800 PM.

I remember looking in an estate agents window in a two bedroom flat in North London was 120 grand in 1998

Sorry read Not in London as Nirth London. Doh

I should add, before the crash of 2007/2008 it was easier to lend money for mortgages. People were lent money that they couldn’t really pay back.

One of my older colleagues had a 95% mortgage on her very small salary & borrowed the 5% deposit as a loan which sounds crazy now. Obviously it paid off because of equity gains (she bought in the 90s).

We also have the issue of second homes and properties purchased by overseas investors (more so in cities)

There should be much higher levies.

Absolutely that so many properties are empty or empty for the majority of the year when we have a housing crises is shameful

So may brown field sites in the UK. Closed down offices and factories. Even entire housing estate boarded up. They should be turned into suitable housing for people.

It’s been many years since I was last in that road but there was a housing estate right next to the north circular in London, that had all the houses boarded up. I don’t know if they are still there or not.

They need to create suitable homes, there’s enough space to do it, much of it is already built on.

@HRTQueen

So what if they are professionals anyone can loose their jobs. It’s foolish not to be insured and it’s not expensive

Many thanks for the useful advice @HRTQueen.

My mortgage broker wanted to ballpark £500 in child maintenance towards my mortgage.
I was not even talking to my ex about money at the time we were hardly speaking

Thankfully I ignored him and went for something that I could afford

It was so different then

^that was in 2006

No its crap OP, I rented for 10 years before getting a mortgage and rent made it very difficult to save for a deposit. When I finally made it onto the housing ladder the mortgage payments were less than rent and when I went onto a 5 year fixed deal I sighed a breathe of relief as rent shot up around me and I had that constant. With lower mortgage payments I could then save up a "shit goes wrong" fund for all the unexpected expenses (eg boiler).

Quite frankly I think there needs to be a rent cap, housing should not be a commodity and rental homes should be owned by the state. I have nothing against people having more than one house (my parents did after a grandparent past away and when my parents split up my Mum and I had somewhere to escape to) or if you need to rent out your home so you can rent elsewhere due to a job move etc. But personally I disagree with people buying a portfolio of homes purely to rent. It's just making money off people who can't afford to buy, but legislation need to be put in place to prevent it because its easy money once you can afford to do it.

I am very fortunate to buy when I did a few years ago. Something needs to be done to get house prices down to an attainable level.

@SwanBuster

“ So that my new tenant has an immaculate, fully functioning property they can call home.”

I am laughing my head off imagining the warm fuzzy feeling and sense of satisfaction you felt typing that sentence. Landlords really love to convince themselves they are the pinnacle of morality don’t they 😂

@SwanBuster. You really do have a thing about landlords, don’t you. They can’t all be monsters, they’re just running a business and like every business, it needs to make a profit to be viable. My neighbors are small landlords ( one house divided into flats that they rent to students). They’re excellent landlords from what I can gather and invest a lot in the property. One of their tenants caused a fire last summer being careless with candles during a party-then tried to deny it even though the Fire Service was literally holding up the evidence! Luckily no one was hurt and my neighbors had insurance.

So it’s not all black and white. Like any business, there are good and not so good players.

The entire point so many of us are making @Cameleongirl, is that providing homes shouldn’t be a business. There are plenty of ways to invest your money with a decent return without being a landlord, most of them a lot less hassle by the sound of it. It’s pure greed.

@HRTQueen

So bad luck anyone on an average wage in certain areas of the country can no longer buy. Stop moaning and get a better paid job.

Nurses and teachers maybe you should do a part time job to top up your wages or thought about studying for a better paid job

Is that they answer to those who can’t get on the property ladder ?

