buying a London flat- doing the right thing?

ds1980

neverdespairgirl wrote: »

you said something pretty much the opposite earlier in the thread!

i very much disagree with using money to pay for education. I very much agree with using money to buy a home.

I find it very silly that parents who are the chief educators in life want to pay someone else to do it. Crazy fools.

I find it very prudent and endearing that someone wishes to spend their hard earned cash on a home that they can be proud of.

Toodlepip123

Hello

Fair play to you for making this decision - not the one I would take but liek you said, I can see why you've taken it!

However just one suggestion - maybe redo a second version fo that spreadsheet with the assumption that all company benefits have to be paid for (ie no longer covered by the company) This will give you a medium worse case scenario idea of your budget in case you need ot change jobs for whatever reason and you lose those benefits. Looks ok from where I'm sitting but off the top of my head i'd imagine your budget would only leave you with 10s of pounds spare, ratehr than hundreds. One Interest rate hike and you'd be done for. Plan carefully and good luck!

morg_monster

all the best ojos - i'm sure you'll be very happy there. you SOA is very impressive, I'm quite jealous!! :-) Realistically if you are going to live there for 10 years I'm sure buying now will not bring you any financial problems, whatever caution some of us are advising. Just don't start aspiring for a bigger and better place before you get a good pay rise ;-)
xx
still think that you could possibly knock some more off the offer - why have they accepted now; do they know something that you don't?!
oh and i agree with Toodlepip - perhaps consider a worst case scenario. Don't know where you work but if there is any chance of your company suffering in a recession you'll want to have at least a vague plan for this. As you said, a lodger could well be the answer and I'm sure you'll have people biting your arm off to live there.

olly300

OP if you are worrier then get a longer fixed rate mortgage.

neverdespairgirl

ojosverdes wrote: »

Thanks LillyJ,
I have been living in central London- zone 1 for 9years and won't like to move away. Also friends are nearby and family and friends from abroad come to stay a lot. Especially my brother with the small kids and my sister with hers. I love being central. They love it as well.

There is so much more charm in areas in central London than the ones on the outskirts. :rotfl:

Clapham isn't central London, though, surely?

I live in Bloomsbury - that is central London (-:

carolt

Best of luck, ojosverdes. I wouldn't buy now, though Clapham is an OK area if that's what you want (certainly a lot nicer than Balham). But then renting bothers me less than it appears to do you.

Out of interest, as you mentioned boyfriend, and childcare on your SOA - are children likely within the next 10 years? Does boyfriend have his own place then? Just wondering what would happen if you did have kids and fancied a house or a different area, how you'd manage if you needed or wanted to take a maternity break?

You've clearly done well saving and a strong position; you might this article on nearby Balham interesting:

http://property.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/property/article4477335.ece

" Three months on, the market is now ice cold. In our area - euphemistically called the Nightingale Triangle by the estate agent trade - there are about 30 houses like ours on sale at a similar price. Between January and May 31 this year total sales of four-bed terraced houses in our area were...none."

etc.

HelenDev

Congrats ojosverdes,

We are also buying a house for the first time, despite all the gloom mongering

I think people sometimes forget that in addition to when market conditions are 'right' there is the matter of when it is personally right for you and your financial situation. It would be a shame to wait your whole life for the 'bottom of the market' which may never come, or if it does there will be no announcement!

I bet most people here who bought a house years ago did not try and predict the bottom of the market, they bought when they wanted/needed to.

If we had bought a year or two ago, when almost EVERYONE was telling us we absolutely must, or we'd miss out forever blah blah we would have paid considerably more for this house!

Now that everyone is saying don't buy, it must be the right time

pickledpink

carolt wrote: »

Best of luck, ojosverdes. I wouldn't buy now, though Clapham is an OK area if that's what you want (certainly a lot nicer than Balham). But then renting bothers me less than it appears to do you.

Out of interest, as you mentioned boyfriend, and childcare on your SOA - are children likely within the next 10 years? Does boyfriend have his own place then? Just wondering what would happen if you did have kids and fancied a house or a different area, how you'd manage if you needed or wanted to take a maternity break?

You've clearly done well saving and a strong position; you might this article on nearby Balham interesting:

http://property.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/property/article4477335.ece

" Three months on, the market is now ice cold. In our area - euphemistically called the Nightingale Triangle by the estate agent trade - there are about 30 houses like ours on sale at a similar price. Between January and May 31 this year total sales of four-bed terraced houses in our area were...none."

etc.

Nice to see you're back to your normal bitter self, Carolt.

By the way, you forgot to copy and paste the part of that report where he then said he finally sold his place after 3 months!:p

As for your views on Clapham/Baham - have you ever been there? I don't think you have! You don't even live in London!

I bet you wish you were still Ojo's age and had the ooportunity to buy a beautiful period property in a wonderful location. How much rent have you spent over the last 25 years' I wonder? Just think, the place you're renting now was probably bought for about £1,600 25 years' back; what's it worth now do you think?:mad:

LillyJ

neverdespairgirl wrote: »

Clapham isn't central London, though, surely?

I live in Bloomsbury - that is central London (-:

Clapham isn't central, but Woking is even less central

Now bloomsbury is one place everyone would agree is central!

ojosverdes

carolt wrote: »

Out of interest, as you mentioned boyfriend, and childcare on your SOA - are children likely within the next 10 years? Does boyfriend have his own place then? Just wondering what would happen if you did have kids and fancied a house or a different area, how you'd manage if you needed or wanted to take a maternity break?

Hi,
The subject has come up, but it won't be for another 6-7y before I start trying.
My boyfriend has his own place and is 5y of 10y into his mortgage. We probably live together first in one of the flats (I hope mine!:D ) and we can rent out the other. He makes good money - nearly double of my salary - so I would think we would be ok if I'd to go on maternity leave.

Then further in the future - beyond 10years - we could sell the 2 UK flats and the one abroad to move into a house.