Anyone sold a house and moved into rented accommodation temporarily?

vivster

We did it too, although we rented the top half of our friends' house (they were looking for lodgers) on a very flexible 'mates rates' basis, so didn't need to worry about contracts or deposits or LA fees. We stayed with them about six months in the end, from Christmas to the end of June, giving ourselves a little break from it all at the beginning.

It was great being chain-free, and not having the pressure of having to worry about selling at the same time.

Downsides were having to pay two lots of legal fees, moving fees, and doing the general admin associated with moving twice. Also, just the pain of having to pack up and move twice in a relatively short space of time, although we left lots of stuff boxed up while at our friends' place.

Obviously, we were in a fairly unusual situation, and benefited from very flexible, laid back landlords.

lessonlearned

I'm doing this too. 6 month lease then monthly. Aiming for about 9 months maybe slightly longer if the new house needs a lot of work.

Definitely far less stressful than trying to juggle a sale and purchase at the same time and not getting snarled up in a chain. Hopefully being chain free and a cash only purchase means I shall be in a strong position when I find what I'm looking for.

I did not want to be in a position where I ended up buying something that wasn't exactly what I want and having to compromise just so as not to hold up a sale.

Strapped

Yes, when we moved across the country. Bit stressful when we exchanged and had 7 days to find somewhere to move to :eek: but it worked out OK in the end. (I hurtled down and found somewhere but it wasn't ideal with a child in school!) As said above, take care if you have early redemption fees on your mortgage - we did, but we ported our mortgage to the new property to avoid paying them. Be aware that you may need to borrow at least as much on your new mortgage if you do this (which could've been an issue for us as we were downsizing) and also, even if they say that you have 6 months available to port, if your mortgage deal runs out before those 6 months, then you only have until the deal expires (as we found out the hard way and managed to complete by the skin of our teeth).

I'm never moving again :rotfl:

moneyistooshorttomention

Put like that - ie even gun crime going on in your neighbourhood (crikey - this is Britain we are talking about here right?!!! Yikes) - then I'd be outa there myself as fast as my legs could carry me. I wouldn't feel like I was living in my own country if I had that sort of thing going on around me...would be some distinct "cognitive dissonance" going on there of "Us Brits don't have things this way....."

Therefore it sounds like a good idea for you personally to go rent someplace else whilst your house sells - provided you can afford to do so.

Also, if the area is that bad, then it could take some time for you to sell. So you therefore need to bear in mind just how long you can afford to rent for (as well as paying your mortgage) on the one hand and it would help give you an advantage to present to potential buyers to counterbalance that awful area on the other hand and help get rid of the place.

Davesnave

We did it, but some years ago, when interest on money in the bank was close on 7%. Never been so well off! That is one incentive you won't have, I'm afraid.

For us, the most enlightening part was finding out that the house & road we'd chosen weren't half as nice as they were supposed to be. The house had subsidence, which we were told: "no one talks about," as it was general, and while the folk in the road were OK, many didn't know each other, so community spirit was lacking. Paying £100k extra for that seemed like madness.

Anyway, we threw a party for the road, and some people met for the first time, despite living there 20 years. It was all very jolly, but I have a sneaky feeling that some were quite happy to see us go. After all, we had a very big van, and it was bright yellow......;):rotfl: