Jump to content
NEurope
Shorty

House buying is the worst

Recommended Posts

1 hour ago, Fierce_LiNk said:

I want to go to Tokyo. N-E meet? :D

You could ask the person to meet at your place or in a café or your place or something. Our person came over and had tea and biscuits with us. I wouldn't have been able to go into a branch either due to work. It was quite useful, even just as a starting point and to talk about all of the available options. @Eenuh is probably the better out of the two of us in terms of finances and stuff. 

Yes! N-E meet in Tokyo haha! I'm off to there as part of my honeymoon in May :D

  • Like 3

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Booked an appointment with a mortgage adviser at the end of next week, mostly for a lark as I suspect they'll say no because of my work sitch.

Also looked a bit into shared ownership yesterday and I can't see why people would do that.  Sure, you pay less of a deposit but seemingly pay much more in monthly costs and you can't outright own the home (at some point I thought you'd eventually buy the whole property but it seems there is an upper limit) so you're essentially trapped there...right?  Just seems like a ponzi scheme unless I'm missing something.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
On ‎30‎/‎12‎/‎2017 at 6:59 PM, Blade said:

Yes! N-E meet in Tokyo haha! I'm off to there as part of my honeymoon in May :D

Hope you and @Kav have an excellent time!

6 minutes ago, Ashley said:

Booked an appointment with a mortgage adviser at the end of next week, mostly for a lark as I suspect they'll say no because of my work sitch.

Also looked a bit into shared ownership yesterday and I can't see why people would do that.  Sure, you pay less of a deposit but seemingly pay much more in monthly costs and you can't outright own the home (at some point I thought you'd eventually buy the whole property but it seems there is an upper limit) so you're essentially trapped there...right?  Just seems like a ponzi scheme unless I'm missing something.

Goood maaaaaan. 

I think @Eenuh has been speaking to you about shared ownership stuff. I'm not a fan of it. It seems and feels quite complicated and, imo, finances need to be kept simple to be kept on top of.

  • Haha 2

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Just now, Fierce_LiNk said:

Goood maaaaaan. 

I think @Eenuh has been speaking to you about shared ownership stuff. I'm not a fan of it. It seems and feels quite complicated and, imo, finances need to be kept simple to be kept on top of.

We spoke briefly yesterday on facebook, in which I mostly said the above anyway.  I just don't get it.  I'm approaching this meeting next week to figure out that top-level stuff and speak to someone who presumably knows more about it.

I still think I'll go "nah, I'll just bugger off instead" :heh: 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
17 minutes ago, Ashley said:

We spoke briefly yesterday on facebook, in which I mostly said the above anyway.  I just don't get it.  I'm approaching this meeting next week to figure out that top-level stuff and speak to someone who presumably knows more about it.

I still think I'll go "nah, I'll just bugger off instead" :heh: 

Hopefully they'll be able to explain all of the ins-and-outs of this sort of stuff. Buying a house is much more difficult than buying, say, a laptop. I wish it was easier!

Good luck with the meeting! 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
On 12/30/2017 at 6:59 PM, Blade said:

Yes! N-E meet in Tokyo haha! I'm off to there as part of my honeymoon in May :D

Can we add an N-E meet in October for Tokyo too? I'm a bit terrified that me and my partner are going! :eek:

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Just an FYI, I don't think you can legally rent to family.  I know someone who bought a house with his partner to rent to his dad and brother and it all had to be under her name (they arent married) so that may be a legal sticking point. Could be a weird antiquated law in northern ireland, but its worth checking out the legalities just in case. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
14 minutes ago, Raining_again said:

Just an FYI, I don't think you can legally rent to family.  I know someone who bought a house with his partner to rent to his dad and brother and it all had to be under her name (they arent married) so that may be a legal sticking point. Could be a weird antiquated law in northern ireland, but its worth checking out the legalities just in case. 

Hmm having a quick look it is legally possible, but just requires more hoop jumping including a 40% deposit and even on a property in my home town that's lolnope.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Just back and I basically have three options:

  1. Buy to let back home, but would need to save up another ~20k for the deposit because of the higher percentage needed and the loan amount is in the "properties that are okay but it's not going to be easy to find one that ticks some of the boxes" range.
  2. Go back into full-time work and then get a shared ownership thing (I could probably get work to make my contract full time with little quarrelling)
  3. Do the contracting stuff for another 2 years (before they'll factor it in) and think about it again

I think I'll probably do 3.  Or, rather, I'll kick it into the grass.  My PT work ends in September and my contracting projects end around then as well, so I'll see which has more legs.  Obviously I hope for the latter because its better paid, but we'll see.

