Zell Posted April 26, 2021 Posted April 26, 2021 I'd strongly recommend going through a broker. They will give you independent advice and you will generally get a better rate than going directly to a bank. Some brokers will even have rates/offers that are not available to customers that go direct.
Raining_again Posted April 26, 2021 Posted April 26, 2021 20 hours ago, nightwolf said: The difference is perhaps that we've had covid and the market has been...weird at best. We also can't do 5%, at least nothing that I can find that would be worthwhile. We are looking at all routes obviously. But with my health, help is needed. Yeah covid has shaken up a lot, lots of job instability that wasnt a thing pre covid. I dont think 5% deals are really a thing anymore, it only happened to be a deal nationwide did at the same, and you had to save all your money with them for the deposit too. Oh and NI market being significantly different to english makes a big difference... my house was only 70k lol
Ashley Posted April 26, 2021 Posted April 26, 2021 37 minutes ago, Raining_again said: my house was only 70k lol 1
Raining_again Posted April 26, 2021 Posted April 26, 2021 2 minutes ago, Ashley said: Don't forget theres also the dire lack of job opportunities and The Troubles... all relative lol. I know you wouldnt get a garage for that in london. Contextually you'd be doing well to get £10-12 an hour round here.
Ashley Posted April 29, 2021 Posted April 29, 2021 On 26/04/2021 at 6:25 PM, Raining_again said: Don't forget theres also the dire lack of job opportunities and The Troubles... all relative lol. I know you wouldnt get a garage for that in london. Contextually you'd be doing well to get £10-12 an hour round here. I'm not actually in London at the moment, I'm in Brum. Just looking at right move to see what the market is like and its all so depressing. Everything is a flat (or apartment, they can't seem to decide what term to use) in a large building. Some are small houses converted into flats. A fair few are for "investors", one even boasted about having tenants in already as if they were furniture. It's all so depressing.
Cube Posted April 29, 2021 Posted April 29, 2021 I'm with a local financial advisor and we're really hoping for a 5% deposit mortgage to have a chance of buying a house. Out savings are in the level where we could potentially get something cheap (for the area) if we can get the 5% deposit.
MindFreak Posted April 29, 2021 Posted April 29, 2021 We signed the buying agreement yesterday and seller signed it as well, so I guess our search for a new home has ended. It is both exciting and terrifying, we have just agreed to establish a loan of more than 4 times our annual income - before taxes! Shit... But oh man, getting our own garden, getting a garage, owning our own bricks. The garage even is isolated so we could build a small wall inside it and we could create a home gym, something I'd really appreciate! But it's going to be sad to leave our appartment for the past 8 years. We really enjoy the company of our neighbours and we'll miss that our son can just go outside and most days find someone to play with. But we don't move that far away and he'll stay in the day care that is nearby so we'll swing by from time to time.
nightwolf Posted April 30, 2021 Posted April 30, 2021 Well we spoke to a broker and we're able to afford upwards of a 325K house, whoop! Kind of. We have to get the Decision in Principle first, as my partner is currently on agency work, apparently banks want 12 months to prove some kind of weird bullshit. But our broker (the one we've chosen, others were fine, but some didn't want to do anything over the phone only online? What's that about?) has found several mortgages we can be offered. Whoop! So now we search, I've been keeping an eye (erm every day shh) on the market, so we've got a fair amount to choose from, but I'll feel much better when the DIP is approved.
Ashley Posted April 30, 2021 Posted April 30, 2021 1 hour ago, nightwolf said: Well we spoke to a broker and we're able to afford upwards of a 325K house, whoop! Kind of. We have to get the Decision in Principle first, as my partner is currently on agency work, apparently banks want 12 months to prove some kind of weird bullshit. But our broker (the one we've chosen, others were fine, but some didn't want to do anything over the phone only online? What's that about?) has found several mortgages we can be offered. Whoop! So now we search, I've been keeping an eye (erm every day shh) on the market, so we've got a fair amount to choose from, but I'll feel much better when the DIP is approved. Congrats! I know when I looked into it a few years ago I was told self employed needs two years of history before a mortgage will be allowed so it might be something like that. 1
nightwolf Posted May 1, 2021 Posted May 1, 2021 11 hours ago, Ashley said: Congrats! I know when I looked into it a few years ago I was told self employed needs two years of history before a mortgage will be allowed so it might be something like that. That's exactly what it is, I don't know whyyyy because he's never been out of work, but all we got was banks need 12 months for agency. Thankfully that's a month and a bit away, so we're safe. The main thing was that the banks were willing to give us a mortgage and also for the right amount. We were looking at about 270-280.
