You can not afford to buy a house if...

shortchanged_2

poppysarah wrote: »

Over 50% of renters get help with their rent. I assume that's an indicator of lack of affordability in the rented sector.

Would that be another one of the factors helping to prop up the housing market then?

HappyMJ

poppysarah wrote: »

Over 50% of renters get help with their rent. I assume that's an indicator of lack of affordability in the rented sector.

I have a feeling that if rents reflected my part time minimum wage earnings then rents would be far too low. By saying that there is a lack of affordability I'm assuming you mean that a family with 2 kids should be able to afford to rent a 3 bedroom house in a good area with just 1 main wage earner earning minimum wages therefore not having to claim any help with housing benefits from the taxpayer. That's not going to happen as all the 2 bed places then need to cheaper and the small 1 bed flats would be cheaper again.

50% of renters get help because they need it. The ones who don't need help are considering buying when they can or prefer renting over buying.

tyllwyd

poppysarah wrote: »

Buying a house is the most serious financial decision a person has to make. To allow them to absolve themselves of all financial committment in the run up to this process (ie: saving a deposit) is utter madness.

If you can not save a deposit then you will not save for the ongoing repairs and maintenance of your house.

Rubbish. We bought in 1997 with a 5% deposit lent to us by my parents - in the first three years of house ownership we paid them back and paid the mortgage. We would never have been able to save a deposit and pay rent at the same time.

I don't claim we are a model of financial prudence and good planning, but for us buying when we did was the right thing to do, and trying to save for a 40% deposit would have been the wrong thing.

dorset_nurse

I'm amused the people on here laying down rules about what other people can and can't afford are the people that don't have mortgages and seem to be justifying the reasons why they haven't yet.

The responses from mortage owners above have all been positive- especially in proving that the length of mortgage term is irrelevant and dependent on individual circumstances. Overpaying a mortage will reduce this but I guess if you don't have a mortgage you wouldn't think about things like this before making blanket statements.

The points made by the OP have not been thought through and are surely written to encourage the same boring debate about buying, renting, shared equity etc.

I know a lot of people that have shared money with their family for deposits and arranging interest payments with them. They save money and their parents make a better return on their "savings".
I also know people who have cash in ISAs but choose to use parents money as a deposit in order to preserve the interest rates on as much family money as possible.
According to the OP they "can't afford to buy a house" as they have been gifted a deposit.

I don't hear any people on here with mortgages or having had them and stuggled with the repayments posting on here about how hard they found it- I'm going to wait until I hear it from them rather than listening to people trying to justify why they still haven't taken on the responsibility of a mortgage.

To anyone reading this thread and worrying about being able to afford a home; weigh up your own situation and don't listen to people on forums who have no experience in the subjects they profess to.

poppysarah

dorset_nurse wrote: »

I don't hear any people on here with mortgages or having had them and stuggled with the repayments posting on here about how hard they found it-

They're on the debt boards.
hth.

The_Blue_Hatter

poppysarah wrote: »

• You have to have a gifted deposit.My parents gifted me 10% deposit
• You whinge about not being able to afford stamp duty
• You extend the mortgage term over 25 years. Have moved mine to 30 years to over pay into offset account as am looking to go bigger and this way gives me more flexibility. When I move I will reduce the years back accordingly.
• You can afford it on the fixed rate but not if it went up.
• you can't save a deposit yourself Had it gifted
• you are looking at interest only mortgages. Dont really think they do these too much now (BTL aside of course)
• you can only afford to be a % of a property

Stop preaching.

poppysarah

dorset_nurse wrote: »

. Overpaying a mortage will reduce this but I guess if you don't have a mortgage you wouldn't think about things like this before making blanket statements.

The points made by the OP have not been thought through and are surely written to encourage the same boring debate about buying, renting, shared equity etc..

Not having a mortgage doesn't mean I have no concept of debt, mortgage overpayments or the like.

The points made in my initial post would all make good rules for the FSA to help ensure future borrowers didn't end up repossessed. At the moment huge numbers of repos are being held by banks because the taxpayers can not afford to let the ponzi scheme fail or carry on.

It's an insane position for a country to be in.

Whilst everyone cries about student debts of 27k being horrendous, they seem quite happy to allow FTB to get stamp duty exemption on properties up to 250k.

Does that now strike you as strange.

dorset_nurse

poppysarah wrote: »

They're on the debt boards.
hth.

Of course, like you are here because you can't afford to buy.

Running_Horse

Doesn't this belong on the house price forum?

You can afford to buy a house if you have enough money.

No sh*t Sherlock.

madmish00

It isn't as clear cut as you seem to want it to be.

I bought 5 years ago at the age of 21 using 10k that I had saved of my student loan (so not really my money - just didn't spend it on booze like my mates!). I took the mortgage over 30 years. This has allowed me to get onto the ladder and obtain a lifetime tracker rate at 0.18% above base rate. None of my friends can even come close to getting a rate like that now.

I am now in the process of buying my second home and the term will again be above 25 years. This is because I know that if interests rates go back up to 5% I will still be able to comfortably manage the payments taking into account the possibility that we may have children in the next few years and would for a while have less disposable income.

However, the total lending we are taking over 30 years is still LESS than the bank would be willing to lend us over 20 years. It just gives us more disposable income now to play with and allows us to overpay as and when it is convenient to us.

It is all a matter of managing your finances in a way that works for your own lifestyle and I can't see how such generalisations are at all helpful.