getting a house

[amyclaire]

So oh and I want to be in a house and have a mortgage by nxt june when we start ttc. My parents have said they want to help with the deposit. The thing is, oh and I went for a meal with them last night and basically conversation got onto the future etc and my mum said In passing "ahh it'll be a good few years before you'll be looking at getting a house"... What do I do!? We are absolutely certain that we want to be ttc by sept at the latest nxt year. Should we consider continuing to rent even with a baby? Does anyone have experience of this? Or should we break the news of wanting to ttc at 22 (10 years before my mum n dad had me)... Then maybe even if they're against us ttc (which isn't going to stop us ttc anyway) maybe it'll make them realise that we're really ready to get a house.. Ahhhh!! Sorry for rambling, just really need some advice/personal experiences xxxx

 

[4magpies]

We saved for our own deposit and I used some of my inheritance from my grandad.

We have bought on our own @ 22 and I am really proud of that fact.

I dont know how family will react when I get pregnant though but me and my mum were talking last night about how my cousin has endo and wants a hysto but they wont give her one because she is too young but she knows she doesnt want children and I said I find it odd when women dont want children and she said its just natural so I'm guessing she would be happy for me as she knows I want children!

Sorry about the longwindedness and varying off topic.

Just tell them you were thinking of buying sooner. You dont have to mention the fact that its because you want to TTC. Just say you want to get on the property ladder quickly whilst house prices are low and stop wasting money on rent.

That was part of our reason for buying, so was starting a family but we havent mentioned that to family.

xxx

 

[Princess_LV]

Amy! Long time no see!

I'd tell you parents that you want to buy sooner, but no need to tell them why, right? I'd disguise it as having found the house of your dreams that you just can't pass up on. Also, market is on the rise, so emphasise that the sooner you act, the more house for your money you will get. You've also already started saving, so you can show them that you are serious about it.

Have you looked into how much of a mortgage you can get yet? Banks are still being fairly stingey in general, and not keeping up with the property prices just yet- we could borrow a max of just £55k. Not even enough for a shed here! IMO, this goes in favour of waiting a while.

We've made the decision to have a baby while renting, as otherwise we worry we won't end up doing either. We currently pay £595 pcm for our large 2 bed flat. We are looking at getting a 2 bed house instead, so that we will have a garden for LO. We did originally want to buy first, but for us it is just not doable, as I will need to save money to cover my graduate loan through maternity leave - so bang goes my share of the deposit.

At first, OH was conviced we wouldn't be able to buy if we had a baby first, but I think if you ensure you live within your means, you CAN save at the same time. We have now resolved that we will buy in between bubba #1 and bubba #2. My point, I guess, is that it is a personal decision, and neither way of doing it it wrong or right. If you think you can realistically do the house first, do the house first. If not, renting with a child will not be the end of the world! x x

 

[silverbell]

Not sure about your situation exactly, but DH and I will be renting for the foreseeable future. We have no chance of saving enough for a deposit as yet and we've delayed baby-making for long enough (we're 30 next year and the clock is ticking if we want to get our family started).

It took some getting used to and in the ideal world we'd have a fabulous house and a mortgage before TTC, but this isn't an ideal world and we've accepted that.

We'll be looking for a larger place to rent once TTC.

 

[mandaa1220]

did you post this twice

 

[wanna-b-mummy]

Hi Amy hun,

I would tell them you're looking to move out and buy sooner. You don't need to tell them why. I would just say you're sick of throwing money down a black hole with renting and want something you can decorate and call your own.

I totally understand. We're in nooo position to buy at the moment (no deposit at all, every penny of our cash is used on bills and rent etc) but owning a house is something I really badly want to do so I can understand wanting to do it sooner than later.

 

[DJ987]

Hey Amy! Haven't seen you for some time, hope the exams are going well!

I agree with the others in that I would say you hope to buy sooner due to house prices etc, but there is no need to say why!

Personally I think mortgages are better than renting, my mortgage is less than your rent Leah! And we have a lovely 3 bedroom house. My friend has just bought a house on a scheme, I think it's the Homebuy Direct scheme it's for first time buyers, and as long as you have enough for your legal fees you don't have to have a deposit with all of them, my friend had to have £500 to reserve her house and that was it! Some of them I think you need a 5% deposit. and because the banks see the money you get from Homebuy as a deposit (up to 30%) you get a better mortgage rate! So it's a win win really! xxx

 

[DJ987]

Oh and I should of said we didn't have any help from parents either I saved my uni bursary but seeing as you are almost finished it's bit late for that now!

