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Original poster

Do you regret stretching yourselves financially?

51 replies

zlapeo · 25/04/2024 21:22

Of all our friends who have done well out of property, it is those who stretched themselves.

DP and I are 28 and 30 and thinking about buying a flat for £1.4mil. We’d find a flat that costs £600k acceptable to live in, but not much scope to add value at the lower end of the market.

We could afford the expensive place, but if we change jobs in the long run we’d likely need to sell it. But it’s much more likely we’d make bigger equity gains in the expensive flat vs the cheaper flat, so if we ever downsized then there’d be more money to be had.

Do you regret stretching yourselves financially?

OP posts:
Deniseo · 25/04/2024 21:35

No. We took the old advice of ‘buy the best house you can afford’ and I’m so glad we did. For a start the house is great in a brilliant location and we always get appreciative comments from guests! I love the fact we don’t need to worry about having to upsize in a few years or pay a second lot of stamp duty and fees as a result. Yes it’s a heck of a lot of our monthly income but I wouldn’t go back and change a thing.

rwalker · 25/04/2024 21:38

When we moved didn’t extend the term of mortgage but borrowed more
the place was a complete shithole couldn’t afford to do it up snd we had big payments
fast forward 12 years mortgage free early forties after a few VERY tight years

Solgrass · 25/04/2024 21:39

Yes but do you really know what their financial arrangements were?

You don’t really know how they managed- if they had to borrow money from parents etc.
You don’t know how close they were to missing the mortgage payments, or if there were horrific arguments between the couples because of being financially stretched.

So you really can’t use your friends as a good example.

Lampslights · 25/04/2024 21:43

No, and we made much more equity doing it, as we moved up the chain, so now at fifty we are in a much better position.

Lampslights · 25/04/2024 21:44

Solgrass · 25/04/2024 21:39

Yes but do you really know what their financial arrangements were?

You don’t really know how they managed- if they had to borrow money from parents etc.
You don’t know how close they were to missing the mortgage payments, or if there were horrific arguments between the couples because of being financially stretched.

So you really can’t use your friends as a good example.

What? You’ve no idea what she knows. 😂

Bs0u416d · 25/04/2024 21:49

We've don't the opposite of stretching ourselves and our gross annual income is more than our mortgage (by a whisker). That said this is more to do with the food fortune of high incomes and geography that means we live in a mirror of our friends place in St Albans yet ours cost 4 times less! None the less id choose to buy at the lower end of my limit as I love the security this affords us.

TheSeasonalNameChange · 25/04/2024 21:51

The other option is buy the cheaper flat and a rental.

Icanseethebeach · 25/04/2024 21:52

Are you planning on having kids? If you are then your living cost will increase massively. I know people who stretched themselves and are now regretting it. We didn’t and as a result we’ve been able to make some serious life style changes.

Solgrass · 25/04/2024 21:52

Lampslights · 25/04/2024 21:44

What? You’ve no idea what she knows. 😂

Show quote history

She’s hardly going to know the intimate details for her friends financials is she? That isn’t info that people share.

NarrowGate · 25/04/2024 21:55

I regret not stretching myself. Stayed in the same flat for years. I should have been less emotionally attached to my flat and I think I sold myself short on my career because I didn’t have so much debt to improve my sense of drive.

user18 · 25/04/2024 21:57

We did stretch ourselves and it paid off but we did it once we had kids already and so their costs were already factored into the equation.

Tutifruitie · 25/04/2024 22:00

No. Our second (still current) home was more than double the cost of our first home. For some years we lived frugally but we have avoided another set of stamp duty, estate agents’ fees, the associated stresses of selling and buying.

Maninthemoonsmiles · 25/04/2024 22:01

Stretched massively on one good and one minimum wage but no regrets as want to stay here for good and we have had an amazing place to bring up family.

Tutifruitie · 25/04/2024 22:02

Maninthemoonsmiles · 25/04/2024 22:01

Stretched massively on one good and one minimum wage but no regrets as want to stay here for good and we have had an amazing place to bring up family.

^This.

