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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask what your mortgage debt is proportion to your assets

76 replies

Bearlionfalcon · 09/09/2025 15:14

For example our ratio is 3.5 assets to 1 debt.
ie. We own a house worth 700k but we have 200k mortgage debt left to pay off.

Our mortgage cost is currently about 25-30 per cent of our income. Expected to rise when we renew our mortgage but thankfully we have another year.

I think this is a reasonably fortunate financial position to be in, my DH thinks we have a mountain of debt and we’re about to be in terrible trouble when rates rise etc so should put all our money/ efforts/ savings into reducing that debt.

Who is right??!

YANBU - me
YABU - DH

OP posts:
ScholesPanda · 09/09/2025 15:26

Someone more clever than me will be along to give you better advice, but my understanding would be your LTV/ asset to debt ratio is really healthy, if you have some term to go.

But I thought having housing costs at 25-30% of income and about 50% on bills in total was a rule of thumb. So if new rates take you above those ratios then you'll presumably have to cut back on other spending or on saving. Could you overpay now so that you keep the same ratio going forward?

I think your DH is unreasonable to really panic, but if you can afford to overpay I'd have thought you'd be in a more comfortable long-term position.

Mumstheword1983 · 09/09/2025 15:28

Interesting. Our mortgage is 20% of our income (will rise when current rate is up in 20 months).

House worth approx £450k mortgage £260k. I think you are in a good position.

buffyfaithfredwesley · 09/09/2025 15:37

House worth 120k ish
72k left on mortgage
mortgage including service charges is 31% of my income

Bulbsbulbsbulbs · 09/09/2025 15:42

House worth about £550k. Mortgage is £310k. It seemed a good idea when interest tates were low... Mortgage is 35% of income.

Leilaandtheloggerheads · 09/09/2025 15:43

Mortgage is about 24% of my post tax income (house is in my sole name and paid for by me). But honestly, I find that totally meaningless as I could reduce that drastically by calling my mortgage company and extending my term to 20 years. Or increase it by calling and changing my term to 5 years. Utterly meaningless percentage unless you’re already at 35 year term with a large percentage payment (I.e you cannot reduce the percentage any further).

Assets… don’t really know what exactly my house is worth but at a guess about 3.3 assets to 1 debt.

Barbarachicken · 09/09/2025 15:45

House 625k
Mortgage 175k
Monthly mortgage cost approx 20% of income

Ledwood85 · 09/09/2025 15:46

My mortgage amount remaining is about 20% of my savings. Not including pension or any other assets... and by assets I mean cars because there's nothing else worth anything significant.

Mortgage is about 15% of the house value.

DramaAlpaca · 09/09/2025 15:49

We paid off our mortgage a few years ago, but we always tried to keep it to no more than 20% of income and never took out other loans.

If your only debt is your mortgage I wouldn't worry about it as long as you can afford it. Debt from loans and credit cards would be much more of a concern.

InterestedDad37 · 09/09/2025 15:50

£200k/£0k
Sorry, but it gave me far too much pleasure writing that, after 25 years of debt (mortgage + cards) 🙂

basinbasin · 09/09/2025 15:52

Surely age makes a huge difference?

Statsquestion1 · 09/09/2025 16:07

Mid 30’s/early 40’s
house worth approx 520k. Mortgage of 399k
monthly payment is 25% of income. We have approx 200 in cash savings between us though.

Ionlymakejokestodistractmyself · 09/09/2025 16:10

House worth 600ish I would guess, has almost doubled since we bought it

120k left on mortgage

Repayments are about 15% of take home

We managed to avoid the v high rates when renewing

Hello98765 · 09/09/2025 16:20

House worth around 900k
mortgage of 550k
bought four years ago, we are mid thirties.
one year of a 2% rate left so we are trying to get to 40% LTV for then…

Hello98765 · 09/09/2025 16:21

Oh our mortgage repayments are about 25% of income

Onionringsforbreakfast · 09/09/2025 16:22

Depends on your age too. If you’re 25 and your salaries are likely to increase this is an amazing position.

If you’re 70 and desperate to retire it’s less good!

Septemberisthenewyear · 09/09/2025 16:23

Surely this will depend on your stage in life. Now I’m middle aged I’m in a good position, my Dad and in laws are mortgage free but are retired and when I was in my late 20s it would have been a very different story for me.

unsurewhattodoaboutit · 09/09/2025 16:25

House valued at about £580,000 mortgage £67,000.

However, I’m 58 so that’s significant surely. It’s not just mortgage amount but how long you have earning to pay it off!

BottlingBurpsForGrandma · 09/09/2025 16:31

Age 36. Mortgage about 25% of house value, monthly payments around 15% of monthly income, total owed is around 2 x annual income. Happy with our overall position but my pension is shit as had nearly a decade off with the kids. Cash savings around £100k but with 4 kids we are keen to keep these in place for the uni/ driving licence/ house deposit years.

Ineedanewsofa · 09/09/2025 16:33

House is 50% owned, 50% mortgage. Mortgage is 25% of net income on a monthly basis, we commit 30% of net income to overpay.
We have accessible savings that are 10% of house value and joint pension savings that are currently 3x the accessible savings, growing YoY.
@Bearlionfalcon it sounds like you are fine at the moment but if rates cause your mortgage payment to go up over 30-35% of joint net income you’ll probably feel the squeeze
Edited to say we are early 40s and mortgage amount remaining is 2.5x our gross annual income

mamagogo1 · 09/09/2025 16:36

I have no mortgage so £500k no debt but dh has retired and I’ll be leaving work in 2-3 years thus to be expected

RobinTheCavewoman · 09/09/2025 16:40

Equity is 70% of home's value according to the bank. No immediate plans to sell so that could change dramatically in either direction.

Allbacktoschool · 09/09/2025 16:42

our house is worth anout £900k and we have about £100k left on the mortgage. Seriously downsizing when it comes to retirement. I'm classic asset rich and cash poor (ish).

nutbrownhare15 · 09/09/2025 16:53

Our asset to debt ratio is 2.3-1 and similar proportion to you paid on mortgage each month so you are better off than us on amount owned/owed but maybe not rate. We fixed for 10 years and have seven to go. What rate is your mortgage now?

Lancasterel · 09/09/2025 16:56

Both early 40s.

House worth 850k, mortgage outstanding 400k.

We've always taken the maximum term on our mortgage to make payments as cheap as possible but we do overpay. Repayments about 25% of income and by overpaying we should pay off around 60.

Tryingtokeepgoing · 09/09/2025 17:01

Surely to assess the debt to equity risk you also need to consider age. A £1.5m house with a £0.75m mortgage is pretty low risk if you are in your early 30s, but for someone who's 65 it might be quite stressful. Likewise, paying 25/35% of your income on a mortgage might be OK for someone in their 20s or 30s, but if you're in your 50s with 3 teenage children about to go to university you might you might be more uncomfortable with that level of debt service