Any reasonable property prices in the London area??

Running_Horse

I agree. But on their budget they are never going to get more than a grotty flat in a grotty area of London. Might as well make the jump straight to the home counties when they are in a position to buy. Save doing it ten years later when kids come, which is what most do. Rochester is a nice little city, and they will be surrounded by similar couples. And a freehold house with a nice little garden in Kent is going to be preferable to a lease on a couple of shabby rooms in a London slum.

WalkinX

Yeha I much rather have a good house then a crappy flat but 3K just to travel to work sucks. May have to look for work in Kent if that was the case but my gf is pretty much London work based so not sure what she'd do but she does like the idea of Kent alot so maybe that's a sacrifice she can make.

rach29

grey_lady wrote: »

Have you looked at Thurrock? Upminster, Rainham, Purfleet etc
only half hour on the train and much cheaper house prices.

A 2 bed house for under 140k shoud be doable.

Upminster certainly isn't cheap. Thurrock is a good idea. Grays is a relatively cheap town, and only 40mins into central London.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-27877192.html?premiumA=true

Here's an example of what you might get in Grays

hazyjo

I know they can get a lot more for their money in cheap areas, but please remember that if you buy in a cheap area, you'll could be left behind profit-wise when (if!) the prices go up.

I know people say a house is a home and not an investment (I bang on about it too), but for a FTB who's trying to get a foot on that ladder in the middle of a recession when prices are lower than they have been for years, they should think long term. If I had say £200k to spend, I'd much rather buy a flat in an area where prices have previously risen quickly than spend £200k on a house in a 'cheap area'.

I've known people who got left behind in the last boom. One bloke bought in one of the Medway towns as he thought it'd be great to have a house and got loads more for his money, but when his friends' flats were going through the roof, his had barely increased - and he was unable to even afford a flat in London, let alone get out of an area he didn't want to live in long term.

Jx

Jowo_2

Currently the OP has a budget of 130k for a house in the south-east which is a fairly miserly budget to find a house within a decent cheap commute into London.

Should the OP improve their budget by 10-20% if their partner's income improves, I'd make a vote for the semi rural area of South Darenth or Sutton-at-hone close to Farningham Road station. I had a relative who lived in Sutton-at-hone which is a very quiet spot with a decent pub or two, a chippy and little else but is close to Bluewater and Thurrock for shopping. The cheapest house I could find there was around 160/170k. Perhaps it would be too quiet for them. It's about 40 minutes commute to Victoria.

I'd make a tentative suggestion for Swanley (houses starting at 135k) which has many more amenities, such as a sports centre and ASDA supermarket, but I haven't been there for years and would require careful research to filter out the chavvy parts (i.e. the ward that voted in a BNP councillor for starters) and to research schools if they are going to have kids (the main comprehensive there used to have one of the lowest rates of GCSE results in the county but has apparently made great strides now).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swanley

Takes only 25 minutes to reach London victoria by train compared with 45 for Rochester. I'm fairly sure it has a direct link to London St. pancras but couldn't get timetable info on this. I've encountered missing London St. Pancras timetable information for other places too where it's been missing from online information searches, too.

WalkinX

Thanks for this.

My gf advised looking for the 150K area and just offering lower but I don't know how realistic that is - I don't want to be too stretched regarding the mortgage.

Using a mortgage caluclator of my bank it said on my wage alone I could get 76,540 - not enough but if I took my esitmate of the mygf's wage then she'd get 72 so add them together and it's just shy of 150K - But as I said I don't want to be too stretched. So with a 20K deposit on a 120 house it would only need a 100K mortgage.

Thanks for all the info. I will look into these. We are reseraching and such now but we wouldn't be moving until say April next year so we have some time.

I want a place to live in rather then invest (think investing has in part lead to the torubles the housing market is in) but I guess it is a first step so I should look for somewhere I can profit I guess.

And yes kids are likley - though don't know when, probably not for at least 2 years though.

hazyjo

Just to confirm so you don't take that 'investing' thing the wrong way, I'm not saying become a property developer or buy something as an investment as such, but, as a FTB, the chances of you staying in the first house/flat you buy are pretty slim. You will want to move on/upwards, probably in the next few years. You don't want to find your options of moving out of the area are closed.

I also agree that 'investing' has crippled the property market - especially with people having more than one home for investment purposes, or if they do them up to sell them on quickly and bag the profit. I absolutely agree that foremost, a house should be a home.

Another area further out to consider is Reading. Very quick transport links to London, although it's over £3k in fares. I'd rather live there than in the Medway towns and the travelling prices are probably pretty similar.

Jx

womble12345

What about Catford? 115k for 1 bedroom flat.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-26176844.html?backListLink=%2Fproperty-for-sale%2Ffind.html%3FsearchType%3DSALE%26locationIdentifier%3DREGION%255E85422%26insId%3D1%26radius%3D0.0%26displayPropertyType%3D%26minBedrooms%3D%26maxBedrooms%3D%26minPrice%3D%26maxPrice%3D120000%26retirement%3D%26partBuyPartRent%3D%26maxDaysSinceAdded%3D%26_includeSSTC%3Don%26sortByPriceDescending%3D%26primaryDisplayPropertyType%3D%26secondaryDisplayPropertyType%3D%26oldDisplayPropertyType%3D%26oldPrimaryDisplayPropertyType%3D%26newHome%3D%26auction%3Dfalse%26x%3D41%26y%3D7&thumbnailId=1

Walking distance to Hither Green train station, its quite a nice area.

The benefit of the area is it is not on the tube so is cheaper. Blinkered buyers look on a tube map and only consider those places when the overland trains are very good as well, this keeps demand/price down.

Ferrety_2

A few months ago I was looking for a flat somewhere within a 10 mile radius of Croydon where I work, on a budget of £125000.

I ended up buying a 1980s 1 bedroom house instead on the outskirts of Orpington, for £130000. An identical house on the same street went a few weeks later for £126000 and other identical houses in the area (all by the same builder!) generally go for £125000-135000. I know it's not the most salubrious area, but it's not exactly the Bronx, is it?

I know loads of people will say a one bed house is a poor investment opportunity, but for a home with garden, freehold, no service charges etc it offered everything I needed and probably everything OP needs for now too. Victoria is 23min on the train!

Have a look at the St Paul's Cray/St Mary's Cray area - there's usually a good few cheap flats too which go for even less than the 1-bed houses and they tend to have gardens, which is a major plus.

hazyjo

womble12345 wrote: »

What about Catford? 115k for 1 bedroom flat.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-26176844.html?backListLink=%2Fproperty-for-sale%2Ffind.html%3FsearchType%3DSALE%26locationIdentifier%3DREGION%255E85422%26insId%3D1%26radius%3D0.0%26displayPropertyType%3D%26minBedrooms%3D%26maxBedrooms%3D%26minPrice%3D%26maxPrice%3D120000%26retirement%3D%26partBuyPartRent%3D%26maxDaysSinceAdded%3D%26_includeSSTC%3Don%26sortByPriceDescending%3D%26primaryDisplayPropertyType%3D%26secondaryDisplayPropertyType%3D%26oldDisplayPropertyType%3D%26oldPrimaryDisplayPropertyType%3D%26newHome%3D%26auction%3Dfalse%26x%3D41%26y%3D7&thumbnailId=1

Walking distance to Hither Green train station, its quite a nice area.

The benefit of the area is it is not on the tube so is cheaper. Blinkered buyers look on a tube map and only consider those places when the overland trains are very good as well, this keeps demand/price down.

That's a brilliant find! Nice looking road, and lots of nice areas nearby too.

Jx