come and tell me its do-able!!!!

[Becaroooo]

Our monthly incomin is £2500-2600

We have no debts.

Tell me that a £850 pm mortgage is do-able!!!

Very true alpine We could do £1450 pm, but it would mean living hand the mouth tbh.

We had hoped to add to our deposit from day 1 but, sadly ds1 needs some private treatment/therapy and then its xmas so dont think we will be adding to it this year!

Ds2 starts school in 2 years - hence why I think I should be "doing" something before he starts so I have more choice if/when I go back to work.
I would love to study at home (and have done OU courses in the past) but not even sure what I want to do!

Its amaxinf actually, how much "little extras" are isnt it? I have ds2's 3rd b day, dnephews b day, my b day, SIL and sbro's b day, and a new niece on the way all before xmas! Then there's xmas!! As you say, it all adds up.

You're right, it's all the "extras" and yes, you can live on very little - but it's utterly shit and it certainly helps if you know it will "all be over by October" type thing. :(

I think it massively depends on "how much" is "a third" of your salary and where you're living. The last house I bought had a mortgage repayment which was a third - even so, it was bloody tight and there never seemed to be any spare which was soul-destroying and I couldn't see it getting better, so I sold up.

If however you were taking home 10k a month and your mortgage were 3.3k - well, 6.7k should keep you in days out with the children and birthday presents for cousins!

Life is one long string of difficult and pretty major decisions!
When looking at retraining, I'd go for something you enjoy, are good at, and that's going to lead to a good job (hours/pay & conditions, future stability) - very difficult at the moment to see where the jobs market is going though! You need really good advice - from where, I'm afraid I don't know.

You need to keep your family finances manageable though, and going for a sizeable mortgage now is likely not a good option. The likely scenario is that the economy will trundle along at little to no growth, that the job market will contract and be a lot more competitive, and the really big one - that the property market is heading for a significant adjustment.
But regardless of what happens in the next few years, costs are increasing and becoming more of a burden right now.
FWIW, I think that buying another house now, at today's levels, and saddling yourselves with a large mortgage at unprecedented low rates of interest, would be a big mistake. There is a great deal of talk about affordability right now - trying to inject some optimism back into the market - but that is just looking at the monthly payments based on the lowest rates we have ever (and are likely to ever) seen. OK for a couple of years, but what then?

The likelihood is that you will find something to retrain in, get yourself a nice job when your youngest starts school and your family income will improve. At that time, the housing market is more likely than not to have either continued to flat-line (best case - but taking into account inflation, a subtle downward move) or adjusted significantly, so you will have more money, your deposit will be more and as a percentage, higher, and you will be in a much stronger position to buy again.
Meanwhile, negotiate a good long-term deal on your rented house (don't get me started on how crap the rental situation in this country is - but hopefully doable if your LL is not just looking for a fast buck before selling) and save some dosh.

You are a trooper if you've read this far

I know many will accuse me of being a pessimist, and I have always had a bit of a rep for being uber-sensible, but that has got us into a very strong position financially and personally, so am not just full of crap

What great advice MLM

ALL of what you say makes sense.

Dh is very angsty (is that even a word??) about renting (dead money etc etc) but we are in a lovely village - think thatched cottages, open fields, no shops and 1 pub!! - with friendly neighbours. We could never afford to buy here tbh and although its only a 2 bed its only £500 pm so I can live with that!!!

I think the LL would like a long-term rental (we have signed a 6 month lease) as they bought this at the height of the market - I winced when I found out what they paid for it! - so they cant afford to sell (they rejected an offer of £172k 18m ago)

Its just so confusing! Everything feels very uncertain atm and I HATE that! Bottom line - there is nowhere we like that we can afford. I hope that will change next year, but who knows?

Successive Govts seem to let the banking system do whatever that hell it wants to with little or no regulation and sod the poor devils who suffer for it

Thanks again for the advice.

Am considering training as a social worker and would like to specialise in sn kids.

A useful tip:

If you think you'll be able to live on £x less, start paying that £x into a savings account now.

This will get you used to being hard up, and will also increase the amount you have tucked away for a deposit, unexpected expenses etc. You will find out if you can manage or not.

Obviously start by paying off your credit cards and other debts, and cutting the cards up. You won't be able to afford them in future and card interest rates will be four times your mortage rate.

PJ Hello. We have no debts (no HP, store cards, loans etc) and we have set up a regular savings account too which we are hoping not to touch.

We really wanted to start putting money into the deposit account straight away, but just cant see it happening til Jan due to upcoming fees/costs of treatment for ds1, xmas etc

Luckily I can get my osteopathic treatment on BUPA...

If you are definitely going back to work & you have no other debts personally I would go for it ,

I would go for it as long as it is going to be a long term thing- ie. You're not planning to sell within 2-3 years.

For every £100k you borrow and for every 0.0025% ( quarter of a percent) the base rate increases , (assuming your mortgage tracks the base rate) the monthly payment on a interest only mortgage will increase by £20 per month.

Often you revert to the bank's standard variable rate after your initial period - eg. If you are on a fixed rate for 2 years . The standard variable rates roughly increase with the base rates, so to be on the safe side, look at your bank's standard rate now and add say 5% to that . In my opinion that will be worst case scenario. Would you be able to afford that, bearing in mind your income may have gone up by then?

If the bank's svr is 4.5% now and you have an interest only mortgage, that will be 100,000 x 0.045 /12=£375 per month. If the base rate increases to 5.5% and the bank's svr increases by the same amount, the mortgage rate would be 10% and the monthly payment would be
100,0000 x 0.10 /12 =£833.

Honestly this is worst case- last time the base rates were 5% or so the svr s for most banks were around 7.5 to 8%. also there is a fair chance the base rates will stay lowish for quite a few years to come. I would still go for it. It sounds like you have the potential for your income to increase anyway.

Why go for it? Basing on future increase in earnings? Isn't that rather reckless? I can only assume you are Estate Agents or otherwise deeply involved in the market to peddle such irresponsible rubbish.

There will be a great house to buy when Bec has her increase in earnings and can budget accordingly.

I think it really depends how you live. Our income is the same as yours and our mortgage is 1000 a month, on a 5 year fix. But we are still managing to save (a bit!) as a decade ofbeing students has made us pretty frugal. On the other hand, we have a good deal more equity in our house than you would have, so no fear of negative equity. In your position I'd probably wait until I could rustle up a bigger deposit, if nothing else.

Yes, we def need a higher deposit...we sold for £20k less than asking which didnt help matter but, hey, we sold and in the current market thats a good thing.

Thing is we dont really want to upgrade IYSWIM? We just want a similar size house to the one we left but in a better/easier location. Never really liked the old house tbh...wish we hadnt spent so much money on it, but there you go.

I suppose what I cant get over is the fact that, over the past 2 months we have seen 2 houses we liked and our offers of only £5k under asking were rejected!!!! Ok, 1 of the houses was then taken off the market and I am guessing the 2nd one will be soon as they obv arent serious about selling but still.....its worried me. We need someone serious about selling, like we were!