To stick in the craw. Costs

[Violashift]

Yes I know a mortgage is my choice, my risk and I am lucky to have one but with the new rates when I remortgage that's going to be another £300.

Utility bills already doubled from last year.

That is nearly £500 we are down from last year as a family. This has a huge impact on our lifestyle. I am lucky we can just about scrape through. I know others are worse off and may lose their homes. I understand the war etc not Truss policies though.

It just sticks in the craw that I work a stressful job but can't afford any little luxuries. £500 is a lot. Money I can't spend on local businesses. All going on interest because of stupid announcements.

Just pisses me off when I think of the waste to families.

Nobody?

It’s shit for everyone :(

I think the rich will be ok, so not quite everyone. The moderately rich may have to cut back a bit, but they won't struggle to maintain a reasonable standard of living.

But it will be tough for anyone whose income is average or just above average. And the poor will absolutely fucked.

All going on interest because of stupid announcements

Interest rates were always going to go up though. They were already on the way up, they should/would have been put up if not for Covid. It was not sustainable to have such low interest rates for so long on a global scale. Every country in the world is on the same trajectory. The USA has far fewer issues with regards to energy and inflation, but are not up at base rate of 3.25%. Yes, it is hard, but unfortunately history tells us that everything is cyclical, something will always happen, and nothing is constant.

It was not sustainable to have such low interest rates for so long on a global scale

This! People were given mortgages they should never have been given with far too low interest rates.
Renters have their rents raised all the time, often by quite a lot and often having to move because they can’t afford it. Nobody cares renters lose their homes regularly because of this and move all the time.
How many are ‘moving home’ to something they can afford, which I’ve done many many times, and how many are actually losing a home completely and don’t have another?

You knew when you took the mortgage out that rates were at historic lies and were likely to go up, so you are being unreasonable to not have factored this in.

Too many people have overextended themselves on cheap credit over the last decade, it’s normal that this comes to an end at some point.

Too many people have overextended themselves on cheap credit over the last decade

not just this last decade, it’s an ongoing thing. Every time. The banks should be held more accountable, they’re the ones giving mortgages to people who can only just cover them. House prices are far too high and a much bigger percentage of our incomes then they used to be. Wages need to increase, and in the meantime when you get a mortgage, do not max yourself out.

The banks haven’t been giving mortgages to people who can only just afford them though, all mortgages for years now have been stress-tested against far higher rates than we currently have. They have also been requiring higher deposits and lending lower multiples if earnings than they used to.

all mortgages for years now have been stress-tested against far higher rates than we currently have

so why are so many saying they’ll lose their homes?

I can afford it. That's not the point in this thread. My mortgage is actually just on my income not husbands.

You're mad if you think this is just due to the war.

I can afford it. That's not the point in this thread. My mortgage is actually just on my income not husbands.

Gosh, you seem quite well off then, nothing to complain about really!

House prices are far too high and a much bigger percentage of our incomes then they used to be.

This^
And one of the factors keeping house prices high is interest rates being low. So people can afford to borrow more to pay the high house prices! Vicious circle.

When I bought my first house the cost of it was much lower ratio to my salary than would be now but the interest rate was 9%

I certainly don't.

And one of the factors keeping house prices high is interest rates being low. So people can afford to borrow more to pay the high house prices! Vicious circle.

yup. I just despair. I really do. It’s like people have no memory or something!! Why can people not see the obvious problems? We need more people able to buy their own homes. This cannot happen with things as they are now. House prices are ridiculous, and this isn’t just happening in the UK. It’s global. NZ has an even bigger issue with a lack of housing and high house prices, they have higher rates of homelessness than here and two income families living in their cars. We need an honest conversation in politics about this but they only do things to get voted in. They don’t ever care about long term effects on society. The UK has also got an issue with planning laws, they’re stupid and not fit for purpose, stuff like overage etc is just insanity.

Just pay the damn thing off as fast as possible that’s my advice to everybody, either fill your pension pot up so that you’re able to get rid of it the day you turn 58 with the tax free government sum or over pay it as much as possible.

Renters have their rents raised all the time, often by quite a lot and often having to move because they can’t afford it. Nobody cares renters lose their homes regularly because of this and move all the time.

Actually, @WahineToa , I'm always banging on about it! I work in welfare rights, and the gap between the amount the DWP will give people towards their rent and the actual amount of the rent has grown massively. Plus the benefit cap is crippling families, and hasn't risen for ages.

