Big or small mortgage?

[HomeDilemma23]

I realise this is a hugely privileged position to be in but I find myself very unexpectedly with a large monetary gift. I am in my mids 20s, currently renting but looking to buy. My partner and I both work and earn decent salaries but we’re stuck between two properties.

1. small 4 bedroom house where all bedrooms could just fit a double bed but one would have no space for storage, good parking, garage, decent sized garden. Needs no work but would be keen to potentially extend/convert the garage. £500pcm mortgage (with our large deposit)
2. 6 bedroom house with a large garden would potentially need a bit of work. £2kpcm mortgage using the whole deposit. Our dream home around 5 minutes walk from property 1 so location not very different but this one does have stunning views

We don’t have any children at the moment but hope to have 3. We plan to start trying in the next year if we buy a house. My worry is the 1st house probably couldn’t sustain us forever if we were lucky enough to have the family of our dreams.

We are leaning towards the smaller house and either using the full amount of money or keeping a little aside to alter the house to some extent. For context we’re in a cheap area and both houses are under £450k. I currently work 50 hour weeks in a very difficult job and all I long for is my own home to feel comfortable in. Will we regret not getting our dream home whilst we have the chance?

Again, I am completely aware of how privileged this situation is. I grew up in a household with no money and we all shared rooms and we didn’t even have heating and sometimes went without food. I really welcome any viewpoints

@HomeDilemma23

the differing opinions are very interesting, some of them make me shout NOOOOO, the most valuable thing you can do with them though is really think about YOUR reaction to them.

6 bedrooms and a £2k mortgage a month or a 4 bed and £500 mortgage a month.
It’s a no brainer in the position you are in.
Go for the 4 bed and then use that property as your starting point. Circumstances may change in years to come.

More rooms = higher running costs - its really not worth it at the moment. Save that money to give you the opportunity to complete the refurbishment or for when the children come along and you don’t have financial strains then.

Still saying that you need a slightly bigger house than the 1st house! Moving is so so stressful and expensive. Buy a house that will be big enough for you not to have to move again. Neither of the houses are the best choice. Something in between the 2.

Always detached.

View this house with a builder/practical person and go from there. Sounds ideal to me

I'd be holding out for something better and then moving to something with large enough downstairs living space. The 2nd house looks narrow and the bedrooms across the two floors would be tricky if you had small children. Not to mention, it looks as though two of the 'bedrooms' have just been partitioned off from the main bedrooms.

A few people I know live by the mantra of 'buy the largest house you can afford' and to be fair it's not done them any harm although they all have much bigger mortgages now than they anticipated 5 years ago. You're buying in a more normalised interest rate environment which is better.

What I would say though is maxing yourself out limits future options. We chose not to max ourselves out. Bought a 4 bed detached 8 years ago costing £340k when we probably could have stretched to £500k and bought a bigger house in our new build estate. We regretted it for a while but have since extended our house. We're now in a position that we want to send DC to private school (not initially in the plan...) and although it'll be a stretch, it would have been out the question with a huge mortgage.

Badly designed and tiddly little rooms.

Keep looking, I don’t think any of these are right.

Really appreciate all the opinions here! We will keep looking (and view the middle house)

Opinions on this layout, detached.
I’ve had a couple of messages asking where we’re looking. We’d like to be within 45 minutes commute of Newcastle central station (or on a metro route) and ideally near the sea rather than inland

• Much better layout
• Detached

Still a bit small - I assume the total includes the garage?
Is there room to extend at the back?
I’d tuck the downstairs loo under the stairs and then double the utility space. Turn the office into another bathroom and convert the garage into an office or a tv room.

The honest answer it it entirely depends on your income, which I don’t think has been mentioned? Also worth nothing the running costs of a bigger house are much higher, but the flip side is only having to pay the stamp duty etc. I personally would go for the bigger house, but only if I could still afford holidays, savings and to go part time, otherwise the trade off wouldn’t be worth it for me.

The one you’ve posted just now looks like a good layout, and I’ve lived in one very similar before, but impossible to say without knowing the condition/location.

The biggest you can afford, factoring in potential increases in interest rate. Have a look on Bank of England for historic rates.

What might be £2k per month now (ouch as it is!) could increase to a disgusting amount should interest rates go a bit mad and lead to you losing your home.

If it’s been on for 8 months it is not worth what they are asking. So make a silly offer and go from there. Everyone in my area is having to sell for significantly less than they thought they would so it’s a good time to buy.

nursery fees are huge and you will have to pay some at some point unless you have a super helpful family.

I much prefer this layout. All bedrooms on the same floor and potential to convert garage to living space if needed.

It's a decent layout but the bedroom sizes are mean. The master especially and there probably isn't enough room for a King bed + decent storage so I would want to allocate that to sleeping and one of the other bedrooms as a 'dressing room'.

Ahh good point @Chewbecca our bed is a king
it works out as £1.3k per month so a middle option

The bedroom 2 dimensions seem off. Either it is very much not to scale or they have made a mistake.

Assuming this is an error, I like it

You’re right @Calmdown14 that 2 is surely meant to be a 3?

So we viewed the middle house.. we really like it and are going to view again. Is 30k below asking price opening offer too cheeky for a house that’s been up over 6 months? It’s just over 10% below their asking price

The mortgage would actually be £900 if we went with their asking price so still better than where we are now