To think people with an average mortgage are still far better off than their renting counterparts

[Theinventoroftoasterstrudel]

I met with a friend today who was moaning about having sorted their remortgage this week and how their payments have increased by £250 a month due to interest rises. She's now paying £1000 for their 3 bed semi and I do fully appreciate how stressful knowing this remortgage was due has been for them this past year and how painful suddenly paying so much more is. I'm not in any way trying to minimise that for my friend or others with a mortgage in this position.

However, I rent and we live in a very similar property in a similar area to her which I had been paying over £1100 for for the past 2 years and a few months ago this increased to £1250. When we were told about the increase we looked to see if there was anything we could possibly find for cheaper and everything comparable was actually closer to the £1400 mark.

I feel like the news has covered the impact interest rises are having on home owners virtually every day since the mini budget last September but renter's have only had a cursory 'and rents will increase due to landlords passing on their increases' at the end of the odd story. And with zero acknowledgement that rents were already so much higher than mortgages anyway and still are. It's not like renting has suddenly become the better option; it's still utterly impossible!

Am I being unreasonable to think there needs to be more outrage and support for renters and not just those needing to remortgage.

Is the new boiler gold plated? We had a top of the range boiler fitted last year, along with replacement of 14 radiators and it cost us a touch over £8k. The boiler’s guaranteed for 10 years with free servicing for the first five. We’ve never spent £5k a year on maintenance.

🙄

The only way we could afford to buy our first home was using the government help to buy scheme. Which they should have called “help to get yourself in crippling debt that you actually can’t afford”. So our deposit was by much at all. And as the help to buy scheme had to be a new build that’s what we bought so we paid over the odds and like all new builds the house lost value initially.

No it isn’t, and I’m not sure exactly how you could come up with any sort of figure without knowing the term? - it’s a 185k repayment mortgage. Remortgaged last month with Halifax. Rate is 4.29%.

You missed my other post explaining the cost. It had to be relocated to meet current building regs also.

Well let's face it most people with a mortgage have the option to sell up and rent if they want. Most renters do not have the same level of choice.

Not when you’re in negative equity!

I’m in this position too but without the baby and instead 3 tweens teens. The rent I pay £1200 is cheap (yeah right) compared to what everything else is now here , £1800 for 3 bedroom and £1500 for 2 bedroom.
sucks

So did ours. It’s not even in the house any more, it was moved to the garage.

His was moved to the loft which involved reinforcing the floor. I don’t know the full ins and outs of what had to be done but I know he was horrified at the price and couldn’t understand why it couldn’t go back in the bedroom it had been in for 15 years.

I know that a lot of people on here are very keen to give costs which may or may not arise annually when owning a house (I certainly hope that I won't have to deal with leaks every year), but there are some considerable advantages to owning that no amount of money saving by renting can make up for:

• the security: I can own and never have to worry about being kicked out at 2 months' notice again for whatever reason someone else decides. Each house move has cost me the best part of £1000, and there were times where this happened every year.

• being allowed to maintain the house. Yes, that is a priviledge. I no longer have to ask whether that fuse box from the 1960s can be updated, I can decide it will be.

• being allowed to choose my own timeline for maintenance. I no longer have to worry about having to be in the house at 11am on days I'm working (I can't take days off outside of my scheduled ones). If I decide that the gutter can wait another month before clearing is needed I can make it so. If I cannot be arsed to cut the grass for 3 weeks then that's my priviledge, because I don't have to follow a stupid contract where everything has to be perfect for inspection.

• being allowed to decorate. I fucking hate magnolia with a passion. One of my walls has about 30 nails stuck in it because I like the pictures and decorations I have hung there and I didn't need to get a knock by knock permission to do so.

Nothing can convince me that the extra money I am spending on the mortgage and maintenance (yes, I pay more than I did for a less desirable house, all in) is not worth the freedom and security that comes with owning a house. And, ultimately, the money in this piggy bank made of bricks and concrete.

Yet if the house stood empty you would still need to pay council tax, standing charges for utilities and also insurance at a minimum. That’s part of being a home owner. Too many attitudes that landlords are going Tennent’s a ‘favour’ by up keeping their OWN property, the majority of which would need to be paid wether there were tenants in or not!

Yes.

and as a home owner I’m unlikely to come home to a ‘you need to leave in 8 weeks’ letter just like that and totally out of my control.

Issues with finding a home, changing sch/work if needing to relocate.

so many ppl in hotels moving every few days.

I’m a home owner, things are a bit tight but I’m a bit disappointed by some of the tone deaf responses here.

https://www.romfordrecorder.co.uk/news/23484609.havering-council-keeps-homeless-family-hotels-months/

Wow!! Someone who is actually in the real world, speaking sense!!! Thank god, sadly so many don’t have your attitude

I don’t know the full ins and outs of what had to be done

No shit.

Given that’s below the base rate yes that a low rate, and only available as you have a large deposit of 25% ! And I’d guess it’s a long fixed rate so a bit of a gamble. 35 year terms aren’t available to many people due to their age either

Landlords have to pay their letting agent, service fees for the building, common repairs , ground rent, insurances, gas safety checks, boiler repairs as well as servicing, landlord registration, EICR, LRA, PAT. That’s on top of any repairs that are needed, redecoration between tenancies, routine maintenance and new flooring and kitchen and bathroom as required.

Your landlords mortgage will have gone up too , it’s just that their rates are higher for rented properties than for home owners. Oh and even higher if they are a limited company or have more than 6 properties.

So yes these are “ genuine essential costs “ .

It’s very easy to underestimate the costs of owning a property.

@TUCKINGFYP0 but I wasn't comparing renting with being a landlord, I was comparing renting to having a mortgage on your own home that you actually live in yourself. Being a landlord is about making money, of course it's whole different ballgame.

25% is not a large amount of equity, we not have such high equity because we bought a property nearly £300k less than what we could have. We are living below our means intentionally.

A long fixed rate is the exact opposite of a gamble - we have security that our monthly payments won’t go up for a long time. A short fixed rate is a gamble.

It’s not a 35 year term either, but we are also not exactly ridiculously young homeowners. We are mid 30s.

YANBU.

I'm very lucky, not a homeowner but I have a housing association property. So I have a home for life, I can decorate it how I want and my rent is subsidised.

I really feel for private renters in this current climate.

@TUCKINGFYP0
Yes there are additional costs, isn’t the rent normally high enough to cover these asset maintenance costs?

Overall, is your point that landlords have it worse than renters (and/or residential homeowners?)

Yes. At least with a mortgage it's your own when it's paid, even if it's a struggle at times. I feel for renters and young families who can't get on the ladder.

Personally, I’m glad I’m not renting now. Where we live, rents and mortgage payments are not massively disproportionate. Our rent was similar to our mortgage. However, we have been really fortunate in that we haven’t had any big expenses since owning our home; therefore we can view our mortgage payments to date as money in the bank; whereas if we had been renting, that would be lost.

Had we not bought when we did (with a very small deposit!) then we would probably still be renting, as we had an unplanned pregnancy 6 months after buying.

I'm not sure that it needs to be a competition. It's shit for renters AND mortgage holders.

It's not so much about whether one of these groups has been more screwed over than the other - it's more the fact that certain generations have been screwed over.

Honestly? It has always been the same. In 1992 we bought, although we had almost no money. Mainly because our rent was £350 pcm and our mortgage was £250 pcm.