Ashley Posted May 1, 2021 Posted May 1, 2021 7 hours ago, nightwolf said: That's exactly what it is, I don't know whyyyy because he's never been out of work, but all we got was banks need 12 months for agency. Thankfully that's a month and a bit away, so we're safe. The main thing was that the banks were willing to give us a mortgage and also for the right amount. We were looking at about 270-280. Yeah they can be a bit weird. I was asking around about rental places a while back and when I said I am working part-time as self employed they said I would need a guarantor earning over £20k a year and I said I earn over that a year but still.. 1
MoogleViper Posted May 3, 2021 Posted May 3, 2021 What's everyone's thoughts on the future of property prices, particularly in and around London? With covid job losses, brexit job losses, more people going remote working and therefore able to live elsewhere, I keep expecting house prices to go down. But they seem to keep rising. I still don't understand how that can possibly be. The average salary and average house price don't match up.
Zell Posted May 4, 2021 Posted May 4, 2021 18 hours ago, MoogleViper said: What's everyone's thoughts on the future of property prices, particularly in and around London? With covid job losses, brexit job losses, more people going remote working and therefore able to live elsewhere, I keep expecting house prices to go down. But they seem to keep rising. I still don't understand how that can possibly be. The average salary and average house price don't match up. I bought a house a year ago (first time buyer) and I admit I did worry that COVID would cause house prices to collapse but the opposite happened. I now better understand some of the reasons for this: Stamp duty holiday, record low lending rates, easily available mortgages (through a lot of government schemes) and of course demand outstripping supply all key forces at play here. If the cost of buying a house is cheaper for everyone, people will be able to afford more expensive houses at the same average salary People are reassessing where they want to live in a post-COVID/ post-commute world - people now realise they no longer need to be tethered to London so there is an exodus out of London to smaller country towns. This is where house prices are rising the most I believe. In London house prices are rising at a much lower rate It's also business that have been moving out of London (a trend that started before COVID) because places like Birmingham offer cheaper rents and workforce People have a lot of pent up cash and a lot of it is going into property. This COVID recession is different from the previous one in that there is still a lot of cash being pumped into the economy only it's being pumped from different sources in different directions. COVID job losses aren't as bad as you might think because of the furlough scheme and there'll be a post-COVID bounce. As for Brexit, the impact on jobs has been negligible so far, I think the true impact of Brexit will be felt in the coming years I can only see house prices continue to rise unless there's a big unforeseen market crash, and no-one wants that. The ideal would be for house prices to stagnate or rise by very low amounts, i.e. below inflation so the wages start to catch up and house prices go down in real terms if not in nominal terms. 1
MoogleViper Posted May 4, 2021 Posted May 4, 2021 34 minutes ago, Zell said: People are reassessing where they want to live in a post-COVID/ post-commute world - people now realise they no longer need to be tethered to London so there is an exodus out of London to smaller country towns. This is where house prices are rising the most I believe. In London house prices are rising at a much lower rate This is one thing I'm unsure about. How far out will people move to/from? Currently considering places such as Watford, Rickmansworth etc. But are those (particularly Watford) the areas that people will be moving too or moving from? As for the stamp duty holiday, I'm hoping that means a small drop once that ends next month. 1
Zell Posted May 4, 2021 Posted May 4, 2021 1 hour ago, MoogleViper said: This is one thing I'm unsure about. How far out will people move to/from? Currently considering places such as Watford, Rickmansworth etc. But are those (particularly Watford) the areas that people will be moving too or moving from? As for the stamp duty holiday, I'm hoping that means a small drop once that ends next month. I really don't know the answer, it's so hard to say what will happen. People still don't have a good idea of what kind of commuting/office commitments there will be and it's going to be different job to job, company to company. My company made an announcement about flexible working a month ago which got some positive press but so far there's no real details or any changes to our contracts. So I have no idea how often I'll be expected to work from an office. The risk is in moving to somewhere which is nicer and cheaper to live but not easily commutable to London. If it was say over a 1 hour for just the train journey, how often could you put up doing that in a week, and would you want to pay for that? Having said that, there were people before COVID who did these silly commutes 5 days a week. With places like Watford and Rickmansworth, I would guess people from the centre of London would be moving in at the same time as people are moving out to more rural areas but I'm a bit clueless really as to what will happen. Do you know what you're working situation will be like post lockdown, do you know if you'll be expected to be in the office 5 days a week?
