Not sure whether to buy or rent

[nappyaddict]

Me and DP have been together since May and are looking for somewhere to move in together.

Everyone keeps telling me not to rent because it's dead money and that if we've got enough for a deposist then we may as well buy and prepare for the future.

However as much as I don't want to be negative I keep thinking it's still quite a new relationship and what if we split up? If we rent it's not going to be that difficult to go our seperate ways. If we buy then we'd either have to remain living together until we managed to sell it, one would stay in the house and the other would move out or we would both move out and rent it out. Then there's also the problem that we might not even be able to sell it straight away anyway cos we could still be in negative equity.

I get so annoyed at the tribe of people who say "renting is dead money" when they actually don't know what they are speaking about. Why would you even think of buying (an overpriced wherever you are) house in your circumstances? It would be a disaster.
Read www.housepricecrash.co.uk

oops that's [www.housepricecrash.co.uk]

Aaarggh www.housepricecrash.co.uk

oh god! dont buy you've only known each other two minutes.

Don't even think about buying atm, specially in your circumstances.

Please.

I think it would be a really bad idea to buy now, in such a new relationship.

I agree - definitely rent. No matter how in love you are, you need to know that you are financially compatible before making such a huge and potentially complex commitment as buying a property together. You will get much more idea of his attitude towards money and responsibility once you have had to divvy out the bills between you and made sure that there is enough money to cover the rent each month.

Hope it all works out for you.

We are both very good with our money and both save quite well so I know that wouldn't be a problem. I am glad I'm not the only one that thinks buying is too big a commitment yet. What's the minimum amount of time you think you should be together before doing that? It could just be that we stay where we are, forget about renting and then when we've been together a bit longer buy somewhere.

Also what do you do regarding bills? I earn a lot less than him but I have DS so do we pay half each, I pay more cos it's me and DS (I don't expect him to pay for DS' things as we've not been together long and he's not playing any sort of fatherly role to him) or he pays more cos he earns more? I just don't know how to fairly work it out even if we rent!

I'm not sure that there is a set formula for an of this - it all requires time and a lot of conversation, especially the stuff about splitting bills fairly (whether that reflects the amount of money you earn or whether you take into account that you have a son). I think that's another really good reason to rent so that you can see how easily you negotiate these things.

I don't know how old your son is and how much contact he has with his father but it seems quite fast to move in together if you have only been seeing each other for six months and there is a child involved. Sorry.

He doesn't see his father at all. He is 4.

DH and I bought a house after 1 yr together but we had no kids and had lived in rented places together practically since we met. Still felt like a big commitment tbh!

When we moved in together we opened up a joint account for bills although we earned about the same so wasn't hard to split the bills equally.

I would agree it sounds too soon to make the commitment. I wouldn't be worrying about house prices or anything else at the moment - just make things simpler for you and him and get a nice rented place for a while!

Rent without a doubt. Please dont even consider buying at the moment.

I said to him I think we should rent for 6 months first and then think about buying if the price is right at the time.