 

[Princess_LV]

Most mortgages are lower than our rent unfortunately we found a house we really, really liked in Daventry, 3 bed, all recently refurb'd for £89,000... got ok'd on the mortgage for it, family were all ready to lend us the short fall on the deposit, went down to fill in the full application, and the divvy cow had added an extra zero to our income figure!! Needless to say, without that extra zero we fell flat on our faces. We were heartbroken lol. The repayment would have only been £400 a month (capital and interest), which if we can afford 595, we can obviously afford! But, alas, banks do not work like that - if they did all the sensible people in the world would be able to have mortgages! Hey-ho, we will get there one day! I would have prefered to buy first, but as I don't know when we will be able to, I'm not willing to put off the baby-making! x

 

[amyclaire]

Thanks for all the advice definitely going to look into the homebuy direct thing. If you just have the money for legal fees and don't pay a deposit does it not make your mortgage much higher?? I suppose even if it is, it'll still be much lower than our current rent, £600. Its just difficult being in greater manchester. Even if we move away from the centre which we will, (somewhere more rural etc) its going to be over 100000.
Aww that sounds horrible leah hope we can find somewhere with 3 beds its not like I'm too fussy. The only room I'm fussy about is to have a decent sized kitchen because of how much I like cooking. That and a fair sized garden for the bunnies
I'm good thanks danielle, just not been online much been revising etc. I'll be done at 5 a week on friday then I'll be addicted to bnb once again
Lol I did post it twice... I altered the title and for some reason it posted twice instead of just changing it.. Ooooops xxxx

 

[DJ987]

No it doesn't make your mortgage higher (sorry wasn't very explicit) the government and the home builder (for brand new builds) give you half the deposit each which in my friends case was 15% from builder, 15% from govt, and they give it in the form of a loan which is interest free for 5 years and you don't have to pay it back. When you sell the house 30% will be divided between them! Or you can pay it off in big chunks I think. So it's pretty darn good really and it's not like shared ownership because you own all the house! Defo worth looking into xxx

 

[DJ987]

Ooh and Amy a week on fri will be big day for both of us then because that's when i come to the end of my 2WW!! 9 more sleeps! xx

 

[Princess_LV]

If you go the homebuy direct route, I'd pay off the 30% gradually, because otherwise the gov and developer retain a charge over your house - much better to eventually buy them out when you can afford it than keep owing the 30%, because if/when you sell, it will be 30% of the then market value you have to pay them back, not 30% of the price you paid for the house, so when the market rises you'll owe more than you borrowed. Hope that really long sentence made sense lol x

 

[DJ987]

Lol yes that is another good point I failed to mention lol.. My friend seems to think you can't pay it off monthly though and you can only do it in chunks?

 

[Princess_LV]

Depends on the terms of the scheme you take on, just like with any other contract. They call the options staging and staircasing I think, but I can't remember which is which! If you negoitiate the contract quite well, you can have a mixture of the 2, but they like to place a limit on how much you can get rid of each year so they still make money off of you in the long run. The ones I've seen say you can pay of lump sums or regular payments, so long as over the course of a year they do not exceed 15% of the amount outstanding. So, for example, if the house was £100,000 and the scheme paid £30,000 for you, then in the first year you could pay back a maximum of £4,500, on top of paying your mortgage on the other £70,000.

They are quite good options, the only problems we found was that there are no developments around here offering it, and in the ones we looked at a bit further afield, the houses were all pre-fab style, so didn't seem too sturdy.

Still, better than rent-to-buy schemes and shared ownership schemes (non-gov backed) which most banks won't even lend on!

 

[4magpies]

I have bought my house with homebuy direct! Its fab!

xx

 

[amyclaire]

Had a quick look on the homebuy direct website. All looks really good etc, but there's only really select properties that you can get, and they're very university-accommodation like, if you get what I mean, mews houses etc. Hmmm. I just want a nice house!! Ahhhhhhh!!!!! (Sorry) xxxx

 

[amyclaire]

Oh my god danielle its getting so close!! U getting excited then?xxxx

 

[4magpies]

Mines a millerhomes one so its good build quality, stone built, double drive, garden. I love it!

xx

 

[Sooz]

You might be interested to know that The Nottingham are offering 95% LTV mortgages in some areas of the country, though the FR is 6.39% for 2 years (high for now but not compared to what the rates used to be in the property boom).

We are in the process of trying to buy a house (like waiting to exchange) and it has been the single most stressful thing I have ever done. I feel like I am on the verge of a nervous breakdown and keep wondering if it's worth it all. We are buying because I cannot see us being able to buy after having a baby, due to me, as the higher earner, not working. It would be difficult to get a mortgage based on DH's income alone.