Aneres11 Posted May 6, 2021 Posted May 6, 2021 Houses buying is the worst. But buying and selling is even worse. we’ve just moved out of a new build house that we were the first owners of in 2017, to a 1900 built Victorian semi. We planned to stay in our new build for years, but circumstances changed. Namely, we got a puppy last year ( yep, like every other person in lock down) and our living room was at the back of the house, so the dog was coming in during the winter absolutely filthy and dirtying the living room, shaking mud and water all over the furniture etc. Rugs were just pointless, so were curtains which just got ruined and the room always looked scruffy because of it. There was no other way to bring her into the house from the garden and it just became tiresome. The kitchen was tiny too for a new build. I mean really cramped. Worktop space was non existent and then I decided to start my own part time baking business. Yup, like every other person in lock down. Wow I’m basic. Anyway, due to this the dog couldn’t come into the kitchen anymore (health and safety) and the business really took off so the kitchen became the baking room and we were practically falling over each other in there if I was baking and my OH was trying to make tea or a snack. We also had a government grant as part of a help to buy for the new build and that was due up in just under two years which would have sent our mortgage much higher as you remortgage with the help to buy loan added on. So we made a call to look for somewhere that now fitted in with our needs better. We moved to our new (old) house at the end of March and we love it. But then you have all the problems of an old house that whilst we were prepared for to a degree, doesn’t make them any less annoying. We’ve had wood worm, damp, blown electrics, a gas leak, non existent water pressure, and a pair of previous owners who chose to just paper over crumbling craters of plaster. The walls were ‘spongey’ which I found odd until we got the paper off and noticed that they’d just bodged it. They managed to hide a lot of the issues we’ve had with carpet, wallpaper and their furniture so we didn’t pick up on any of it when we viewed. Still, the character is incredible. Original fireplaces in each room, original Minton hallway flooring and they’d out a brand new kitchen in before they sold it (presumably to help them sell it) which is stunning. Plus I have a room I’ve converted to a baking room which keeps me out the way in my own space. Although it’s a nightmare the whole house buying and moving process, it’s so worth it when you get in and start making it a home. We have so much to do. We’ve only decorated the living room so far but it skinted us as it was THAT bad and we kept uncovering so much. But the difference is amazing and now we wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. 3
nightwolf Posted May 14, 2021 Posted May 14, 2021 We got our agreement in principle sorted! Just a little over how much we were hoping for. We also saw a couple of houses Tuesday and loved one of them, we are cautious as someone maybe put an offer in so we are seeing three more tomorrow. Question: how many house viewings is too many? Because of covid we are only getting about 15-20 minutes per viewing argh!! 3
Ashley Posted May 15, 2021 Posted May 15, 2021 15 hours ago, nightwolf said: We got our agreement in principle sorted! Just a little over how much we were hoping for. We also saw a couple of houses Tuesday and loved one of them, we are cautious as someone maybe put an offer in so we are seeing three more tomorrow. Question: how many house viewings is too many? Because of covid we are only getting about 15-20 minutes per viewing argh!! Congrats! Maybe it's worth one of you filming your own tour of it while you're in there? So if you forget exactly where/how something was you can look again. Obviously not as good, but might be a handy reference if needed.
nightwolf Posted May 15, 2021 Posted May 15, 2021 4 hours ago, Ashley said: Congrats! Maybe it's worth one of you filming your own tour of it while you're in there? So if you forget exactly where/how something was you can look again. Obviously not as good, but might be a handy reference if needed. Thanks! In the end we saw 5 places and put an offer in. We have a fight with another family/couple so I guess we will find out if we need to keep looking.
nightwolf Posted May 16, 2021 Posted May 16, 2021 Well things moved fast. The offer was accepted! In the end we saw 5 houses and felt that was enough, we very easily knew what we wanted. So now we moved forward with the solicitors tomorrow. Having a broker so far has been super useful! 3
MindFreak Posted May 17, 2021 Posted May 17, 2021 The buying process has been stretched quite a bit for me. Both the seller of the house and I had accepted the deal but our lawyer had to go through the contract. He found that the garage had not been approved by the authorities and that it was too big to be instantly approved so he advised us to make the seller get it approved - and if it couldn't be approved, we should get a refund of about 3.1 % of the amount we pay for the house. The seller did not accept the amount - he suggested 1.5 %. We refused and now we've been waiting for more than a week for the seller to return to us. This is a bit frustrating.
