How am I ever going to afford a bigger house?

[rootsandwings89]

We bought our first home 1.5 years ago, we have 3.5 years left before our mot gave renews and we'd like to be in a position to buy a bigger home by then.

We have 2 x small children and a dog living in a small 3 bed Semi. It will do for now, but we definitely feel like we need more space and we don't have much privacy as it's quite open planned. I also feel our children won't be able to move out until they're much older so I want a house big enough for 4 x adults to live in.

We don't have any inheritance and we are currently clearing our credit card debt which should be done by the end of the year. That gives us 3 years to save, which sounds great but house prices seem to have jumped loads!

How do people afford to move to a bigger house without inheritance??

Unless you can increase your income then the alternative would be to move to a cheeper area where your money will buy you more house.

The open plan issue could be addressed with partitions/folding doors - post a floorplan if you’d like suggestions.

Is there scope for a loft conversion or other extension? A garden room?

Depending where you are, house price drops are likely over the next few years IMO.

Outside of windfalls such as inheritance etc your earnings going up at a faster rate than house prices [and your other outgoings] has historically been the only way that people have been able to do it.

Honestly?

Cool your jets.

You only bought your house 5 minutes ago, you have young DCs and you are already fretting about not having a big house suitable for 4 adults.

If you want a big house now then you are going to have to move to a cheaper are or get better paid jobs. There's no other option.

Otherwise like the majority of people you stay put for the time being and reassess the situation in say 5 or even 10 years time.
By then you should have some equity, savings and perhaps income profession. So the situation will be different.

No point selling up now, the market is shit and unpredictable and any equity you have will be swallowed up by fees and moving costs.

Blimey a family of 4 in a small 3 bed, you will be fine!!

A bigger place is a nice to have.

Surely unless you live in a very cheap area then paying the costs of moving twice in 5 years will be pretty painful?

I think most people don’t expect to move that quickly. We’ve been in our first house for 11 years and have 2 young children. It sounds similar to your house, but we’d need probably another £300k to upsize to anything decent enough to make the stress and cost of moving worth it. Hats off to you if you think you can raise the equivalent in your area through either cash or mortgage in 3.5 years!

You save and pay down your mortgage, when you have something more behind you and your earnings have increased you will be able to increase your borrowing and move to a bigger and better house.
Rome wasn't built in a day.

We have 7 adults living in our house which was only the second house we've lived in. We have to use the downstairs front room as a bedroom for ds1 and his gf who lives with us. None of them can afford to move out due to soaring house and rent prices. We have been lucky enough to extend the kitchen/ diner so that the front room can be used as a bedroom. We've never been able to afford to move up the ladder we just have made do with what we have.

We had 2 DC in a 2 bed house, where we lived for 7.5 years. You've got enough rooms so plenty of time before you need to move.

Save, over pay your mortgage and be realistic about your needs.

Most people just make do. I wouldn't worry about something that is so far in the future.

We're making the move to a 5 bed (family of 4) with DC of 9 and 13 for the reasons you describe OP - they'll likely live with us til 25, so we need space.

We've done this through doubling our income and some inheritance. Been in current place 10 years so time for equity to build up

Also we each need a home office, hence 5 beds.

Patience. We had a family of 4 plus 2 dogs in a house like you describe for 21 years. We were extremely happy and had it fully paid for. We only moved when it became obvious that extending would improve it as much as moving house would.

We used to look puzzled when neighbours asked how we managed. The house was immaculate. It was easily maintained and had all the best fittings we could afford. The only reason we moved was because my daughter was getting older and we, similar to you pictured having 4 adults at home at some point in the future.

Young families dont get some god given right to a bigger home. Having a family doesnt bring with it some increase in your income to afford this. You wait, you work and you make decisions. When we moved into our new house one of the neighbours asked how we could afford it. I replied myself and my partner saved for 25 years which is the truth. Appreciate what you have and work hard. Its that simple.

Added to what everyone else has said, it's worth looking into the possibility of extending, particularly if what you need/want is more ground floor space and/or if you have a loft you could convert to gain an extra bedroom. Extending will be expensive but often not as much as the additional borrowing costs for a bigger house + moving costs and can add a lot of extra value.

If you have the outside space it could be worth looking into a garden room that can be used as a home office or adult space initially and then maybe a teen/young adult hangout in the future.

Plus, like others say, patience and wait to see what the future holds, you have enough space for each child for have their own room and the open-plan issues might be able to be fairly cheaply fixed with good furnishings like screens and 'zoning' in the interim, or even putting up stud walls and redecorating?

We had better jobs after 4 years in our first house so moved cuz we could borrow more

Try to be content with what you have which is more than many.

We moved in 2015 from our 3 bed semi to a 4 bed house when prices were a bit longer. You asked do people afford to move to a bigger house without inheritance. We did it because DH and I paid off our mortgage in the 3 bed semi before we had DC2. We had most of it paid off from over paying when we were two good incomes and no children. I had was made redundant after DC1 which gave me a good lump sum.

You aren't in this position given you bought only 1.5 years ago. To be honest, I don't know how anyone can save loads with children. Unless you are a very high earner or you have inheritance.

We planned to do this when we bought 16 years ago. Then house prices rocketed meaning they outstripped out ability to upgrade locally, even with salary increases.

We never intended to, but we stayed put and built the house to our needs. Since then we have built a loft extension, a garden room and extended the kitchen. The last part was only this year. We’re now in “that’ll do til the kids move out”territory.

We’ve also avoided large chunks of stamp duty and all the work has added more than we paid.

I still don’t actually see it as my forever home, and we’re planning to move to a cheaper area once the kids have left their lovely school.

We have four adults living in a small 3 bed semi. No problems at all. We still live in the same property we bought when we got married. Didn't want to move as preferred to semi retire at an earlier age.

How do people afford to move to a bigger house without inheritance??

They tend not to move after only 5 years.

We moved into a bigger house when our eldest turned a teenager. The previous terrace was too small for us and also open plan which we didn't like (but handy for little ones). Some don't mind and will stay but we moved (slightly cheaper area) and love the extra space as soon it will be like having 4 adults in the house.

This.
Stop wishing your life away, and start appreciating everything you have.

Perhaps you're being a bit ambitious to think you can move in 3.5yrs.

You have credit card debt and I assume childcare costs.

Maybe you should think about stabilising your budget in the short term and growing your savings medium term. The move should be a long term plan.

As to how people do it, it's generally either an inheritance, salary progression or long and frugal wait.

We bought a 3 bed semi 14 years ago and would still struggle to buy much bigger without moving to a less desirable area. But we did a loft conversion 2 years ago so now have a massive master bedroom and en suite, the children have a decent double room each and the small bedroom has become an office. The house feels hugely more spacious. Would you be able to do something similar?

We moved from a nicer area to a cheaper area. Went from a 2 bed end of terrace with one parking space and small garden to a three bed mid terrace with parking for four cars and a huge garden. Our new house was £30k cheaper than the previous, money which was used for an extension. We only could do this by moving out of the city to a not so nice but up and coming village. The location wasn't where we'd wanted initially but it has become home.

Just to addy husband had been in the previous house for approximately ten years so had more equity built up over that time.

We've got 2 kids in a 3 bed mid terrace. My son has a tiny box room. I work from home in the living room. Dog, cat, small garden. I used to think we would upgrade. But we've accepted now that a bigger place is out of our reach. Tbh we couldn't afford to buy our house in today's market. So we consider ourselves lucky, we have a house we will be able to fully pay off by retirement age.