Sell house or take out mortgage?

[RunningThrough]

I have 300 in savings since selling my house, I'm currently staying with family/staying in AirBnBs and my stuff is in storage. I cannot find any house I like at all for 300k, but lots of amazing dream/forever homes are around 500k.

I don't work at the moment so I cannot get a mortgage. I have a rental property that I own outright worth 200k.

Two options:

1. Sell the rental now and buy 'forever' house outright for 500k

2. Move into the rental (need to give 6 months notice) and then find full time employment to be eligible for 200k mortgage. I can then re-rent the house and the rent will cover the mortgage.

What would you do?

Sell & buy as soon as you can, taking advantage of the 0% stamp duty to buy.

@Porseb

Sell & buy as soon as you can, taking advantage of the 0% stamp duty to buy.

Because the house is tenanted and it needs a few bits doing to it, it is worth £15k less than if it was all up together.

The biggest stamp duty saving would be £15, so it's swings and roundabouts!

Also if I sold it now I would need to pay hefty capital gains tax.

Depending how much you bought your investment property for, you might be liable for CGT? Have you factored that in?

If you want to keep the investment going, you could always buy a place you can afford and move to a ‘forever home’ once you’re settled in a job etc.

We've just had this exact dilemma op and have decided to hang on to our investment given the economic climate atm. We may lose out on the Stamp Duty benefit but ultimately right now a secure income from our tenants is pretty meaningful.