MoogleViper Posted June 1, 2021 Posted June 1, 2021 On 17/05/2021 at 9:23 AM, MindFreak said: The buying process has been stretched quite a bit for me. Both the seller of the house and I had accepted the deal but our lawyer had to go through the contract. He found that the garage had not been approved by the authorities and that it was too big to be instantly approved so he advised us to make the seller get it approved - and if it couldn't be approved, we should get a refund of about 3.1 % of the amount we pay for the house. The seller did not accept the amount - he suggested 1.5 %. We refused and now we've been waiting for more than a week for the seller to return to us. This is a bit frustrating. What would the difference in value be if the garage had to come down? I'd imagine it would be more than 3.1%. Definitely more than 1.5%. Would you also have to pay to bring it down yourself?
Jimbob Posted June 2, 2021 Posted June 2, 2021 Had an offer accepted on a house start of May, so finally moving out from private rental to ownership hopefully by middle to end of July. We're sick of the neighbours downstairs smoking weed, blasting loud music and just being annoying. Landlord was round the other month and could smell weed, thought it was me. Absolute pain in the rear searching for a place, we saw many houses over the past few months but they were going so, so quick. Offers going on before a viewing was done was one tactic. We went to see one house, but when we got there, an offer was put on and accepted before we stepped foot in the door. Didn't see the point of viewing it after that. Saw one which had a garage, but didn't belong to the house but to a neighbour. In the end, i think it was a case of the owner of the current house accepted our offer as we were first time buyers looking for somewhere to live other than buying up somewhere to rent it back out (which has happened a lot to the houses we've seen ourselves). Was an article i saw the other week, where in Cornwall a house was sold to FTB at a lower offer than a higher one as they were local to the area. Thought that was nice.
MindFreak Posted June 2, 2021 Posted June 2, 2021 (edited) 16 hours ago, MoogleViper said: What would the difference in value be if the garage had to come down? I'd imagine it would be more than 3.1%. Definitely more than 1.5%. Would you also have to pay to bring it down yourself? He went with our proposal in the end. He tries to make it legal and if he doesn't succeed, we get a sum of money that we can use to make it legal - which would require us to tear it down or at least a part of it. But the most likely scenario is that it is just accepted and everyone is happy. But yeah, tearing it down and rebuilding it would likely be more expensive than what we would get and devalue the house a bit. We were perhaps a bit too soft on the seller but we also didn't want him to turn us down and sell to someone else. It's a seller's market here at the moment with house prices having risen almost 14 % in Copenhagen over the last year - and it was expensive before. There aren't enough houses for sale and many want to buy houses now as well. Edited June 2, 2021 by MindFreak
nightwolf Posted June 2, 2021 Posted June 2, 2021 5 hours ago, Jimbob said: Had an offer accepted on a house start of May, so finally moving out from private rental to ownership hopefully by middle to end of July. We're sick of the neighbours downstairs smoking weed, blasting loud music and just being annoying. Landlord was round the other month and could smell weed, thought it was me. Absolute pain in the rear searching for a place, we saw many houses over the past few months but they were going so, so quick. Offers going on before a viewing was done was one tactic. We went to see one house, but when we got there, an offer was put on and accepted before we stepped foot in the door. Didn't see the point of viewing it after that. Saw one which had a garage, but didn't belong to the house but to a neighbour. In the end, i think it was a case of the owner of the current house accepted our offer as we were first time buyers looking for somewhere to live other than buying up somewhere to rent it back out (which has happened a lot to the houses we've seen ourselves). Was an article i saw the other week, where in Cornwall a house was sold to FTB at a lower offer than a higher one as they were local to the area. Thought that was nice. We had the same. A person put an offer on ours and immediately folded. Apparently some are doing it to give themselves time. Weird tactic but whatever! We are now finally getting the mortgage going, it's weird not hearing anything for days at a time I want constant check ins but that's house buying I suppose. Our seller has already nearly finished packing!
Recommended Posts