First Time Buyers ... *eek*

LittleStar

Hi all ...

... A little bit of background info lol ... my other half is in military training and we will be moving into military quarters towards the end of the year (which is rented accomm) ... we have been talking about buying a small property together, and getting on the property ladder as soon as we can (were 21) and then renting it out! ...

... Most importantly neither of us have any experience at all with property, and was wondering if anyone could possibly lay out the steps or process that you need to go through once you have found a property you would like to buy (and maybe even typical costs/percentages you would expect to pay, such as surveyor costs etc) ... so we're prepared and have a basic understanding lol ... We'll worry about the renting process later on lol ...

Thanks in advance xx

brownie2

Hey

Your first step would be to get a mortgage agreement in principle (AIP) this would give an indication as to how much you could afford to buy. You could go to your bank or a mortgage broker who has access to the whole market, check before hand whether you would have to pay for his service though! After this then go house hunting!! Depending on the amount you're looking to buy at depends on whether you need to pay stamp duty, someone pls correct me if I'm wrong but think the threshold for 1% stands for properties at £120,000. when you see a house you like, put an offer in to the estate agent. Once this has been accepted then instruct your solicitor. Shop around and get a few quotes but remember you get what you pay for! Surveys vary in price depending on purchase price, the cheaper the property the less it will be, eg a £100k property the fee is around £350. Then you have your environmental searches etc etc which are all included in your sols fee. As a guess I'd say put around £1500 for your sol work and survey. The whole process can take 6-8 weeks depending on how many people are in your chain and how quickly your sols can get their act together! Hope this helps and happy house hunting! :beer:

Acc72

LittleStar wrote:

Hi all ...
We'll worry about the renting process later on lol ...

I would say you need to think about the renting process at the beginning.

You don't want to buy a house that nobody will rent, or will rent at a level that does not cover your costs.

There are all kinds of day to day issues to contend with - which a management company could do : for a fee ...

The only advice I would give is to do lots of research. There are lots of similar threads on this site - although there are lots of conflicting opinions : whatever you decide it needs to be an informed opinion.

LittleStar

Thanks brownie2 ... that certainly gives us some idea of what we need to do thank you very much

Thanks Acc72 for your concern ... I was going to ask about the process of renting afterwards but I have found some posts on it myself already ... I am aware that we would need to be looking for letting agents at the same time ... as you don't want to be paying off all the mortgage yourself, when you could use the rent to cover it (or a majority of it ) ... thanks again tho ... and I will keep researching, got about a year and a half yet before we seriously start looking into it but wanted a base understanding first

Thanks xx