Buying house with friend or not?

[Elouera]

For years OH and I have considered moving out of London for a bigger garden, quieter life, less pollution & to be nearer his parents etc. We have started looking at homes, but my work options would be more restricted, but not impossible. (OH can work anywhere). We can afford to buy a house ourselves.

OH's friend of many years has also talked about buying a home elsewhere, and has suggested OH and him buy the home together. Do any renovations together, and use it more like a holiday home, whilst still living in London. It might suit us well.

None of us have children & he has a girlfriend working/living abroad. I'd be helping renovate also, so technically there are 2 of us doing work and only 1 of him. Would you consider this arrangement, or could it just be a disaster? Please help me with good/bad points so I can think clear on this.

If you buy a second home, you’ll have to pay the higher stamp duty.
Holiday homes decimate communities and push up prices for the locals.
How will you work out who get what share when the time comes to sell?
What will you do if you fall out with friend?
What will you do if friend wants to live in the house full time?
How do you put a cost value on the share you get when you are a couple and he is single, do you split 50/50 or per person, so you as a couple are entitled to a larger share?
Someone will inevitably spend more time on the renovation, how would this be “rewarded”?
You might be best mates now, but money can easily create a divide. Are you willing to go to court over a shared asset if it were to get that messy?!
You need to put these questions to a solicitor.
But ultimately, i would NEVER EVER consider this arrangement!!

So, a long way out of London if you are going to use it as a holiday home?
I think you would be better off putting your money into buying what you want for yourselves. Sharing sounds like a recipe for disaster. Apart from trying to split money spent, and work done, equally, you would have the conundrum of who uses it when. Also, having had a holiday home, the maintenance can become trying (who want's to spend their valuable free time fixing gutters?), and you eventually get fed up with being tied to the same property all the time, while not having the spare money or holiday entitlement to go elsewhere.
No, do your own thing and stay happy.

There’s an awful lot that can go wrong especially if you’re going to do a big refurb. It takes a lot of time and money and can be very unpredictable making it very testing on friendships. You’d also need to work out what happens when, eg one party wants to sell but the other doesn’t as you’d be out of pocket.

I’m not really sure why you’d do it, tbh. I’m in zone 5, good air and you can walk to the countryside. There are also plenty of areas in the commuter belt that will have fresh air and a quick commute.

I'm a big fan of holiday homes (my family had one growing up, and I've recently exchanged on my own) but I would never do this with a friend. I've seen things like this go wrong too many times. Spend time with your DH working out what the two of you want and can afford and work towards that with no other parties involved - that's the best advice I can give you.

and what if he splits up with his GF and it's then two of them (new local GF) wanting to stay?

If you can afford it, just the 2 of you, why muddy the waters by bringing someone else into the equation.

It's a massive headache just waiting to happen, and mixing money and friendship usually ends in disaster. I wouldn't even consider it.

Total disaster.

Would you use the house at the same time or would you have a system for deciding who got to use it when?

What if one of you wanted to sell and the other couldn't afford to buy them out?

Would you agree on the standard of renovation?

What if one of you wanted to move into the property full time?

How would you allocate responsibility for chores e.g. garden maintenance?

What about decorating? It’s hard enough between a couple to decide on tiles, paint, flooring etc but between 2 couples it sounds like a nightmare!

Thanks for everyone's thoughts- some of which I hadn't considered. OH and I have discussed it, and he isn't keen either to buy with his friend. Just far too many things that could go wrong as everyone has said.