Maths of Renting vs Buying

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Kennyboy66 wrote: »

£1000 a year would barely cover window cleaner, annual boiler service, ground rent (leasehold), removing debris from gutters each autumn & minor bits and bobs.

:rotfl:

Utterly delusional.......

The last 4 years maintenance bill for our current house.

Gas Boiler service x 3. £320

Window cleaner. Zero.

Ground rent. Zero.

Removing debris from gutters. £5 for a trowel.

Painting gutters. £40 in paint and another few quid in paintbrushes.

Having the roof checked and a few slates replaced after last winter's storms. £180

A knob for a kitchen cabinet. 99p

And seeing as how you want to throw in everything else to do with upkeep, I've also spent a few quid on petrol for the lawnmower.:rotfl:

And that's it.....

So far it's running about £150 a year in a 3 bed terraced built in 1900.

Now I know full well at some point I'll have to replace the boiler. BAsed on previous experience, once every 20 years or so for a couple of grand a pop. The previous owner put in new double glazing a year or two before we moved in, so nothing required there for another couple of decades. The house is built from granite blocks so no rendering. It'll need repointed every decade at 2K or so a time. Electrics are in good condition with rewiring done in the last decade or so. Chances are it'll last for decades more. Slate roof was redone within the last 20 years, and will outlive me.

I've had no leaks, no blocked drains, no electrical problems and nothing else broken in the last 4 years in this house. These things will happen occasionally, but based on the last near 20 years in our other house, they're few and far between, and cheap to fix when they do. We spent under 20K in maintenance there in the last 20 years, and that included a new bathroom and kitchen. (You'll need to adjust for inflation, but still...)

On the upgrade front.....

I'm about to have the front steps replaced with granite slabs as they're currently concrete and ugly (though perfectly servicable). Got a quote from a builder mate for £290 as a homer, using left over stock from another job.

I'll fully redecorate once a decade, and probably do it myself for a few hundred quid in paint and materials.

I may redo kitchen and bathroom once or twice a lifetime, choosing traditional styles that suit the house, but as I say a well made toilet, bathtub or kitchen cabinet will last a lifetime so these are almost always optional upgrades and not true maintenance costs. You do them if you can afford to from discretionary income, and you don't if you can't.

ukcarper

I paid my mortgage of 20 months ago and it that 20 months I would have paid £25k in rent for a similar property that covers a lot of maintenance.

geneer

In the long run buying is less expensive than renting? Not really earthshattering news.

Of course buying after a crash rather than at peak is less expensive than renting too.
Oh, and buying at peak.

A no less approximate calculation was done recently.
It was demonstrate that a 20% reduction in your average house price roughly pays for at least a decade of rental costs.

Graham_Devon

Only Hamish could have a (in his words) large house that requires under £1000 of maintenance over 4 years. Suppose it's another thing that happens in Aberdeen only.

Cost me more than that this year just to do up a couple of rooms, which includes carpets.

Can imagine Hamish though in his Grand house, with threadbare carpets and none matching handles on the cupboards of his 30 year old kitchen. Lovely.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

geneer wrote: »

It was demonstrate that a 20% reduction in your average house price roughly pays for at least a decade of rental costs.

So then you only need to see 15% off from 2005 prices, or 25% off from todays prices, to pay for your time renting.....:)

Chances of that happening? Roughly Zero.:rotfl:

FTBFun

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Only Hamish could have a (in his words) large house that requires under £1000 of maintenance over 4 years. Suppose it's another thing that happens in Aberdeen only.

Err, he could have done loads of maintenance before these 4 years so it hasn't been necessary since?

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Graham_Devon wrote: »

carpets.

Don't believe in them. Mostly have polished wood floors with the odd rug here and there.

Grand house,

Your words, not mine.

Our current house is a 3 bed terrace. Not grand at all. Our other house is a larger detached. Decent, but not exactly grand....

threadbare carpets

See point one.

none matching handles on the cupboards of his 30 year old kitchen. Lovely.

Actually it's an exact match, found online, for 99p.

Top moneysaving.:money:

Of course I'm sure kennybigspenderboy would have ordered a new £50K kitchen as soon as a hinge started squeeking. :rotfl:

Putting his window cleaners in as maintenance, for heavens sake.. What next? A housemaid as a repacement dishwasher?:D

Graham_Devon

Polished floors that you don't polish?

That's novel.

FTBFun

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Polished floors that you don't polish?

That's novel.

That's what orphans are for.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Polished floors that you don't polish?

That's novel.

And did you want me to include all the other cleaning products as well?

Thought this was a post about maintenance....