Wife wants to buy now, I want to wait 5 years+. Advice?

getmore4less

Glen0000 wrote: »

Also a lot of stigma associated with HA/council housing. DD is very lucky to go to a good comp, but several of her friends not allowed to play at our house as we live on a council estate.

Wife gets very depressed about this and has led to the overspending as she wants DD to have the latest phone/ clothes to show her friends parents we are not poor/chavs.

1. Low rent, ok income, relativly large debts you are spending beyond your means. You can't afford to buy unless you sort out the spending issue

2. Keep up with the Jones are you mad, these status concious so called friends are probably one missing payment away from the repo man on the house and up to their eyeballs in CC debt also.

You are not poor, far from it, buying the stuff is making you poor and if you buy a house and continue spending you will be destitute before long.

This inheritance is a chance to get out of the debt cycle don't waste that chance. Pay off the debt and as others have said budget as if you had your own house to see if you can manage it, remember buying a house is not just a mortgage it is also a lot of upkeep to pay for that currently in included in the rent so you need to save that also. Do this while the prices are dropping and you may get lucky and find you can afford somewhere that is affordable.

Currently you will have more discretionary money if you stay renting the important thing is to spend/save it wisely and not on keeping up with the Jones.

Glen0000

getmore4less wrote: »

1. Low rent, ok income, relativly large debts you are spending beyond your means. You can't afford to buy unless you sort out the spending issue

2. Keep up with the Jones are you mad, these status concious so called friends are probably one missing payment away from the repo man on the house and up to their eyeballs in CC debt also.

You are not poor, far from it, buying the stuff is making you poor and if you buy a house and continue spending you will be destitute before long.

.

It is really hard to get this over to the wife. Take her sister. Single mum,3 kids. Earns £5k. Lives in a lovely 3 bed new house, private rent. Like a show home. Sister is out every weekend, 2 hoildays a year as well as the Radley bags and designer gear. Also had her boobs done on the tick 8 months ago. Yes, she has £20k of debt, but she is not the one in the council house with a 10 yr old sofa and no social life. Wife see this and think, why can we not live that way? Sister does not appear to be suffering. I see many, many examples of this and despite the crys of recession, the 3 friends of DD who got iphones for Christmas make me feel like crap as she got a £30 game as her main gift. The party is still not over for a lot of people and until it is I will have a hard time convincing the wife.

Ian_Griffiths_Halifax

Glen0000 wrote: »

It is really hard to get this over to the wife. Take her sister. Single mum,3 kids. Earns £5k. Lives in a lovely 3 bed new house, private rent. Like a show home. Sister is out every weekend, 2 hoildays a year as well as the Radley bags and designer gear. Also had her boobs done on the tick 8 months ago. Yes, she has £20k of debt, but she is not the one in the council house with a 10 yr old sofa and no social life. Wife see this and think, why can we not live that way? Sister does not appear to be suffering. I see many, many examples of this and despite the crys of recession, the 3 friends of DD who got iphones for Christmas make me feel like crap as she got a £30 game as her main gift. The party is still not over for a lot of people and until it is I will have a hard time convincing the wife.

Ok, so a compromise. Pay £7,500 off the cards and spend the other £7,500 on a boob job for her and a years supply of Viagra for your self. That way she'll be able to save some money and watch her investment rise!

WARNING! Your Investment may fall as well as rise.

mdk1

Think Boob jobs are only about £4000 now

Wifey has been doing some research

shaven-monkey

10k debt over 5 years at 17.9% apr with no payments = £24,312 ish In fact if you make monthly payments of £150 per month you're still owing £9,920 after the 5 years.

Paying off the debt makes you £150 per month better off in absolute terms. Stick £50 per month into savings and give wifey the £100 as entertainment / treats budget per month.
Just putting the 150 per month into a tin would yield you £9000, putting it into some form of savings would give a better return.
With that saved there'd be enough for a boob job in less than 4 years or enough to buy a new sofa every 4 months.

Save now, buy later, pay less, appreciate more.

