To ask how you made the decision between better house or better lifestyle?

[fortunatelynot]

I am interested how people have made the choice between climbing up the housing ladder against NOT having as much money for other things.

I ask because I earn pretty well and have a mortgage on my terraced house but quite a bit of equity. If I carry on paying what I am paying which is about a fifth of my monthly salary, I will clear my mortgage in ten years in my mid fifties. Odds are, I will overpay and clear it more quickly.

I like my house a lot but, in an ideal world would like two bathrooms instead of one and a semi or detached. Moving up to this would obviously make my mortgage bigger and would therefore mean bigger payments or a longer term.

So, I am wondering…. If you have made this choice, what did you go for? Have you regretted not moving up the ladder or regretted actually doing it? If so, why?

I am genuinely stuck regarding making this choice and I know that everyone has different preferences but would be interested to hear different perspectives.

Depends what your priorities are and what makes you happy, we have a 1930’s three bed semi, so not huge, but more than fine for us two, mortgage is only £600 a month and we earn £120k, but we like nice exotic holidays, weekends away and eating out, I’m not materialistic at all, I prefer experiences, so we are going to Australia next year for three weeks, we wouldn’t be able to do this if we bought the “next house up”, which would be a four bed, it would probably double our mortgage payments with the higher interest. So I’m happy with the small cheaper house for now, will probably change my mind when we have kids and need more space.

Hi OP I've been in the same position and this year took some action with our house! Like some other pps, to upsize to a house worth moving to would add another £150k+ at least to the mortgage so I thought about all the things I liked about those other houses and made some modifications to our house.

I had glass doors installed between the ĺounge and dining room as I wanted to feel we had a separate kitchen diner and bought one of those american diner seating seats for the dining area so I had a comfy seat to work at as office is a small room and sometimes want some space from hubby (we wfh together).

Had the house redecorated and had nice wooden doors installed throughout. House feels like an upscaled version of what we had before and separating the lounge and kitchen diner with the glass doors has given us more space and what feels like another room really! I'm happy to stay in this house now for years. We can manage the mortgage and can afford to enjoy life here.

It's needs vs wants really. DH and I started looking around a couple of years ago at the bigger house which would have added up to £100k to our mortgage. We're mid 40s with 2 DC. That would have got us a pretty lovely 'status' home in our area. But we came to the conclusion that our 4 bed detached was everything we needed. We built a garden office to give us the extra study space. Don't regret it at all. We've cut back on a lot in recent years as we move away from caring about 'keeping up with the Jones' which is quite prevalent where we live but also very liberating to choose not to buy into.

The jump up from our house to a bigger house would be ridiculously huge, so we are staying put. I live in an area I love in a former council house with a garden and 3 double bedrooms. To get 4 bedrooms and a garden in the same area, I'd be looking at well over double and quite possibly triple the market value of my current house. And while our house is a bit of a squeeze for 4 people, it would be very comfortable in the future for just the two of us.

Better lifestyle. With the interest rate rises and people reporting mortgage increases of £500+ a month , I am more confident than ever that we made the right decision.

Always had a small house, never upgraded. Mortgage-free since age 40, lots of good holidays, theatre trips etc, able to retire before 60, decent investments to cushion old age. Never regretted it - a house is just a house, but a combination of great experiences and freedom from major financial worries is priceless.

We earned well enough but wanted holidays and no money worries and wanted to retire early as well. So apart from the two years due to covid we have had fab holidays plus lots of days out, lunches and dinners out.

You can never get time back plus I can only be in one room at a time, So we have remained in a nice three bed semi on a really lovely road p, there is a premium to buy on this road. My friend lives in the kind of house we could have moved to and we did consider this very house about 12 years ago, half an acre garden and 4 beds. She had a holiday recently, first one since 2015. That one extra bedroom plus detached, the costs were huge.

We like travelling and nice restaurants so we chose not to upgrade our house and instead paid off the mortgage. Every time a friend mentions their huge mortgage payment we know we made the right choice for us.

We’ve stayed in a terrace in order to have more disposable income. It was an easy decision for us, we enjoy going out, having more money for our children-DD’s now at uni and we’re able to help her financially.

I want to downsize to somewhere really small in a few years, tbh.

I ponder this fairly regularly OP. I'm very lucky and have paid off my mortgage, but I also live in a two-up two-down Victorian terrace.

I could afford a nice semi or a town house, with maybe 4 bedrooms. But then I would have to commit £1000 a month and 25 years to the mortgage. In my little house I can afford a cleaner, help in the garden, a 4 day a week job, a nice gym membership and plenty of holidays, and still afford to save.

Maybe if I get a big pay rise then it'll be worth it but for now I have concluded I just need to stop buying more things and stick with the smaller house. There's no real need for more room, and my desire for more room doesn't outweigh the enjoyment I get from all the other things.

I was in the same position as you and got the attic converted for an extra sitting room/office space. Maybe something you could consider?

This is exactly it. It depends on your lifestyle.

There’s no right or wrong answer: it’s whatever would make you happy. I am mortgage free in my late 40s and can travel however much I want: but I do really miss having a large house sometimes!!! It is a major status symbol and I don’t have that and sometimes it annoys me. I can’t have friends over because my house is really small indeed.

People often ask me if I’m going to move (no) but also say”oh gosh you are always on holiday!” (True)

I found it hard to chose but ultimately chose a stress-free life of options rather than a nicer house!

