FTB advice

misspiggy87

Hi MoneySavers!

After a year of wistful semi-serious house-hunting I have seen a lovely flat I want to buy. It's on the market for £75k, in a lovely location and in a beautiful old Victorian townhouse. The reason it's so cheap is the old single glazed sash windows. I'm also not too enamoured with the Economy 7 electric storage heaters!

I have an income of £27k and a deposit of £20k (£10k saved by me and a £10k gift from my mum!) which I think would put me in a fairly good position. But the cost of new windows and a gas central heating system could run to maybe £10k - a very rough estimate by me - which would eat into my deposit and leave me paying higher mortgage rates.

What I guess I'm asking is - am I biting off more than I can chew? Any general advice on this would be much appreciated as I am an uncertain FTB!

somethingcorporate

You could secondary glaze the windows relatively cheaply and do the doubled glazed replacements one at a time, that is what we have been doing in our house. So far it has been very manageable. On your income it does not look unreasonable since you would only be borrowing ~2x salary with the 20k deposit. It would also offer you some attractive rates with a good LTV.

Good luck!

Yorkie1

I agree that you can plan to do this in phases, assuming you will have enough money left over after paying bills to put some aside for a renovation fund.

If you aren't going to be able to afford to save, have another look at the overall figures - although as said, you should be fine on multiples.

uberteeb

Do you need to replace the windows right away? I bought a 100 year old tennemant in July wth single glazed sash windows that were painted shut, got a joiner to open most of them for £80, if they open the single glazing doesn't seem a big deal really.

I also borrowed 85% of £102k with a £27k salary and get by fine so your gonna have a fair bit of free cash floating about in theory.

kje_2

The payback on double glazing is a long time (10 years ?). If the windows aren't falling out or totally rotten then why not keep them ? They look lovely when cleaned up/varnished and you could always put some heavy curtains up to reduce heat loss. Concentrate on the CH first and take your time with the windows. You may regret replacing them.

firsttimetom

If you are in a conservation area, you may not be able to replace them with double glazing OR will have to closely match the originals - it would be worth contacting the local council to check this out first

misspiggy87

Thanks for the advice guys. I know what you all mean about the windows, I just thought it'd be preferable to replace them with upvc sash-like windows (if not in a conservation area, as mentioned) to minimise heat loss. I guess heavy curtains would also do a good job.

Wasn't really worried about leaving myself skint every month after paying the mortgage, as mortgage calculators have estimated <£350 a month, which is less than I pay in rent anyway. I was more worried about getting approved for a mortgage in the first place - I've only been working for a year, don't have much of a credit history and I'm just filling in an application to the voters roll.