Feel like giving up saving for a deposit

laurad85

Me and my partner are currently saving for a deposit for a house. We have £4000 at the moment and will need to have £13,000 plus money for fees (this would only be a 10% deposit). We spend most of the week at mine and a few days a week at his but we are really feeling down at the moment.

We hardly ever get to see each other because we have nowhere to be alone together except our bedrooms, which we get sick off spending alot of time in. Every spare penny we have has gone to paying off debts and we are currently debt free but feel guilty if we go for a meal to get away from everyone. We drive old cars, both of which recently failed their MOT and needed fixed-eating into our savings. We are finding living between two houses difficult because we have to constantly think ahead and bring clothes, food, and things i need for work to each house. It sounds silly but i forgot the bread i bought the other day and was gutted because i had to go and buy some more whilst the other one went to waste! Stupid i know!

Because we dont have a house, friends and family think they are doing us a favour by getting us to house sit or pet sit when they go on holiday or away for weekends. At first i like the freedom but it always seems to cost us money, my OH's parents are away this weekend and i am having to travel an extra 12 miles to work and 12 miles back just to keep an eye on their place. Of course, i left milk etc at home so had to go an buy more food. The final straw came this morning when we got woken up at 8am by a company coming to do some work on the outside of the house, we wernt told about this and my partner works till 12 at night. He has went to work another 12 hour shift exhaused and fed up.

We are now thinking about renting somewhere. We can rent a 1 bed apartment for £395 which after all bills have been paid should leave us with £500 left a month to save (we know at theis point this is a rough estimate-hopefully it will be more). We wont have sky, broadband etc and already have most of the stuff we need to move in in my parents house. We can get an old couch from a family friend but would need to buy a washing machine, we already have a fridge, tv etc.

Is anybody else in this situation? We really wanted to save up and buy our first house together but it is getting ridiculous now, we just want to be together without anybody else! We just want to know what would everyone do in this situation?

Thanks

Wutang_2

laurad85 wrote: »

Me and my partner are currently saving for a deposit for a house. We have £4000 at the moment and will need to have £13,000 plus money for fees (this would only be a 10% deposit). We spend most of the week at mine and a few days a week at his but we are really feeling down at the moment.

We hardly ever get to see each other because we have nowhere to be alone together except our bedrooms, which we get sick off spending alot of time in. Every spare penny we have has gone to paying off debts and we are currently debt free but feel guilty if we go for a meal to get away from everyone. We drive old cars, both of which recently failed their MOT and needed fixed-eating into our savings. We are finding living between two houses difficult because we have to constantly think ahead and bring clothes, food, and things i need for work to each house. It sounds silly but i forgot the bread i bought the other day and was gutted because i had to go and buy some more whilst the other one went to waste! Stupid i know!

Because we dont have a house, friends and family think they are doing us a favour by getting us to house sit or pet sit when they go on holiday or away for weekends. At first i like the freedom but it always seems to cost us money, my OH's parents are away this weekend and i am having to travel an extra 12 miles to work and 12 miles back just to keep an eye on their place. Of course, i left milk etc at home so had to go an buy more food. The final straw came this morning when we got woken up at 8am by a company coming to do some work on the outside of the house, we wernt told about this and my partner works till 12 at night. He has went to work another 12 hour shift exhaused and fed up.

We are now thinking about renting somewhere. We can rent a 1 bed apartment for £395 which after all bills have been paid should leave us with £500 left a month to save (we know at theis point this is a rough estimate-hopefully it will be more). We wont have sky, broadband etc and already have most of the stuff we need to move in in my parents house. We can get an old couch from a family friend but would need to buy a washing machine, we already have a fridge, tv etc.

Is anybody else in this situation? We really wanted to save up and buy our first house together but it is getting ridiculous now, we just want to be together without anybody else! We just want to know what would everyone do in this situation?

Thanks

Earn more money and shop in Lidl.

VKay

Sorry you are feeling so fed up. You have cleared your debts and now making progress with your savings. You should feel proud of this.

From your username i am guessing you are around 25 years old. Do remember that average age of a first time buyer is into 30s now. This means that you are no way alone in being in your mid 20s and not being able to afford to buy.

My partner and i have bought a house in the last year. We are in our mid thirties and have rented and saved bit by bit for years.

Youre ahead of many young people in that you are debt free and have realised you need to budget carefully in order to achieve your goal. Now go for it! Don't expect it to happen next week.
The choice is carry on with your parents and save more or rent and save less but be together. it might be a good way to see if you enjoy living together before you buy!

Good luck and take your time. There is no race to buy a house, it is a big tie and there is plenty of time for that!

hostie1985

Laura,

Would just like to say well done for getting debt-free. I understand how you feel, you do get down time to time but if you want to buy a place, you have to keep your goal in mind.

There is nothing to feel guilty about if you want to go out for dinner every now and then, or buy clothes etc. Its not a race to buy a house, just to it in your own time.

If you do need some encouragement, there is a thread called the 'saving for a deposit' and there are loads of people there that are in the same position.

Hostie

xx

Procrastinator333

If you have £4k, and need £13k, that is £9k. If you can then save £500 while renting, that is only 18 months.

Assuming you can save £1k a month without renting, that is only 9 months.

