FTB timeline advice

Bellballanger

Me and my partner are FTB and have saved a deposit of 17500, looking to buy a house which is currently up for 164995. We have had a couple of discussions with lenders and can get a 90% mortgage.

What we would like to know is when should we start? We are both eager to get our of our parents houses! Could we start now? The worry for us is when everything has to be paid.

As I said we have enough for the deposit & we're saving 1500 a month ATM.

What can people advise, could we start looking now or will we come unstuck when we need to start paying out?

Sorry if I sound dim on this but as I said we are desperate to move out - who isn't!

Thanks!

pops5588

Believe me I feel your pain! Look into getting some solicitor quotes so you know who you are going to use if you find a property and also know how much additional money you will need to save to cover fees.

lolavix

My solicitors quoted me 1300 and my homebuyers report is 415. Do you have furniture you can take as you may need to budget for that too.

Lowermax

I'm not an expert on this but i'm a FTB in a similar process to yourself.

You need to think of the following charges:

Stamp Duty
Product fee (depending on which mortgage you go with)
Solicitor Costs
Survey costs
Removal Men
and as you have both been living at your parents you probably don't have a huge amount of furniture to fill property?
.....There may be more but that's all i can think of now.

My Girlfriend and I rented for a year together. I previously said i would never rent due to having such a big deposit and felt it was a waste of money!

But i would highly recommend renting to anyone!

First of all it will give you and partner a chance to live together, who knows you may fall out over something like what to have for tea, what would you rather be stuck with? 12 months of rent or a mortgage?

Secondly it will allow you to build up furniture and other items you need for a house over a year rather than having to buy it all at once, especially when you have put all your money into you're deposit.

Third(ly) You can also get a feel for paying bills over a year of renting and will get a general gist of bill prices. plus your bills will be slightly lower, allowing you to save up more for a deposit.

I guess everyone is different but i would would 100% recommend renting with someone you haven't lived with before committing to a mortgage.

I felt a bit offended when friends were telling me we would be stupid to buy a house when we haven't lived together but i'm glad i did it and a year later we have a larger deposit, most the furniture for a bigger house and are ready for the next step.

Hope that helps!

sx_turbo

i am in the process of buying my first house, we are only buying the house for 145k, and all the fees etc and the deposit comes to £18k

we have managed to do it all in about 8 weeks, (providing the exchange happens this week, we done our bit just waiting on the seller)

i would wait until you have all the money before looking, the reason being is you will find loads of properties before you have the money, and then when you do actually have the money you will think you cant find anything and end up feeling rubbish, thats what happened to me and my partner, although were all sorted now

lil_miss_insanity

I'd also say that it may be better to try build up to an 85% deposit. Everyone's saying 90% mortgages are available, but they are actually very hard to get. I got AIPs from numerous lenders saying it was affordable at 90%LTV, but once it came to credit scored decisions, 3 lenders said no - but we'll do it at 85%. This is despite a seemingly good credit score (meaningless experian report rated me at 997/1000).

Bellballanger

Hi all, thanks for the advice so far. Just a bit more info me & my bf have been together for 8 years & I have lived with him at his parents house for just over a year, could live with him but the rest of the household was another matter!
Rent round here is more than a mortgage and we wouldn't be able 2 save while renting which is why we've decided 2 bite the bullet & buy.

I have done a lot of research and so I know we will need 2 pay for stamp duty, legal fees etc I have also begun getting quotes from solicitors already & they're averaging around £2500-3000.

We've also found a house that we really like the look of, haven't viewed it as we don't want to get our hopes up if we couldn't go any further than viewing. But that's why I asked when do things have to be paid out for? Because of being eager to move out if we could go ahead now and know we'd have enough time to get the rest of what we're planning to save in time to pay for everything.

Ideally we'd like to save more but it would mean just £1000 PCM (£1500 is me being totally skint in order to bump up our savings in the next 2-3 months) and I'm getting itchy feet! We also have everything except a fridge freezer & sofa! Which we have family who will help out.

So if I haven't totally confused everyone I'm trying to find out in the weeks of finding a property to getting the keys in what order and time do things need to be paid?

Really appreciate all the advice!