To think no one has a right to make money off their house

[Laughingstock1991]

The general consensus among financial commentators this week has been that the housing market has turned. Interest rates are still going up and are unlikely to come down for a few years. The low interest rate financial experiment that has been in place since 2008 has ended and it’s unwinding is going to be painful. The housing boom was based on cheap credit.

My mortgage is likely to go up about 400 a month. Lots of commentators reckon we are in for a big fall in house prices. Good thread here:
https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/1668987423643119623

What pisses me off is the absolute assumption made by some people (like my friend today) that the government should use public money to bail out mortgage holders. Most people were stress tested on their mortgage- I was- and yes it’s going to be tough but do I think public Money (renters money) should be used to bail out mortgage holders- fuck no! The Lib Dems have raised this also today.

House equity is unearned wealth. There are no guarantees. We have been through a boom and now it’s going bust. Hopefully sanity will return & housing will be seen as a home again- not an investment. Its not a ‘market’.

And I say all of this as a homeowner who is going to have to pay a lot more. I want everyone to be able to afford a decent home- not just those with money.

I don’t think that’s unreasonable!

I say this not to brag, but to demonstrate if I can do it, anybody can it isnt complicated.

You really don't see how things have changed?

property isn't really cheap anymore & lending rules are much tighter. Benefits are less generous too.

I did what every other ftb did and worked two jobs.

I didn't do this nor did my parents.

Things have not changed exponentially since 2015. I bought the first house in 2019. So took me 4 years. And we had a few bumps in the road along the way I probably could’ve bought in 2017. With a much larger deposit, but something else went wrong that diverted funds to fighting a custody case with my ex.

With nothing. Having lived abroad and rented for many many years.

But I thought you were a FTB in 2001?

Nowhere did I say, my 4 DC were young at the time

You didn't, I just assumed because you were comparing your situation to others so I just assumed you were young yourself.

I'm so confused

"back in 2001 when I was a first time buyer, I did what every other ftb did and worked two jobs."

You wrote the above....

Yes i was.

That house was long gone, sold when i moved abroad.

Nowhere did I say, my 4 DC were young at the time, although I have young DC now.

This doesn't make sense either. Your 4 dc aren't young but you have young dc

@SaveMeFromMyBoobs But its all the young families that have worked hard and have mortgages that would have to sell and rent

What about all the young families forced to live in an insecure rental market now? Do they not count or is it only ‘special’ homeowners that should be bailed out?

And PLEASE can we get over this fucking shitty idea that it’s only homeowners that are ‘hardworking’ too- the narrative is really dreadful

I’ve picked up a couple of extra since 2015 I’m not that old 😏

But didn't you come here with 4 DC and 4 suitcases, upthread you had 4 DC but 2 extra = 6. Maybe you are forgetting how many, like you forgot your first house in 2001

If a private renter gets kicked out then the state has to find council housing - there isn’t any!

If a home owner can’t pay the mortgage, they are unlikely to be able pay, often higher, private rent and even if they are able to downsize, then their credit history will be shot if in negative equity and no one will rent to them, so the state has to find them council housing - there isn’t any!

Wouldn't it be better to keep the latter out of the social housing crisis? It’s cheaper to subsidise a little if necessary.

This is so sad..if you are so enterprising, if there wasn't a housing crisis and you didn't make home ownership/owning nicer homes your focus, you would probably be in London on 100k each today and yes you would own a house because even in London, most households on £200k combined would own a house. And you would have a decent lifestyle too esp with only one child. even on £130k per annum, we have 8 holidays per year and overpay £1250 every month into the mortgage.

I did live with family for 3 years to save a deposit but DH's family live in London so I guess I only really sacrificed for 3 years. Plenty of people I know live with family for a while before renting so I don't feel like I sacrificed more than them

Oh dear, I’m sorry you can’t keep up I forgot most people’s maths isn’t their strongest point. Probably why some struggle to buy houses.

If private landlords didn't exist there would still be the same amount of houses.

Landlords don't create houses out of thin air.

BTL has contributed to the housing boom. Without landlords, properties would have been cheaper and ftb could have paid less or even not ended up in rented accommodation.

I see how a lot of older people live as part of my job . There are literally huge numbers of older people sitting on large amounts of wealth, living in large 4 bedroom homes mortgage free and many owning second properties. I cannot believe that if these people's kids were at risk of losing their home, that they would not help. I know that if we lost our home my dad would take us in ( living alone in a modest 3 bed semi ). Also many older people , as you say have extremely decent private pensions. As part of my job I need to ask people about savings and many roll off figures like 150-180K savings as if it is the norm !
Whilst we could see many number homeless if their homes get repossessed I think for many parents will step in and help. Of course there are people whose parents wouldn't or couldn't help but there are an awful lot who can and will in a crisis.

Of course the Government shouldn't help to pay anyone's mortgage! The mortgage holder must negotiate with the lender to see how the loan can be serviced. If it simply can't then I'm afraid repossession it is.

But I totally disagree that no-one should profit from home ownership. That's hiw the housing ladder works. Without equity most people would be stuck in flats or too small houses unable to move on and newbies would be unable to get onto the ladder.

I didn't ask them to share that detail. I don't care for the detail.
I'm just saying, my experience of benefits would not allow for saving at all - let alone enough to buy a house. Maybe other benefits are different, but I've not come across one.

It doesn’t work like that. Houses were sold to landlords because others didn’t buy them when they were cheap! Lots of these houses were not great. Landlords did not create the housing issues. They responded to it. If the government had built houses, none of this would have happened! Blame governments. All of them .

'Anywhere else in the world', really, not anywhere? How naive but if that's your opinion I'm sure you have plenty of corroborated evidence to back it up.

Of course all the landlords on here are going to argue that they are providing some kind of social good.

They aren’t. BTL has definitely contributed to the housing mess, as has second home ownership. Both need to be even more heavily regulated.

Which will only get more insecure if the housing market crashes. Land lords buy up the cheap houses again, which will be the ones those young families have had to vacate, and the young families already renting will be competing with the newly homeless families that used to own them houses.

People renting now are renting because they cannot afford to buy. We're in a cost of living crisis. These people are already struggling with high rents and everything is getting more expensive. There isn't social housing for them. They won't suddenly be able to magic up a deposit for a house just because houses got cheaper. The people who will have money are the land lords who rent out their houses mortgage free. That's who all the cheaper houses will go to, with no incentive to sell them on to families and lose that income.

To say we haven’t earnt this is not true. We have 60% equity. We sacrificed a decade of our younger years. We didn’t do the London fun, nor the travelling, nor the pubs because when we finished our day jobs we were either working on our business work or renovating houses.

I have similar equity but still did the London fun, travelling, worked one job etc. Does that mean you deserve your equity more?

You bang on about how you just want to pass your house to your kids. Well that's what I'm doing, just in a different way to you.

What's wrong with just passing on one house?

I also thought it was more tax efficient to gift the main property to dc.