Is it normal to settle for a home you don't like?

[Namedrop000]

We're FTBs. We've been patiently saving for many years for our first home. But there's just nothing on the market at the moment? The places we've seen fit none of our (pretty modest!) needs, and have been in terrible condition. We don't have the cash for big renovations.

We've been looking for about a year and prices are going up, so I think we just need to buy something we don't even like just as a stopgap so we're on the ladder, and have somewhere to live. Is this normal? We were hoping to buy a very long term home that we actually had a fairly good feeling about, but seems like that's unrealistic.

I find it hard to stomach spending 400k+ on something I don't even like or care about and would be embarrassed to invite friends or family over to.

That is not a ladder, more like a step stool x

OP we are in the exact same position as you (41, FTB, SE London/Kent borders).
We have found it helpful to try and define a list of Must haves, nice to haves, negotiables, and absolute no. We have alerts set up on our phone for areas we like and sit and discuss everything we like or dont like about it.

I also hate pebbledash but this can be removed! For the right house, I would suck it up and pay for it to be taken off.

Another way at looking at this situation, which so many of us face, is to consider how much you are having to spend on rent while looking for something on which you are prepared to compromise.

Work out what a year of waiting has cost you in rent and in increased prices. Every year you hesitate. While I absolutely agree that long term renting can be good in the right area with the right laws....

I've lived in some very dodgy places (had to use the loo at the local rail station on the way home as we didn't have a functioning one for the first couple of days kind of dodgy).

Whatever state they were in, I've been able to love them because they were mine, with a front foot which kept out everyone except those I wanted to invite in.

Welcome to adulting 101, good luck

Surely there is always compromise
My ex h and I bought our first property 20 years ago and split when we were in our fourth.
I bought him out and have stayed in our fourth with the kids. My major compromise is that interest rates have gone up and I'm seriously struggling to pay the mortgage.
On the other hand this feels most like a family home of any of their homes to my three children and I will do what it takes to stay here (cut back, second job etc).

Our first home when pregnant with #1 was tiny, needed loads doing but was also a fab area, and good school catchment so the compromise was again worth it to us.

Start with your non-negotiables, which your first one seems to be good public transport and things within walking/cycling distance. Do you have to have x No of bedrooms? Do you have to have separate living/dining or open plan, off road parking? a garden? quiet road? No pebble dashing seems a bit of an odd one!

I wouldn't go for anything leasehold (just don't like the idea of it), or a flat (too many close neighbours) and I must have a garden. Everyone has things they really can't compromise on so figure out what yours are then anything else is worth considering. Don't buy something you hate. The worst house on the best road is often suggested.

As @ramposa says,@LuluBlakey1's works in a rapidly rising market, such as the one she was able to buy into. That was luck, not a paint job.
It won't work now. Indeed, the opposite is likely to happen.

all the posters in here referring to buying a tiny or rubbishy house and then climbing the ladder as you accumulate equity are so frustrating.

As of the last 5-8 years house prices are now stagnant and likely to remain so. There is no “ladder” any more and stamp duty is so high that it might not be financially sustainable to move around even if there was.

I appreciate the input, but I do kind of think the people telling me about how you 'bought a doer-upper 30 odd years ago, had to shit in the garden for a month at first, but have since moved 10 times, and built up a ton of equity, and it's all worked out for me' are slightly missing the point here? (And potentially a little removed from the reality of 2024?)

I think the ladder used to work as

You but something small and as your wages go up, or you pay off a chunk of the mortgage, then you move on up

So without rising house prices - start with 10k deposit and a mortgae for 100k
After 10 years you have a 30k deposit ( what you paid off and any additional savings ) and 100k mortgage again - so you move up a level

Rapidly rising prices I suspect have made moving up harder because the gap between your current and next home was getting wider -it's easier to move up when price rises are not so severe

You might be 10 years in one place but that's ten years paying off your mortgae not someone else's

The first one I bought with DH was a 4 bed in early 2015. We bought 3 times and the last one was in 2022. So hardly ages ago and not tiny first time buyer houses either. We have actually ended up in a smaller house in a far better area. But definitely a ladder of increasingly better family homes until
we got what we wanted, adding £200k equity (after moving costs) and recent.

How exactly is this not relevant or recent?!

You either go big and take risks or stay renting shite. I know what I’d rather do.

Well, we brought a doer-upper ten years ago and are still living in it, and it still needs doing up, lol. But it's ours and at least we're paying off our own mortgage and not someone else's.

It's unrealistic to expect to join the housing ladder by buying a house that's perfect in every way, you have to compromise or you'll be renting forever.

When I bought my first place - a ground floor maisonette in a not especially nice area of London - the mortgage was exactly 50% of my wages each month. But other than decor it didn't need too much doing to it so I was lucky and I painted it (badly!) myself. I definitely didn't love where it was, but I loved that it was mine and that nobody could give me notice to leave.

As lots of people are saying, there is always a compromise when you buy a house, the question is, is the compromise one you can live with? So could you buy something more modest to get into the area you want to be in, or do you get something that needs more work (even though you'll have to wait to have time and money to do it)? Or is the precise area less important so you can buy a place you're more comfortable with in a less expensive part of town?