@Whalewatchers, it started off as a 2 up 2down but we extended it to give us a third bedroom, a downstairs loo and a proper kitchen/dinner, so we've already reached the maximum space. We were refused planning permission for a dormer window and loft conversion.

I moved to a cheaper area once both mine were at uni so I get big house and nice lifestyle.

Middle of nowhere, mind.

I'm the same as the OP: mid-terraced house with a mortgage of ~£650 a month. We've been living in this house for 15 years. It's on a main road in a deprived area in a town with a bit of a crap reputation.

I've toyed with moving but haven't gone further than wistfully browsing Rightmove for lovely houses in leafy areas near my family. Reasons so far for not moving:

• The DC (13, 11) are settled in local schools, clubs and teams with friends they've known since nursery.
• We have good neighbours and a nice social network, including the volunteer group DH set up from scratch.
• The slightly nicer areas of our town would be a PITA for the DC's schools.
• If we did move, I'd want to be closer to my family who live in a nicer town. I don't want to throw away equity for the sake of a temporary move to a nicer house in our current town.
• Moving to my family's town would add an hour onto my 45 minute commute and I don't fancy driving for 4 hours a day just to get to work.
• The houses I'm looking at would mean mortgage payments of about £2000 a month. TBH I like spending that money on nice holidays, weekends away and the DC's expensive hobbies.

If we haven't moved by the time the DC finish school then we will as soon as that happens.

We are having this exact predicament too right now and we can’t decide either. New house looks to be about £700 per month more which on paper we can afford. This means we’d be detached rather than terraced, have three bedrooms instead of two, more bathrooms etc and I just can’t decide if it’s worth it. I could pay my mortgage off tomorrow if I wanted to (not that impressive it’s under £20k remaining) but I’ve lived in a house that’s too small for many years now and I honestly would value the space.

Covid and the crazy market have meant it’s taken us a little longer to get to the stage of even having this option than we’d have like and there is a little bit of me that tells me we missed the boat and should just stay where we are. But on the other hand I don’t want to look back and regret settling for a house that doesn’t fit our needs. Yes it’s nice to have an extra holiday or two per year but you’re in your home all of the other weeks of the year so it is important. Some people would say the opposite though and would rather have the extra holidays. I don’t think I’m that person. I’m very much a home body. Obviously having the multiple holidays and the house would be lovely but unrealistic for us.

Currently we do ‘waste’ a lot of money just because we can. Maybe for us paying a higher mortgage and having more to show for it in the end wouldn’t be a bad thing!

In some cases people are maybe talking about moving from a perfectly adequate house up to the next natural rung on the ladder but in my case my house is definitely inadequate so we’d be compromising mental health even by staying here. It depends how bad the current house is is what I’m trying to say I think!

This, 100%

I am happy in my modestly sized home in a central location. I like to have the time and money to go out and do things. I don’t want to hang round the house all that much.

I know other people who love spending time at home - gardening, fixing the place up, entertaining people in their homes. They are better suited to a bigger place with a garden that’s further out.

(Also, trying to get my husband to do his share of the modest amount of DIY type stuff and balcony gardening that our flat requires, is like pulling teeth, and I’m not prepared to bloody do it all by myself. So we’re better suited to a smallish place where very little needs doing).

In my fantasies at least, home is a small cosy space whence I sally forth on adventures, so I'd choose travel over home costs. I do still agree that your home is part of your lifestyle, and for me that's location, not size. I live in a rather shabby flat, but everywhere I want is in walking distance and it feels very safe. Big or small, I don't really care.

For my next move, dd will have left school which frees me up location-wise and I want to move to a cheaper place. I do want it to be a small house (freehold) rather than a flat (leasehold) as the constant negotiating with the other flat-owners in my building is maddening.

Thank you so much for all of your experiences/perspectives. I know that ultimately, it comes down to individual choices and a very close consideration of all the boring things in life of mortgage costs/financial planning etc.

During my twenties I was in a long term relationship and we had a mortgage. We split in my early thirties and for a couple of years (as our house took so long to sell), I rented and things were quite unstable house wise for me.

I was then able to buy my own house in my mid thirties (where I still live now) and it is a nice house and it was so nice to have my own house and feel more stable. I suppose now, ten years later and earning more, I wonder whether to upgrade a bit as it just feels like the next stage of my life (if that makes sense). I do have a partner who lives with me (but it is my house!!) and my adult son may return after uni so it is not just a case of me wanting to rattle around in a big house.

However......so much uncertainly with mortgage rates and potentially my mortgage where I am could be paid off within a relatively short space of time. I hate grown up decisions.

I am ten years down the road after choosing ‘lifestyle’ and have absolutely no regrets, but I would say you need to be clear about what you want to achieve from it.

It enabled me to start the business I had always wanted, and survive on the initially lower income that entailed in the first few years. My smaller home is cheaper to run and easier to maintain, freeing up budget and time for more fun things. It has also forced me to curate my possessions more ruthlessly, cutting clutter and making smarter design decisions for making best use of limited space.

You have to decide where your priorities lie. For some people home is just a base and they absolutely thrive on going out and socialising, holidays etc. for others they are home bodies and don’t care about travel or eating out.

Decide what your priorities are make the decision from there. Personally I would like more space, but then more space equals more cleaning and maintenance- which I HATE.

No it doesn't. What if you have shitty neighbours? Unless you have acres of land (sometimes even then).
Small semi here and plenty of spare cash for fun. We moved here 26 years ago because it's all we could afford, but then never traded up. It's close to town centre and station and all the neighbours are ace
Winner.