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WWYD? In this climate, would you risk moving? Be honest.
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uropachild
Posts: 522 Forumite
Okay, imagine you are me... I need brutally honest expert and not so expert opinions please. 
My husband and i would like to move to a bigger house. We are living in a 3 bed semi in Yorkshire and would like to move to a new build 4 bed detached. We don't NEED to move, but after assessing what money we need to spend on our existing house to get it how we would like it and what we can afford to add to our mortgage we have decided to seriously consider moving to a new build.
Here's the maths:
Our house would go on the market for £140K and probably achieve £135 after a while, but would likely sell quite fast if we put it on at £120-125K. Houses down my street were up for sale at £160-165K at peak. We really don't want to sell our house in the traditional way, but a developer has offered us £135 for it in part exchange.
We can afford an extra £40K on our existing mortgage of £66,500 and have some savings to pay for the fees associated with moving.
If we stayed put we would be looking at paying at least £15K to get our current house to a standard where nothing else needs doing (to compare to a new build where of course everything is already done).
We are very lucky because our repayment mortgage is currently only £360 because of the interest rates - we're on the SVR. We can afford £600 per month without me having to go back to work (i'm a stay at home mum at the moment).
If you were us what would you do?
I really don't know what to do for the best. We would like to extend our family and will probably need the extra room eventually, but do we move soon or wait or not bother at all!? My dad keeps telling us we don't need the room because him and his 5 brothers and sisters all shared two bedrooms growing up. I understand that, which is why i say we don't need to move, as such.
Thanks for reading.

My husband and i would like to move to a bigger house. We are living in a 3 bed semi in Yorkshire and would like to move to a new build 4 bed detached. We don't NEED to move, but after assessing what money we need to spend on our existing house to get it how we would like it and what we can afford to add to our mortgage we have decided to seriously consider moving to a new build.
Here's the maths:
Our house would go on the market for £140K and probably achieve £135 after a while, but would likely sell quite fast if we put it on at £120-125K. Houses down my street were up for sale at £160-165K at peak. We really don't want to sell our house in the traditional way, but a developer has offered us £135 for it in part exchange.
We can afford an extra £40K on our existing mortgage of £66,500 and have some savings to pay for the fees associated with moving.
If we stayed put we would be looking at paying at least £15K to get our current house to a standard where nothing else needs doing (to compare to a new build where of course everything is already done).
We are very lucky because our repayment mortgage is currently only £360 because of the interest rates - we're on the SVR. We can afford £600 per month without me having to go back to work (i'm a stay at home mum at the moment).
If you were us what would you do?
I really don't know what to do for the best. We would like to extend our family and will probably need the extra room eventually, but do we move soon or wait or not bother at all!? My dad keeps telling us we don't need the room because him and his 5 brothers and sisters all shared two bedrooms growing up. I understand that, which is why i say we don't need to move, as such.
Thanks for reading.

Sarah. 
DD is 8 years old DS1 is 6 years old
DS2 is 14 months old

DD is 8 years old DS1 is 6 years old
DS2 is 14 months old
0
Comments
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you need to do a spreadsheet and work out how much your mortgage would be when interest rates go up - these low rates will not last forever.
newbuilds are not without their problems in terms of poor building quality and snaggings
if you know you will increase the size of your family - then buying a larger house at the bottom of the market may make sense
tricky one0 -
Thanks.
At the extreme after a 5 year fix at 3.99% if interest rates went up to 15% the mortgage would be £1225 per month. We couldn't afford it on my husbands salary alone, but if i went back to work we would manage, although it would be incredibly tight.
I need a time machine...Sarah.
DD is 8 years old DS1 is 6 years old
DS2 is 14 months old0 -
If staying meant you could have another baby and not have you go to work .... why would you want to move to have a baby and then have to go out to work and have a worse standard of living.0
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This is the thing... Interest rates might not go up that high. If we stay put and they don't increase that much and it turns out we could have moved to a bigger house i would be kicking myself!
BUT, they also might just end up that high.
I suppose the worst case scenario of staying put would be that we end up crowded in this house, having spent £15K on making it nice and we have to move anyway (or have to stay put because we can't afford to move by that point).
Worst case scenario of moving would be that interest rates sky-rocket and i have to either go back to work to fund the more expensive mortgage payment, or we sell up and downsize again back to something similar to what we're in now.
Hmmm...
Thanks for helping me. I think i just need to thrash this out some more and getting outside, non-emotionally involved opinions will help.Sarah.
DD is 8 years old DS1 is 6 years old
DS2 is 14 months old0 -
While trying to decide pay the £600pm you can afford.
If you have swap on offer it is down to whats the new place worth to you.
Is it likely to have lower running costs, what is the councel tax etc.0 -
That's a great idea Getmore! At least then we can actually test the affordability while we wait to see what the prices do. Fab!Sarah.
DD is 8 years old DS1 is 6 years old
DS2 is 14 months old0 -
Sometimes at the end of the day, whatever the hard economic facts there are still those who want to move up. It is exciting and there are those who pay a premium for a brand new home.
And there are the good builders but you need to check them out carefully. Look at those who live in their recently completed houses, walk down the street (and if you are confident) stop people and ask for their help - in what they think of the builder.A retired senior partner, in own agency, with 40 years experience in property sales & new build. In latter part of career specialising in commercial - mostly business sales.0 -
Personally if it was me, I would go for it. In fact we are
We sold our house in September 2007, have rented upto now in a tiny 2 bed Bungalow. A house we loved back then was on at 475k which we couldn't afford, but we have agreed a sale of 418600k which is currently going through now.
Personally I think as long as you don't stretch yourself too much it should be fine even in times when the rate rises.
You could try to fix for longer - 10 yrs or so if you think you wont be moving etc. Sure it might be hard at times, but it depends on how you look at it, we wanted the extra space in our next house which we will get this time around, to my missus a family room/dinning room is something she really wanted and unfortunatley we couldnt really do anything with our previous house as it had no room to grow.
You never know what will happen in the future but i strongly believe you only regret the thingas you don't do. If it gets too much or too hard, you would have to sell up etc. Personally i wouldn't go for a new build but thats just my personally choice although my wife really loves them.
If your gut instinct tells you to go for it, give it a go... interesting that a developer would give you what you think you would get on the open market i use to think they would offer you much less than open market price.Listen to what people say, but watch what people what people do!!0
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