Hello I'm hoping to join in the house search. We're ftb - mid 30s - 3 dc under 5 (twins & reception), have a good deposit (finally!) but as I work p/t the amount we can borrow is quite low however we live in the NE so have a bit more scope. We've been looking since January and becoming quite disheartened. Is anyone else feeling the same way? How long has it taken everyone else to find a house? How did you compromise on location or house?
We're currently paying £650 a month in rent and the rentals on my street have jumped the past few months so we're getting quite nervous that we need to move into our own owned home soon.
We're 15k shy of a move in able house in a good area. So we have the compromise of a big project in a good area or a okay house in a bad or OK area. It's really hard choice as we don't have anything left in the bank to do up the do-uppers (will take another ten years+ of saving to get a sizeable chunk of money)
Went to see two today - one had no completion cert for the loft conversion, needed new boiler, rewiring, kitchen was...well in bits, single pane windows, garden was knee high . The bones of the house is perfect and in a lovely location, the school was at the end of the cul de sac.It was sold three years ago for 40k under what they're asking for now.
Second house we viewed was small, but in good condition - kitchen/living room/diner all in one room, 3 beds upstairs and a redecorated full electric brick outbuilding in the garden. New carpets, kitchen looked lovely we could picture ourselves living in the house but the street had six (!) houses with boarded up windows, graffiti on the fence of the path, few young 'uns on mopeds driving the street. Felt really unsafe stepping out.
We have a wide-ish search but everything seems to be snapping up in days or staying put for months (the ones that are not habititable.) We would love to move into a home that "just" needed new carpets, decorating and some maintenance on the garden or yard- they seem very few and far between.