If you sold and had to go into rental while house hunting, tell me your experience

[littlecrystal]

I am a hopeless house hunter having lost 3 buyers of my current house. I have been looking for almost a year now.
I don't want to lose my fourth buyer and so made up my mind to go into rental if need be.

It is an expensive matter - I will lose my good mortgage deal, have to pay early repayment fee and probably have to commit to 6 months' rent agreement and the prices may go up while renting (London suburbs here...)

Do you have any advice of how to find a least committing rental? Did you choose to go to rental - do you have any regrets?
Was relocating twice a big deal?

Any experiences appreciated!

we did this - in fact we're just about to move from our rental into the house we've bought. We rented for about 15 months. I really didn't want to do it, but actually it was probably a blessing in disguise - we were relocating and it allowed us to get to know the area etc before committing to buy.
Also helped that the house we ended up renting was beautiful (much nicer than we could have afforded to buy) which made the relocation less painful. I am not hugely excited about moving into the house we've bought but I think that is just moving fatigue.
After all the stress of moving, renting was actually a very welcome breather - you forget how nice it is to just ring up when something is broken and it gets sorted for you! (as long as your landlord is good of course, which luckily ours was/is).
Our landlord was really looking for a long term tenant, but we got on, and they allowed us to do a 6mth rolling contract.
Renting does put you in a very strong position for buying. good luck!

We didn't go into rented but we did move in with my parents for a year (wasn't meant to be that long...) while we found something. Relocating twice was not a massive deal because most of our stuff stayed packed up, but that wouldn't be the case if you went into unfurnished rental of course.

The main thing I would say is that we spent far too long house hunting. We were looking for something that didn't exist (well it did but only in a few houses so very unlikely to come on the market). In the end we compromised a bit and it would have been better if we'd compromised earlier!

did it - yes, a major PITA sorting out what to store and what to keep, two moves etc etc BUT made buying a LOT easier.

found a short-term month to month let (they do exist, needs big mutual trust but it worked, good landlord) but was there nearly six months anyway so wouldn't have made much difference.

I am about to do this - I think. I need to sell fast and house hunting/ co-ordinating everything is a nightmare so this is how I am thinking. Hoping it will help me make the right choice when I do buy as I won't feel pushed into going for something because I am under pressure. Interesting to hear what others did.

Just posting to say ditto to everything redundant said really. Especially getting things sorted by the landlord when something needed doing felt like a breather!

Yes, moving twice was a pain (we rented an unfurnished house for 7 months so did unpack completely into the rental property) but actually we ended up buying our neighbours' house which didn't even go onto the market because we rented in a street we liked and put the word about that we were hoping to buy.

Good luck.

Oh and re: the mortgage, as we bought within a certain time, we went back onto our previous deal and had the early redemption cost refunded to us. That was with Barclays/Woolwich but not sure if that still happens.

Woolwich gives only 30 days porting period nowadays. But the main thing I am worried are rising house prices.

We're about to do just that - completing and moving into rental next week. Initially it was because we found our house to buy too late in the sale process but we've now pulled out of that purchase so will be glad of a breather I think. I'm worried about prices going up but hoping we can save towards the deposit during that period too so crossed fingers it should cancel each other out. And we are primed to snap something up come spring when (apparently) all the houses come on the market!!

We did this, although it was due to a move to the other side of the country, and the fact we were trying to sell in the dark days of 2008. It actually worked out really well, and was a lot less stressful. It meant that (when we finally sold our old house) we could have a relaxing look around for a new place - and we cut down on moves by buying our rental house!

Thank you for your replies. It is good to hear positive experiences. I am still not very clear how to approach letting agencies if I want least committing rent contract (really looking to buy swiftly).
I wish I had family/friends with space to host us for a couple of months, but unfortunately that is not the case.

We moved out of our houses twice without moving into a new one.

The first time we lived in a hotel for 6 weeks. We were moving into a new build and didn't want to hold up the chain any longer as we had already kept them waiting for a while. Put all our stuff into storage and just kept clothes etc. It actually worked out pretty economical as we had no extra bills and we agreed a deal with the hotel.

The second time we were relocating. Had originally planned to buy a house in the new area but had to pull out. So decided to rent instead. We couldn't sign up for a rental until we had a firm exchange date on our house as the agents wouldn't agree. Took on a 6 month lease which worked out well. Gave us chance to look around when we moved and find the right house for us. And after renting a listed house we decided we didn't want to buy one (which was DH's original plan). We managed to almost tie our purchase into the end of the lease but did have a couple of weeks where we were renting and owned the new place. But that gave us time to decorate certain rooms etc before we moved in.

We did have to redo our mortgage but ended up buying a cheaper property than we originally planned and bought in a different area!

the law means that the minimum contract you'll get from an agency will be six months. After that you go on to a month's notice (two months from the landlord)

landlords that don't go through agencies may work differently. They are not by any means all dodgy, but you need to confirm things like gas certificates and deposit protection. If you rent a draughty tatty dump don't expect it to improve!

Are you in a holiday area? Some owners of holiday cottages/houses/apartments would be pleased to let on a month-by-month basis during the winter months.

little, you might find that the six months goes by pretty quickly. I don't think you've said whether you'd already found another house but you put in your OP that you have lost 3 buyers of your house because you've not found anywhere to buy in a year.

Let's say that the best happens and you move into rented accommodation and find somewhere to buy in the first month. Unless it is a no-chain deal, the chances are it'll take a few months to go through.

You may end up with a month or so after buying when you are also renting but this happened to both my move and my DPs, who recently relocated, rented and bought. We found it allowed us to get things done to the house that needed sorting out before we moved in and we also moved gradually ourselves which worked out cheaper.