The lack of security for private tenants is a bloody disgrace in a civilised society, and means some tenants put up with all sorts of nonsense for fear of losing their home.

A little bit outing but this is a post from my local Facebook page look at the list of horrific proposed policies and the only thing they get in the knickers in a twist about is the potential building on the vast amounts of currently on used waste Greenbelt land.

It’s tough for most people OP.
Due to disability, we now rent. We were evicted two months ago and had to move to a smaller place for £200/mo more. The movers were £1000. Utility bills have more than doubled to £400/mo. The food shop is online (disability) and I have a easy shop where to book the delivery slot I put exact same items in the trolley to reserve it and then later go back to add/delete exactly what we need. These same items have gone from £65/week to £92/week. School lunches have gone up (not low enough income to qualify). DH would be eligible for a UC top up if he were not an immigrant who doesn’t yet have settled status…which by the way he should have gotten this past April but the application is sitting in a Home Office backlog.

So we are also trying to find around £450 to £600 a month more as well. I did get a grand total of £150 lump sum in aid from the government for being on PIP do that’s something. We haven’t used the heat yet, but will eventually need to as my medical condition can’t take much cold. I spend a lot of time in bed only getting up when the house is warm enough to do so. I am hoping we don’t get into too much debt.

But yes, it’s hard on most people to varying degrees.

We are having to find 5k before jan for son's Uni accomodation. His student loan is just about enough to live off yet we are not high earners and have younger kids to support too. he knows he will have to look for a job in his Uni town. But I am wondering how on earth parents manage to help their kids through Uni whilst they still have a ( rising) mortgage as well ? It is a massive cost that we hadn't really anticipated. When our eldest son went to uni a few years ago we paid around £400 a month for his accomodation for 3 years. We have never been in a position to save huge amounts since they were born to cover these costs. What are parents meant to do ? I am just relieved to not still have a mortgage to pay as this has floored us. We also have dd who wants to go to Uni next year but no way could we pay this twice so will have to encourage her to have a gap year or two.

The bankers have it pretty good, obviously they were struggling on annual bonuses capped at a paltry 200% of annual salary, so nice of the Tories to think of them and abolish the cap just in time for Christmas. Some of them must have been wondering how’d they’d possibly afford their annual NYC, Paris, Hong Kong and Dubai Christmas shopping trips and of course the chalet in Gstaad with personal butler, chef, ski guide and Christmas interior designer isn’t cheap.

As your home is paid off, you could think about taking out a home equity loan? Your DS/DD could take over a share of payments after graduation?

I don't think that this is as obvious as you think.

For one, lot's of people aren't experts in economics, house prices, long term interest rates, boom and bust etc etc. Some have been adults 10 years and didn't even really see the credit crunch happening.

For two, the whole house of cards was insane 15 years ago, and has been allowed to get twice as bad in the years since the credit crunch. As someone with a degree in economics and who works in property and who has believed property prices to have been too high for at least 15 to 18 years I was beginning to think that we would have rock bottom interest rates forever, for the simple fact that government and the BoE have had two choices - to prop up the whole house of cards forever using every single tood available or to watch half the country lose their houses when the inevitable mega crash to end all crashes happened. I think maybe what I forgot to factor in when I was bemoaning what an appalling PM Cameron was, was the fact that the tories are getting worse and they will be happy to see hundreds of thousands or millions of repossessions so long as it enables their donors to buy up private housing en mass to make the slave class even more slave-like.

Yep. I have been observing as well. They’ve been propping up the property prices (not values) for years now by keeping interest rates low. Rishi Sunak’s stamp duty holiday and the fact lockdown didn’t apply if you were selling or buying a home /moving was a steroid shot to limp the market through covid. Then they relaxed the affordability criteria for mortgages. The social care cap agreed so many would not lose their home to care fees to prevent (ever older) first time buyers from giving up on buying because why bother if you’re going to lose it all anyway. Then they put 95% LTV mortgages back on the market. Stamp duty holiday or reduction is potentially making a come back. Bankers bonuses uncapped…so all those investment bankers managing property portfolios and portfolios of mortgage debt are being encourage to take risks - one of the issues that caused the last crash.

We don’t quite have the same situation as the last crash but they’ve eroded many of the regulations that were put in place to prevent the causes of the last crash from happening again.