Renting if you don't want to lose your buyer but can't find a house!

agrinnall

One disadvantage of temprarily renting is that for a while you won't be on the electoral roll at all, and once you are on it you will show as recently moved, both of which have a negative effect on credit rating. However, if you have been in discussion about your mortgage before you move this is unlikely to have much of any impact on the provider(s) you've spoken to.

CPS

We sold and now rent - best thing we did. We are saving for a deposit (lost money on 1st house) watching better and better houses come into our price bracket as people lower their prices because they cant sell. it now means we can now move when the right house comes up, not when we sell our house.
And not the case re the electoral register - we are on at our new (rented) address.

Kynthia

I think the pros outweigh the cons in many cases. However the reason more people don't do it is hassle of moving twice and fear of having to pay rent and mortgage if they successfully buy a property while still tied to the fixed term of the rental. However the hassle of moving twice is often worth if if you might lose your buyer and can't find the right home to buy. Also if you have a six month fixed term it's unlikely you find and complete on a property in significantly less than that, and any additional rent you did pay before moving out would be small in comparison to the costs of buying and selling your home.

Mr_Moo_2

This is exactly what we did - we're renting for 6 months initially while we check our new locality out and look for the right place. It deffo takes the stress out of trying to link a chain together, we have a lot of stuff stored around the house and in the garage but enough out to make it feel like home.

Only issue we have found is that while we have applied to be on the electoral roll at new property, it is being updated at the moment so we won't physically appear on it for some months. Council have offered to confirm that we have applied to go on if we find any problems, but I can see this may impact on any streamlined or online mortgage application where there is no human interface to explain the details to. We will see.

Would definately recommend renting.

pinkteapot

My mum has done this several times over the years and not having to tie up a purchase and sale at the same time is so much less stressful.

If you want, you can start your rental a week or two before your sale completes (but don't sign a rental contract until after you've exchanged contracts) and then move bits in gradually, get the carpets cleaned, sort out anything else you need to. Same applies when you then buy - you can arrange to have an overlap with the properties. If the place you buy needs a few rooms painting for example, it's so easy to do with the property empty.

I sold a flat a few years ago and rented while the hubby and I looked for a house. We ended up renting for 18 months as we (*cough*I) were being fussy about what we wanted. It was so easy though - when the perfect house does come up you're just ready to go. You can also negotiate something off the price because you're chain free.

Personally I think the only downside is moving twice. Last time we moved, we paid the removal company the extra couple of hundred pounds to have them pack for us. It was honestly the best money we've ever spent. House completely normal up until moving day - they packed everything in a couple of hours then shifted it to the new house! Really relaxed move.

If you have stuff that you use very rarely, you could leave it boxed up at the rental property. Depends how you feel though - I'm a nester so I have to unpack properly wherever I'm living.

The only bit that gets a bit stressful is choosing a rental property. You can't sign a contract until you exchange but around that time you have to pick one and sign quite quickly (in a couple of weeks). Just remember that renting isn't like buying. You just have to ask yourself:

1. Is it in budget?
2. Is the area OK?
3. Is it in reasonable enough condition that I can live here for 6-12 months?

Choosing a rental is a completely practical decision - you're not looking for the feeling you get from a place you want to buy.

pmlindyloo

Another one who recommends renting. In fact we rented for a year and bought the house we rented.

I would also make sure that you rent somewhere with a garage and be very careful with your packing.

Have a really good clear out (charity shops, ebay, freecycle) and pack everything that you can mange without into boxes labelled 'garage - crockery etc). You will unpack so quickly this way. In fact we even stored some furniture in the garage as we had downsized.

I was ruthless about having the bare minimum.

No point in having pictures for the walls - you would only have to take out the hooks and 'make good' in a rented house. Have a few ornaments just to make it homely but just a few - saves on dusting! Books can be stored - just keep out the 'must haves' (first aid etc) You can use the library!

In fact I was so ruthless that even when we bought the house there was very little in the garage that I needed and so had another good clear out!

It is amazing what 'rubbish' we collect and amazing what little we need to live!

GDB2222

We did something different. We sold our house, but with a delayed completion date, ie we signed a contract but the completion date was several months after the contract date rather than the usual 28 days. This gave us a chance to find somewhere to buy without moving into rented, and our buyers stayed in their rented place a bit longer, so we each moved just once, which is a serious consideration if you have a young family.

DRP

as i posted above, I cannot afford to move into rented accomodation first as I need to directly port my current (extremely good) mortgage rates.

Strapped

DRP wrote: »

we are in a similar situation - we have sold, yet can't find anywhere decent to live

i'm not sure if this applies to the OP but we cannot really rent anywhere because we will lose the ability to port our mortgage (at an extremely reasonable rate) if we don't directly transfer it to the new house... might be an extra thing to consider

Some mortgage companies will allow you to port as long as the ported mortgage is started within 6 months. We ported our mortgage but rented inbetween as we moved areas. It does add a time pressure though which is not great.

BlueberryMuffin

Strapped wrote: »

Some mortgage companies will allow you to port as long as the ported mortgage is started within 6 months. We ported our mortgage but rented inbetween as we moved areas. It does add a time pressure though which is not great.

This is what we are doing at the moment. There was a problem in our chain and we decided sell up and look for short term accommodation while we wait for the purchase to go through. HSBC is allowing us to port our old mortgage as long as we can complete within 6 months. It is all a bit of a gamble because if the purchase falls through we will be unlikely to find anything else in time and will lose our low mortgage rate.