Shared Ownership, is it a good idea?

leveller2911

gazfocus wrote: »

The new builds are not anymore overpriced than if you bought on the open market. Resales are often available at a much less overpriced cost.

New builds are overpriced by around 10%. You pay the extra (overpricing) for the new fixtures and fittings (kitchen,bathroom,decorating,fencing etc). Even the banks openly say newbuilds have a "premium" attached to them and tae this into account when lending. They don't like lending 95% on newbuilds for this reason, as soon as you move in they can be in negative equity.

The last sentance makes no sense "Resales are often available at a much less overpriced cost".Your previous sentance said they aren't overpriced.

I built a partition wall, conservatory, new kitchen and the permission granted was on the basis that the job was carried out by a competent tradesperson, but this was never enforced and as long as the job was done properly, they didn't care (they also never inspected the work afterwards).

Sanctuary Hereward HA insist on all work that requires Building regs to be signed off by their surveyors which they make a charge for.

Not true - many housing associations give you the option to sell the house as a 50% share or as a 100% outright purchase.

It is true in the case of some HA who's properties are in small towns and villages as many have Section 106 attached which means you can never buy 100% , generally 80% is common place.

leveller2911

SAM_Conveyancing wrote: »

The firm I represent can offer you fixed fee conveyancing solicitors who are experienced in all the various forms of shared ownership and work on a no move no fee basis. I would be delighted to advise you further - just get in touch with our office.

Regardless, best of luck with your aspirations to home ownership; it gives you so much more stability than renting IMHO and gets you away from throwing money away endlessly to private landlords.

Spam reported........:spam:

gazfocus

river_storm wrote: »

Hi Gaz,

I am new to the forums and not sure who Brit somebody is, but I didn't have time to finish my post.

I've been looking into SO for a while now and have done a lot of reading, including on MSE over the past 6 months or so.

The facts that I have posted are 100% correct and the reason I can be so confident about this, is because we are considering buying a SO via Rooftop Housing and I have a copy of the lease in my hand.

The house that we are thinking about has a reasonable sized kitchen, however, it has extremely limited storage and work surface space, We knew we would have to get permission from Rooftop to carry out any work in the kitchen and asked them how much this permission would cost. I have an email that I could forward on to you if you so desire from Rooftop clearly stating that we need to apply in writing to do the work and it would cost £75 for a letter from them giving us permission to carry out the work.

It also clearly states in the lease that the rent will increase annually by the RPI, plus 1.05%.

It also clearly states in the lease about the 21 year thing having to sell back to them etc etc.

I am not in the habit of posting incorrect information or facts on the internet / forums and was merely giving my opinion in a debate.

I also state in my post that things vary from HA to HA and not everyone is the same. Some are more strict than others, but the majority of them are the same.

The point of my post was to illustrate that just because Rooftop Housing have those fees in place and those terms in their lease, it doesn't mean it's the same for every shared ownership house. It's obvious that the shared ownership house I have is worlds apart from the one you are looking at buying.

Your post gives the impression that the things you mention are generic across housing associations which isn't true so it's important to illustrate what other housing associations offer.

gazfocus

leveller2911 wrote: »

New builds are overpriced by around 10%. You pay the extra (overpricing) for the new fixtures and fittings (kitchen,bathroom,decorating,fencing etc). Even the banks openly say newbuilds have a "premium" attached to them and tae this into account when lending. They don't like lending 95% on newbuilds for this reason, as soon as you move in they can be in negative equity.

If you read what I actually put in relation to the post I quoted, I meant that buying a new build shared ownership house is no more overpriced that buying a new build on the open market.

leveller2911 wrote: »

The last sentance makes no sense "Resales are often available at a much less overpriced cost".Your previous sentance said they aren't overpriced.

As above, I didn't say new builds were not overpriced.

leveller2911 wrote: »

Sanctuary Hereward HA insist on all work that requires Building regs to be signed off by their surveyors which they make a charge for.

In fairness, I have never had any work done that required building regulations so I can't comment, however, there is nothing in my lease referring to using the housing associations surveyor.

Whenever I have requested permission for anything (in particular the conservatory I had built), the permission letter stated that I had to seek relevant approvals from the council if required.