Mortgage Saving Ideas

for_real

Hi, I am new here! I have just got married and have two questions.

1. We have been given around £3000 from friends and family. We want to use this to start saving for a house. We want to put this into a good account. Any suggestions?

2. From doing some research, I have found we will need around 20k if we want to get a house of our own in the next two years or so. This sounds like an impossible amount to save for a deposit. How do we go about doing this? where do we start?

Any tips or any think you could point me to would be great - a bit freaked out by it all at the moment!

grumbler

1. >> Top Savings Accounts

2. Earn more and spend less. And it can take more than "two years or so". See also Help to Buy & other schemes, but I hope 'Help to Buy' is pulled ASAP.

lushplus4

When I bought my house, prices were really rising fast and we wanted to jump on the ladder before the first rung was out of our reach.

So we sold everything we could.
Did every scrap of overtime.
Took on an extra part time job.
Saved every penny possible, not spending at all. That means packed lunches, walking everywhere, not going out, no gifts etc etc.

Family and friends understood and were very helpful, so go for it and good luck !!

thegreenmonkey

If it has to be two years, you're looking at 5% interest per year on the £3000 in current accounts (I'm making many assumptions with this).

I think a good place to start would be to create a budget - money in/out, adjust and review.

SG27

Took us 8 years.

Sanne

I'm using an app called "Daily Budget" on my iPad to track income/expenditure. The great benefit is that it takes savings off right away, i.e. it tells you how much you've got available to spend without showing you the money you've committed to stash away. Really motivates you (well, me at least!) to try and come out with even more savings at the end of the month!

We're just really saving as much as possible and then see where it goes. 2 years would be a dream (we'll need way more than £20k as small two bed flats with 90 years' lease are going for £230 000 here at the moment - I'm not in London!) and I really wouldn't want a £210k mortgage for a 2 bed flat. So... there's either a big crash (unlikely where we are) or we'll have to move. We'll see.

Thrugelmir

Both Nationwide and Halifax offer incentive saving schemes for FTB's. Side benefit is that improves chances for a mortgage with them as well.

Sanne

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Both Nationwide and Halifax offer incentive saving schemes for FTB's. Side benefit is that improves chances for a mortgage with them as well.

Though you're only allowed to hold the account for three years (Nationwide) so would need to be fairly certain to be able to raise the money in that time. It's also not possible to withdraw the money (a no-go for me but may be fine for OP!) while there's accounts with higher interest where instant access is possible.

I'd start saving with higher interest accounts (TSB, LLoyds....) and then think about this type of account later on when the other accounts are filled up - it's sufficient to have held the account for six months to have access to their mortgage offer.

newuser78

Based on calculations, if you need to save 20K in 2 years, you need to jointly save £833/month (e.g. £415 each) - depending on your outgoing costs and your income, it doesn't seem impossible.

When I was with my partner, I saved £450/month but we had big outgoings of £600/month each (her credit card!). After breaking up, my outgoing costs went down so I was able to save a lot more although I have made a mistake of not giving my savings a good workout. Best thing to do right now is do a lot of research/reading in this forum on how to make your money work.

Either way, it is good that you as a new married couple are starting to work together with same goals. :beer:

for_real

Than you so much for all your advice - I have started a spending diary to help understand, we've started to make our own lunches and trying to be organised with food etc. Also scheduling an appointment with either halifax or something similar to see what they suggest. Its going to be difficult but we really want to make this happen at the same time its petrifying as we've not saved for anything before. It will be a good experience and learning experience.

innovate

The last place I would go for information on how to save up for a mortgage is a bank. All they will tell you is what THEY have to sell. No single bank or Building Society can offer all the best deals that you should use to construct your savings pot, so you will lose out by following the suggestions of a single bank/BS.

No bank can offer you anything regarding savings that isn't known on the Internet, and the MSE Forum is probably the place where you find the most comprehensive knowledge about making the best out of what is available.