Unfortunately it is....I’m a nurse but back in 89 when we got our first mortgage my partner got a 2nd job working weekends in order to be approved for a mortgage ( quit the job when we moved in) ....appreciate not everyone can do that though.....but many could

@Silverswirl

If you don’t want to live in a communist society (which is has proved a disaster time and time again) then some people will own more and some will own less. People buy houses via hard work, sacrifice or sheer luck and good fortune. If you have not had luck or good fortune in terms of family helping or been old enough to buy a house before 2005 then it’s down to hard work and sacrifice. Ask yourself. What have YOU personally done to buy a home since turning an adult? Have you waited to have kids or made the decision to have fewer or none at all in order to own a home? Moved to a cheap area / run down place in order to get on the housing ladder? Have you done everything possible to maximise earning potential including choosing a partner carefully who will help you achieve your goal? What about striving for a better job / wage. Working 2 or 3 jobs. Because I can tell you, some people have done most of these things just to get on the housing ladder and it’s taken many years and much sacrifice. Sure for some it’s easy. They get given a house by mum and dad. But that’s how a capitalist society works. Some have more, some less. So many are not thinking longer term. You may not have had the bank of mum and dad but what have you been doing / are you doing to create the bank of mum and dad for your own kids? The other option is everything you own would be taken and shared amongst everyone - never works.

Good grief. It’s not about envy or entitlement. It’s about what enables society to improve year on year. It should be really obvious that good affordable housing should be available to everyone in 2022.

When interest rates go up to 15% again and homeowners are complaining they can’t afford it I’ll be sure to suggest they move to China if they don’t like capitalism.

@rugbunch

Honestly where does this nonsense come from?

If you have not had luck or good fortune in terms of family helping or been old enough to buy a house before 2005 then it’s down to hard work and sacrifice.

How will hard work & sacrifice mitigate wage stagnation? Or the change in lending rules pre 08?

Have you waited to have kids or made the decision to have fewer or none at all in order to own a home?

Have you seen the birth rate & age of FTPs?

Moved to a cheap area / run down place in order to get on the housing ladder?

No one has thought of this but is your job always transferable &/or is the commute affordable?

Have you done everything possible to maximise earning potential including choosing a partner carefully who will help you achieve your goal?

So marry for money?

What about striving for a better job / wage. Working 2 or 3 jobs.

Again how easy is this? Many people work overtime already in 1 job so where do you fit in the other two? The salaries need to be high to buy so you will be losing a fair whack in tax by earning more plus pension deductions, student loan deductions. Jobs that naturally lend themselves to casual working tend to be insecure.

Because I can tell you, some people have done most of these things just to get on the housing ladder and it’s taken many years and much sacrifice.

I'm a millennial & I do not know anyone who has managed it without some form of help. Statistically it's never been easy to buy a house but it's become much harder.

Again more fairness around the system (because it isn't working & the economy needs more investment & higher productivity) doesn't equal communism.

I do agree it’s harder to buy now and yes the cost of houses in relation to wages has changed. However. In the 50’s / 60’s many people lived with very little. There is a huge expectation now around what we own/ where we visit/ what we spend money on. Even in these tough times whilst of course there are people on the bread line, expectations consumerism has increased drastically in the past 30 / 40 years. When my parents were kids, other children literally had no shoes to come to school in. This wasn’t just a small minority. They had to be given school plimsoles. My mother had a tin bath hanging on the wall that the whole family used one lot of bath water for a bath in the kitchen once a week. No indoor bathroom. My mum also shared housing with other families. Might be their own family ie cousins or maybe not. Many of her friends didn’t own their own homes or if they did they were packed out with occupants and no indoor bathroom. Clothes were stitched up and handed down. Hardly ever bought new. Food was very simple. There were no day trips except once a year to the beach. Weekends were spent in the house or visiting friends or family. What I am saying is the expectation of buying stuff for everyone has exponentially increased. It’s now just ingrained and the bar has been raised so high. Yes it’s not fair in some cases that someone has 4 houses and another family has none. But I can almost guarantee you that is the family who had none were to wake up to find they had the 4 houses, nothing would change and they would be raking in the rent like anyone else. Get married for money- . I don’t mean you don’t love someone - I mean pick your partner wisely. Of course you can choose not to do that but then you may live in poverty forever. Personally I could never fall in love with someone who didn’t work hard or had dreams and aspirations to better themselves and wasn’t actively working to make them a reality. Things don’t always work out that way of course due to illness and many factors, but you can start off on the right foot.