I think I'll just enjoy life for a while instead. Although I was doing some reading last night and I'm getting a brace next month and they advise against tomato-based food, red wine and bread so maybe I won't be going to Italy in a few months 🙃

  • Thanks 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Meh this is the closest place.

I got a new bed recently and it's fine, but in hindsight I should have got one a bit higher off the floor.  Can anyone advise about raising the height of a bed, particularly given it has two metal support feet in the middle.  It's this bed (support feet not pictured).

Chrysanthos+Double+Upholstered+Bed+Frame

 

I've had a quick look and I can see you can buy things that will raise the feet, but for some reason I'm just assuming that won't work with the middle ones.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

As long as whatever you're raising it with is screwed in, I'm sure it will be fine. Alternatively, return the bed? Or buy a bigger mattress :p

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

How would a bigger mattress change things...?

It's more that I can't find anything comparable for the metal bits. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

All six are screwed in. The four main ones are just a bit of wood with a screw in (quiet). The other two are T-shaped bits of metal that screw into the central support bar and have wee feet on the bottom of them. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Had an offer verbally accepted on a flat last Monday and we were advised by our solicitor to get the mortgage sorted. A week and a bit later we're still waiting on the official letter of acceptance but their solicitor told ours this morning (via letter - why do they still use letters!) that they were taking final instructions from their client.

I have no idea what these final instructions are. The flat is empty and hasn't been lived in in months as they've been renting it out for years. Our tentative move-in date was June 27th but this might have to push back as my LISA can take up to 30 days to withdraw for some unknown reason. Hopefully it doesn't actually take that long...

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
6 hours ago, Charlie said:

Our tentative move-in date was June 27th but this might have to push back as my LISA can take up to 30 days to withdraw for some unknown reason. 

Because you didn't sing her a birthday song?

  • Haha 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
22 hours ago, nightwolf said:

If there's a Tokyo meet, I'm there in November :D aww yiss. 

Are we to assume you're buying a home there and that's why you posted here...?

  • Weird 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Finally getting my keys tomorrow!

Seller had threatened to pull out if we didn't complete  by 12 today but it was totally out of our hands (it was actually their fault) but they didn't seem to care. Finally got everything sorted last night and just need to get the money transferred then pick up the keys tomorrow.

  • Like 1

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Congrats!

It's such a stressful time before you get your keys, because most of it is not something you have any control over. Hope it all goes well!
I remember it being such a pain in our case as well, with the sellers taking ages to sort out their house purchase (6 months!), and their online solicitors just being useless in general (for example not notifying them that our funds had been transferred). D:

 

We are currently in the process of remortgaging. I am going to try to do it myself rather than using a broker, but we'll see if I can manage to do it or not. Not sure if I should go for a 2, 3 or 5 year fixed rate though! 5 years is more stability, but we would be paying a bit more. But then if we go for 2 or 3 years, the rates might have risen lots after that time. So yeah, fun times. :p

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Charlie said:

Finally getting my keys tomorrow!

Seller had threatened to pull out if we didn't complete  by 12 today but it was totally out of our hands (it was actually their fault) but they didn't seem to care. Finally got everything sorted last night and just need to get the money transferred then pick up the keys tomorrow.

Same thing happened to us. Seller took 4 months to evict the tenant, then wouldn't answer one of our questions for another 2 months, then told us at midday that we had to exchange contracts by the end of the day or he would relist it. Asshole never did answer our question.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
46 minutes ago, Eenuh said:

We are currently in the process of remortgaging. I am going to try to do it myself rather than using a broker, but we'll see if I can manage to do it or not. Not sure if I should go for a 2, 3 or 5 year fixed rate though! 5 years is more stability, but we would be paying a bit more. But then if we go for 2 or 3 years, the rates might have risen lots after that time. So yeah, fun times. :p

I got a crazy good rate on a new 5 year fixed recently. I think you can do it without a broker just fine (not that I did, I have a broker I can use for free), it's the new lender's solicitors that manage the difficult parts anyway.

My main interest was getting somewhere that lets you transfer that mortgage, cos I'm thinking of moving again soon ish!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
1 hour ago, Shorty said:

I got a crazy good rate on a new 5 year fixed recently. I think you can do it without a broker just fine (not that I did, I have a broker I can use for free), it's the new lender's solicitors that manage the difficult parts anyway.

My main interest was getting somewhere that lets you transfer that mortgage, cos I'm thinking of moving again soon ish!

If you don't mind me asking, what lender is that with and what rate are you getting? Though I guess of course the rate will depend on your LTV, and ours is still very high. Feels like we barely paid off anything on our mortgage!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Tesco, 2.08%, 28 months remaining. I overpaid my mortgage in the second year by a fair amount though.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

×