So are you willing to wait the extra 9 months to be happier in the short term. Personally I would chose to rent and buy a bit later, but each to their own.

Also, you can use it as an opportunity to test run location, living together, and many other things.

Hope it works out!

anotherginger

it sounds like you're getting pretty stressed out about your situation.

i do sympathise - i'm in a long distance relationship (your statement that you hardly ever get to see each other, but seem to spend the week together is a bit annoying, you should appreciate that time more!), however we both are in jobs we enjoy and in places we like. right now we're both saving as much as we can, so that we have more freedom with our options in the future.

we have the added expense of having to book monthly flights. as with you, we don't seem to get time alone together much. if i go to him, we both stay with my parents, and if he comes to me i have a flatmate (landlord). but its better than nothing!

to make you happy i think you're going to have to take the option of renting, which looks considerably cheaper than the area i live in! i pay more as a lodger than you would in a one bed flat. you should have a look at the 500 figure you came up with for savings. i save more than that a month just by myself, so if you were both working it should be far more than that (depending on your income i guess).

i think you have to think about what your goal is, and then adjust your lifestyle to make that happen.

laurad85

Thanks for all your replies, they are really supportive and have cheered me up. I am 25 (good detective work VKAY) and at the moment we are saving about £1250. I agree that it will be good to see if we like living with each other and i think we would be much happier in the short term and long term this way. I have quite a stressfull job and this has been stressing me out too so it can only be a good thing if we have some time to ourselves and just save half the amount we have been.

Thanks again

qball101

Like someone else said the extra £9k will not take that long to save. Buying a house has never been easy and always requires sacrifices. I'm buying my next time / family home at the moment and I'm still having to make sacrifices for this purchase. We had a lodger for 12 months at one point to help bring in a bit of extra money.

Personally, I would rent somewhere cheap and see how you get along with the area you are looking to buy as well as your partner. Not saying that you might fall out or anything but living together will help you decide what you need home. You could also look at house sharing with someone your own age as a interim step to get you out of the family home.

Good luck with it all.

coffeebreak_2

Sorry to hear you are feeling down. I was in the same situation as you for a couple of months and it was a nightmare. I hate not feeling settled, and you're right remembering the little things is a nightmare!

I know everybody looks down on renting and refers to it as dead money but sometimes it is the only choice. I am renting at the moment and have been for years. I am hoping to buy a house soon and am managing to save while renting. Admittedly it isn't as much as if I was living back at home.. but then I'd be spending more on petrol to get to work so it's swings and roundabouts.

Perhaps renting would be a good option... sounds like you'll be miles happier and it'd give you the chance to live properly with your partner before you commit to buying a house together.

mclaren32

laurad85 wrote: »

Me and my partner are currently saving for a deposit for a house. We have £4000 at the moment and will need to have £13,000 plus money for fees (this would only be a 10% deposit). We spend most of the week at mine and a few days a week at his but we are really feeling down at the moment.

We hardly ever get to see each other because we have nowhere to be alone together except our bedrooms, which we get sick off spending alot of time in. Every spare penny we have has gone to paying off debts and we are currently debt free but feel guilty if we go for a meal to get away from everyone. We drive old cars, both of which recently failed their MOT and needed fixed-eating into our savings. We are finding living between two houses difficult because we have to constantly think ahead and bring clothes, food, and things i need for work to each house. It sounds silly but i forgot the bread i bought the other day and was gutted because i had to go and buy some more whilst the other one went to waste! Stupid i know!

Because we dont have a house, friends and family think they are doing us a favour by getting us to house sit or pet sit when they go on holiday or away for weekends. At first i like the freedom but it always seems to cost us money, my OH's parents are away this weekend and i am having to travel an extra 12 miles to work and 12 miles back just to keep an eye on their place. Of course, i left milk etc at home so had to go an buy more food. The final straw came this morning when we got woken up at 8am by a company coming to do some work on the outside of the house, we wernt told about this and my partner works till 12 at night. He has went to work another 12 hour shift exhaused and fed up.

We are now thinking about renting somewhere. We can rent a 1 bed apartment for £395 which after all bills have been paid should leave us with £500 left a month to save (we know at theis point this is a rough estimate-hopefully it will be more). We wont have sky, broadband etc and already have most of the stuff we need to move in in my parents house. We can get an old couch from a family friend but would need to buy a washing machine, we already have a fridge, tv etc.

Is anybody else in this situation? We really wanted to save up and buy our first house together but it is getting ridiculous now, we just want to be together without anybody else! We just want to know what would everyone do in this situation?

Thanks

Compromising your life and watching every penny is crap, there is no other way of explaining it.

In 3 years me and my now fiance have cleared 15k of debt and saved up over 50k between us. We have dowgraded cars, sold belongings, never had any free money and bar one the only holidays we have had have been shared with her parents. The only thing that kept us going is that we knew that 3 years compromised now would be worth it for our future.

On wednesday we completed on our first home, without any doubt in my mind the last 3 years have been completely worth it.

wymondham

In this situation I'd say save less and enjoy your young life. You don't need to own a home any time soon - life is more important to you. Rent, enjoy each other and it wil happen eventually - probably when they are much more affordable anyhow!!