TotallyBroke

use https://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html you don't have to post it at all.
Do one as your family income/outgoings stand living where you are and the way you are.
Do another showing you as credit card free and with a little bit of savings but still living as you are.
Then do one imagining you are living in new home with double (atleast) mortgage payment compared to your rent. Increased council tax payment. Higher gas, electric etc. Buildings & contents insurance etc.

Show them to her. In black and white it is easy to see. Could you realistically afford it. Remembering how much i-pods etc cost and including them under presents etc.

Good luck but I'd suggest being totally debt free and saving bloody hard in 2009 before considering taking on a new mortgage.

Ian_Griffiths_Halifax

mdk1 wrote: »

Think Boob jobs are only about £4000 now

Wifey has been doing some research

Tell her to wait for the January Sales. I expect she'll be able to find plenty of 2 for the price of one offers. I hear the industry is going tits up.

whathavewedone

I'm not sure that the proposals to means test council tenants will ever come to anything - I think it's just something the government have put out there to win over the Daily Mail brigade. In any event I don't think they're proposing to chuck people out, I thought the idea was that those who could afford to would be asked to pay a market rent.

The only way that you are going to achieve this is by (a) paying off your debt (b) not taking out any more cards and (c) saving a lot more as even if prices plummet you will need more than a 5k deposit.

Will your wife be prepared to take such a drop in your standard of living in the short term? If you have lived with the same sofa etc for years, what are you spending the money on? It can't just be on your dd. You need to sit down and write down everything you spend money on, sweets, papers, magazines EVERYTHING. A lot of money must be being frittered away somewhere.

If you find that not much money is being frittered away and you think that your lifestyle is pretty spartan as it is then I think you should just forget about buying a house, I really do. It must be awful that some of your dds friends aren't allowed to play at your house but that's their parents fault and you should resist any attempt to keep up with the Joneses. People who are that snobby are not going to alter their views just because your dd has nice clothes and the latest toys - in fact they will probably look down on you even more as they will think you have more money than you really do and are therefore getting something for nothing. If anything you're both conforming to a lot of people's preconceptions/stereotypes about council tenants having big plasmas, wearing designer clothes etc.

!!!! what other people think.

It's also likely that in 2-3 years time interest rates will rise sharply. Do you think you and the missus would be able to cope with a £80,000k mortgage at 16%? We already own a house and the answer to that question for us (as with many people) is no but if we were in your position right now with the economic situation as it is we would stay put.

The most important thing is that you have a roof over your family's head which you can afford to pay for. Security is more important than what other people think.

Why not pay off your debts, aim to stay out of debt and spend a bit of the spare cash on making your existing home nicer? Splash out on a new sofa maybe. After all, if you buy somewhere you may have to spend money when you move in on boring things like guttering before you even think about the niceties like new furniture. And I bet if you did get a new house that the next thing would be that your wife would want it to be a palace and if there's no spare money I can seeing you getting home improvement loans secured on the property ...

Could you handle being homeless again? I am being really harsh now but it is a question you need to ask yourself. Because next time you might not get a 3 bedroom house. A lot of people are going to get made homeless over the next couple of years and a lot of them will have more than one child.

getmore4less

Glen0000 wrote: »

It is really hard to get this over to the wife. Take her sister. Single mum,3 kids. Earns £5k. Lives in a lovely 3 bed new house, private rent. Like a show home. Sister is out every weekend, 2 hoildays a year as well as the Radley bags and designer gear. Also had her boobs done on the tick 8 months ago. Yes, she has £20k of debt, but she is not the one in the council house with a 10 yr old sofa and no social life. Wife see this and think, why can we not live that way? Sister does not appear to be suffering. I see many, many examples of this and despite the crys of recession, the 3 friends of DD who got iphones for Christmas make me feel like crap as she got a £30 game as her main gift. The party is still not over for a lot of people and until it is I will have a hard time convincing the wife.

Leave your wife and she can live like that if she wants and won't bring you down at the same time.(not a serious option)

The sister is probably getting significant benifits, rent,council tax, child benifit, tax credits and more. Total net income may not be far of what you earn.

Are you are claimng all your benifits.

geoffky

remember a house and mortgage can become a monkey round your neck....its not all its cracked up to be owning a house (or the bank owns it for the first 25 years)

AND GET HER TO READ THESE REPLYS