I know house prices have gone up stupidly and being a FTB now is HARD, but putting money back in your own pocket is a lot better than paying someone else's mortgage. Even if it is in a less-desirable area than you'd like, or it needs a bit of work - trust me when you get the keys to your first house, none of that matters :)

I think you have to settle and gradually make it into something you're happy with.

Could you say where you are op? I am in SE within the M25 (but not in London) and yes 400k here would not buy you much at all. It's hard to say if the market is just poor at the moment where you are or if you are expecting too much. We bought in our late 30s 11 years ago and chose based solely on location and future potential of the house (i.e. space to extend). I didn't love the house although I do now. We knew we were likely to have greater earning potential so we bought something that could be made twice the size (bungalow) and crossed our fingers. We did the first extension by borrowing money on credit cards and whatever else we could then when we remortgaged we took on extra borrowing to pay debts as the house had increased more in value than we spent. We did lots of the work ourselves to save (the builder did the shell and we did plumbing, electrics, decorating, kitchen fitting by ourselves with the help of friends when needed). Dh came into some money 2 years later through work and we did our loft conversion. We have doubled the value of the house in that time (approximately I appreciate we can't know until we sell it) so you can still get on the ladder but it depends what you think your future holds income-wise.

I agree.

I saved and saved and bought a 'compromise'. It's not in the best area so hasn't increased much, but it's home. It ticked most of my checkboxes but in a part of town I wasn't looking at.

Where did the 200k equity come from?
how much of it was from over paying, or increasing your deposit from savings?

and how much from the value of the houses going up?

if the latter didnt account for much of it, that’s just a growth in personal wealth rather than a “housing ladder effect”

Some people definitely seem removed from the reality of 2024.
Also, equity due to house price rises can vanish also vanish in a downturn.

The ladder used to work because:
a) Wages rose rapidly in the past but have been stagnant/ falling in real terms in many sectors since at least 2008
b) People could afford to buy in their early/mid 20s so had plenty of time to pay off their mortgage and move to a larger home. Now, many are FTB in their mid 30s-mid 40s and taking out 35 yr terms. They obviously can't do this.
c) Houses were so much more affordable relative to incomes

@Namedrop000 -what are your current circumstances now? Are you in a rental? Is the rent/ home reasonable? How do the costs compare to a mortgage? How secure are your jobs? Good idea to keep looking but I definitely would not rush into buying something you really dislike. I think prices will continue to fall and do not think they are rising at present, despite asking prices increasing on average.

My point is you don't have to do lots of work- even if you think it needs doing. Houses increase in price. Just do the stuff you can do when you can do it.

What area are you looking in OP? I just did a Rightmove search in Catford SE London and your budget could get something (that I think is) nice round there. Super well connected. Loads of bus routes, 2 stations. I think it's travel card zone 3.

That's just not true @LuluBlakey1. You were just lucky and bought at a time when prices were rising very fast, exceptionally fast wherever you were. They are falling now so people are losing (theoretical) equity not gaining it.

I don't think people saying the compromises they made to get "on the ladder" is really missing the point. The thing is that at some stage, if you want to own a house you have to buy SOMETHING. Your question was "is it normal to buy something you don't like", and what people are saying is "yes, to some extent". What people do is find things to like/love about a property that is not the dream. The one way to guarantee you'll never own your dream home, is to never actually buy anything.

@Namedrop000
Whereabouts in the south east?
Can you move area?
Coming out Essex way tends to be better value and commutable to London.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/148985249#/?channel=RES_BUY

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/146069675#/?channel=RES_BUY

Well they go through cycles - they might be falling where you are but they are still rising in many places in the north-east for example. Across the country there have been rises for the last 6 years until last year, of varying degrees. They never plummet.

My first flat still isn't worth much but it sold three years ago for 5 x what I paid for it.
Our last house hardly increased in value at all for about 6 years- up a bit, down a bit -but in the last 6 years it has doubled.

Meanwhile my cousin's house in London is worth about 10X what he paid for it 20 years ago and it is exactly what the OP says she does not want- grubby pebble-dash and dated.

You have to take the risk if you buy. The gain is never now- it's longer term.

It depends what you are looking for here. If it's just commiserations, then yes it sucks! People used to be able to get more for the same proportion wages. Even 10 years ago houses in many areas of the south east were literally half what they are now and wages have not doubled. Rishi's new help to but plan won't help either, it just keeps prices high.

If you want practice advice, then yes you will need to compromise. Either get a flat instead, do the works needed on a house, or move further out. Many people start with a 2 bed flat, then move further out once they have had a couple of kids.

@LuluBlakey1 so your first example of your flat doubling in price in 2 yrs after a lick of paint was misleading then.
Yes, the economy and housing go in cycles.
I think it's a real mistake for people now to assume that we will have anywhere near the same real house price growth that we have had in the past 30 years; they were the anomaly. Before that houses generally rose in proportion with incomes. See the real and nominal charts here ( a lot of them only go up to 2020) https://www.economicshelp.org/blog/5709/housing/market/

Yes, it is often best to buy for various reasons but that should not be with the assumption that you can make a fast buck because you are likely to be disappointed and potentially in financial difficulty.