i live in the suburbs of London. How do people afford houses?

silvercar

The_White_Horse wrote: »

so basically, all these 35 yr olds bought when they were 15 and are now rolling in it. I see.

They are probably older than 35 and aren't rolling in it because the money has been spent on the house, so its tied up.

michaels

I hope my house is worth 650k which is 13x take home, I first bought in 2001 and DW brought 70k of equity from her flat when we last moved. Mortgage ltv is less than 50%, with fixed monthly payments of 625 it is not unaffordable.

ash28

My daughter's school friend and her husband live in a nice house in London....started off in a 2 bed flat.....sold it when they got pregnant with child number 1.

They live in a 3 bed terrace they paid about £700k for (they could have a lovely family house in Berkshire for that sort of money).

He's a banker and she is a stay at home mum......she used to work for the Daily Mail before she had the children.....went there straight from university.

There was no inheritance or bank of mum and dad......

They are around 32.

sevenonine

I live in a SW London suburb and have an unmodernised (but comfortable) and well-presented house with large gardens back and front. With all the land available for extending and (land values being high) I have been quoted only £325K; so where are all these people who are searching for houses of £600-800K in London suburbs?

Any advice for getting an energy performance certificate for cheaper than £99 plus VAT (£120) quoted by the estate agent?

ruggedtoast

It is all down to the lefty.

pcgtron

The_White_Horse wrote: »

yes, i would say that a fair few of them "employ" the wife and claim the VAT back on everything - business related or not. pay themselves the minimum possible. take dividends.

it's ridiculous people can get away with this. if you run a company and the turnover is say, £80k, then every penny that goes to the employee/shareholder should be taxed as PAYE. anything left in, must be genuinely left in and any shenanigans should result in prison. someone running their own company invoicing £80k should pay exactly the same tax as someone earning £80k on PAYE

Garbage.
Someone running their own business has an awful lot more risk than a nice steady paye job with sickness benefit, holiday pay, etc etc. I'm not saying there aren't people out therewho cheat the system but to tarnish every sma ll business with the same brush is ridiculou.

CLAPTON

sevenonine wrote: »

I live in a SW London suburb and have an unmodernised (but comfortable) and well-presented house with large gardens back and front. With all the land available for extending and (land values being high) I have been quoted only £325K; so where are all these people who are searching for houses of £600-800K in London suburbs?

Any advice for getting an energy performance certificate for cheaper than £99 plus VAT (£120) quoted by the estate agent?

plenty of houses in SW London worth 800k plus

lady123_2

A friend just sold his 2 bedroom flat off Stoke Newington high st more nearer to Dalston for well over £500k, lol there you have it, a pokey 2 bedroom flat within a mile of murder mile in one of the poorest boroughs in London!
And off him and his family go to a lovely £800k house opposite Chingford plain which is 25 mins to Liverpool street station.

To many people not enough homes by far!

Blacklight

It's sickening that a person earning £22k can't afford to buy one of these places. That's the average wage and these are average houses!

Before too long some buyers are going to start going on strike to combat this insanity!

TruckerT

White Horse makes a very good point. But my question is this - if there is an annual shortfall of hundreds of thousands of newly-built properties, then where are the zillions of homeless people?

I live in a small commuter town to the north of London, and there is no obvious shortage of rental properties. My rent has not increased since I moved in nearly 4 years ago.

TruckerT