Rapunzel91 · 25/04/2024 22:04

We moved and increased our mortgage but could have stretched ourselves further. We ported our mortgage and part of it is due to renew in a few months so I’m glad we didn’t stretch ourselves further. We’re also planning on extending and renovating so will be adding value that way.

BackToWhereItAllBegan · 25/04/2024 22:04

We stretched ourselves and our home has now doubled in value so we're able to downsize and retire at 50 as we have so much equity.

BigBundleOfFluff · 25/04/2024 22:04

I had to stretch myself following my divorce and I wanted to keep the house. I'm just about ok now but I haven't been on holiday for a good few years and not spent as much on maintenance as I should have done on my house.
I wouldn't willingly do it again, I would have preferred to have more money for fun things - but I do have my nearly perfect house!

ACynicalDad · 25/04/2024 22:40

My parents gave us £10k, which was the difference that meant we could buy the grottiest three-bedroom terrace over the nicest two-bedroom one. Then, as we've been promoted, we've done it up. I'm really pleased to have done it that way and not need to move, but also not need a huge mortgage to get something that would bite us on the bum later, we've done it largely as we got the money.

Twiglets1 · 26/04/2024 06:25

No we haven’t regretted it. I do think that you get more equity out of more expensive properties in the long run. That’s the only consolation when you compare the cost of housing in the South compared to cheaper parts of the country. Yes it costs a lot more to buy a property but when you eventually become mortgage free, you own a much more expensive asset.

Of course everyone’s situation is different and you shouldn’t buy a more expensive property than you can afford but it’s also true that you rarely make money without a little bit of risk. I think “buy the best house you can afford” is generally good advice.

littlelandlord7 · 26/04/2024 06:34

No

It feels financially crippling at the moment however it won't last. If we get the planning we're after we will have the dream set up for home/business which we simply couldn't have afforded to buy ready made. It's worth pushing it when you can as your buying power may change through varying circumstances and you'd wish you did.

TheNoonBell · 26/04/2024 09:31

No regrets. Stretch early for rewards in later life.

First house - borrowed max (4.5x joint)
Second house - borrowed near max and overpayed (4x joint, paid off 10 years early)
Third house - borrowed a bit as we had loads of equity (1.5 times single, now 0.9x joint)

fiskalina · 26/04/2024 09:35

I'm in the thick of it so can't really tell if it was a blinding success or not.

Upside - lovely house in fantastic area close to family and with everything we could ever want or need.

Downside - don't really see the light at the end of the tunnel. We borrowed 3x salary but now due to paying it off and payrises it's more like 2x and whilst the repayments are manageable every other cost going up is tough.

I'd like to think less about money but I guess that's a luxury problem.

weareallcats · 26/04/2024 09:45

No, we haven't - we could probably afford something x3 our main home - but we like having a lot of disposable income and our house is actually very nice and manageable.

My parents always stretched themselves to get the biggest house they could afford and then struggled with the maintenance - my childhood home was big and impressive from the outside, but falling down around our ears once you got inside (famously, the ceiling in my bedroom collapsed over my head in bed, as it was so damp - luckily it was just sodden plaster so I am here to tell the tale). We never had any money to do anything fun as the house ate it all. My dad was an artist and every time he sold a painting he did something boring to fix the house. It sounds romantic, being in a big falling down house with an artist parent, but it was shit.

I have always sworn never to overstretch and I've stood by it.

MollyRover · 26/04/2024 10:42

We overstretched but took a lot of measures for sustainability so no regrets, maintenance and running costs will be affordable, our interest is low and fixed for almost the entire length of the mortgage. We didn't get the absolute maximum that we could but maybe about 75% of what the lender would give us which was more than I would have liked but we're still able to afford holidays and treats.

LindaDawn · 26/04/2024 10:47

I think in the past it was the best thing to do to stretch yourselves to your maximum and beyond but with today’s cost of living and the fact that there are not always so many jobs for life out there it may not be the thing to do in every situation. However you need to future proof your house as in having space to extend when buying so you don’t have to have to move. We could have moved to a bigger place as we could have afforded to but was never sure what I really wanted. The plus side is that friends who have now want to downsize whereas our house is not too big so we can stay here forever and not go through the stress and cost of selling and buying.