WWYD? First time buyers, large deposit.

[OTTMummA]

DH and I have inherited 180K
We have debts of 14K and need to put about 6K aside for all the costs involved in buying and moving so will end up with a maximum of 160K after this is all accounted for.

We could buy a doer upper for around that amount but would have to save to do the fixing and with 2 small DC it would be a bit of an ordeal but not undoable.

DH wants to get the maximum mortgage of around 100K the thought of this fills me with dread and although the houses in that price range are lovely I am worried about interest rates rising and being left with little to no wiggle room on outgoings and not being able to save any money.

I think we should go for a very small mortgage of around 30-40K and try to find somewhere that has room for improvement, corner plot or room for extending in the future.
This means that we will be able to save money and have a bit more spare income to do nice things with the DC where as we are really living on a tight budget atm.

But now I am wondering if we should ride this next few yrs out and hope for a property crash ( horrible I know, purely selfish ) so we could buy a larger property at lesser cost, get the most for out money etc.

So, wwyd? any tips or advice if you have been in a similar situation would be gratefully accepted.

TIA

If you aren't planning on moving then it doesn't really matter whether house prices go up or down, what is key is being able to pay your mortgage, when renting moving is a bit easier, but you are in a more vulnerable position if your plan is to stay put (unless in council property).

What interest rates are doing is the key factor, rates are still low, and it looks like they will be staying low for a while, but they are likely to rise at some point. I think looking at overpaying if you can now is wise, then you can go to normal repayments when interest rates rise.

Don't feel pressured into borrowing the maximum you can afford. There does seem to be this unwritten assumption when buying houses that your budget is limited by what you can afford as opposed to the maximum you want to borrow.

We could have afforded to spend 170k on a house, we opted instead to spend 100k, no regrets.