We'll never be able to buy a house!

gabyjane

Well we can't afford to buy a house on the open market , dp earns £20k without overtime and is a special police officer so gets paid for that aswell but it isn't taken into account and i earn around £16k and do 3 jobs! Doing the maths we cannot afford anything but a tiny hovel, it's not about being snobby and wanting somewhere lovely and perfect it's literally not being able to afford it.

We are now in the current position of buying a S/O house, 2 beds, 2 bathrooms, drive, car port, garden, big kitchen, lounge dining room...and we are over the moon...lots on here will say it's a bad idea but it's the only way for us, it's a new build and perfect, lovely area and we are very lucky, although we have been on the housing list for 7+ years it wasn't easy to get!

I really feel for FTB as we are one and realise how hard it is, these people who have homes already have no idea what it's like. I have friends who moan about their £250 mortgage?? hmm yeah well ours will be double that and it's S/O, if we bought open market we would be well over £1k...ridiculas..

chocolatechipcookies

Melissa177 wrote: »

I do think that a lot of people who say they "can't afford to buy a house" are generally setting their expectations of what they should be able to afford too high.

A 130K house in Hull is a lot of house (or it's not in Hull).


When you're getting on the property ladder, the idea is to live in a small place that needs doing up and move up the ladder as and when you can afford to.

That said, I'm shocked that there are one bed flats in my home village of Welton (not far from Hull) going for 99K. It's a pretty village, admittedly, but the flat is tiny!

I've seen houses in Bransholme and Longhill estates for £80,000.

Lavendyr

oasisfeverish wrote: »

Every one has a right to have a roof of their head, but to own that roof takes hard work and determination, not a given right.

Please don't assume that every FTB out there is lazy, undetermined and believes they have the right to own property. It's not true and it's completely without evidence to make such generalisations.

My OH and I spent years of our lives in education, ended up with excellent degrees from the country's top university (he also has post-graduate degrees), we work hard for our money and have built up a reasonable amount of savings (which we continue to add to), we do not spend frivolously, we pay off our credit cards in full each month, and aside from my student loan, we have no outstanding debt, and never have had.

Despite all this, we still cannot afford to buy a house big enough for both of us and reachable from our respective places of work, in the current housing market. However unlike you suggest, we don't blame anyone else for the situation. We know that house prices are at a peak currently and believe that now is a terrible time to be a FTB, so we are waiting, and in the meantime we are saving and saving towards a deposit while renting a house at far less pcm than we would have to pay on a mortgage for a house of the same quality.

oasisfeverish

Lavendyr wrote: »

Please don't assume that every FTB out there is lazy, undetermined and believes they have the right to own property. It's not true and it's completely without evidence to make such generalisations.

My OH and I spent years of our lives in education, ended up with excellent degrees from the country's top university (he also has post-graduate degrees), we work hard for our money and have built up a reasonable amount of savings (which we continue to add to), we do not spend frivolously, we pay off our credit cards in full each month, and aside from my student loan, we have no outstanding debt, and never have had.

Despite all this, we still cannot afford to buy a house big enough for both of us and reachable from our respective places of work, in the current housing market. However unlike you suggest, we don't blame anyone else for the situation. We know that house prices are at a peak currently and believe that now is a terrible time to be a FTB, so we are waiting, and in the meantime we are saving and saving towards a deposit while renting a house at far less pcm than we would have to pay on a mortgage for a house of the same quality.

I've never stated that all FTBs are lazy or undetermined, what I said is that you need to be determined to get what you want these days, no one has the right without hard work to obtain a car, home, holidays, etc.

And as you are proving you are saving & being determined until you are able to use a deposit and purchase that first home. The same I started saving at 14 when I made the decision that I want to buy a home, something my parents never did and regret it now.

If you are definitely stating there are no current properties for sale at all in your price range & area, then think about another close by area, it may not be ideal but it would be yours.

I'm assuming there are two of you? Does that mean you want 2 bed/ 3 bed house, rather than 1 or 2 bed flat. Originally I wanted a 2 bed house in a certain area, however the best I would of got was a 1 bed flat, something I wasn't prepared to have. So I bought in a less popular area to achieve my goal. I saved for 7 years before being able to afford my first home.

The OP said the max mortgage that they could have is £67k but no properties for that price in Hull in the area they want because they want a nice area to show their family friends. Yet on RM there are over 100 properties that are priced at £70k or less in Hull.

So what is more important buying your first home in the area you want, or buying your first home? If the former then yes you will need to continue to save, if the latter then there are homes out there just waiting for you.

Whatever you decide good luck.

Lavendyr

oasisfeverish wrote: »

what I said is that you need to be determined to get what you want these days, no one has the right without hard work to obtain a car, home, holidays, etc.

I do agree with this, I'm not sure that this came across in your first post though - it did come across as a little judgemental. Apologies if I misunderstood the tone, it is difficult to convey accurately over the internet.

oasisfeverish wrote: »

If you are definitely stating there are no current properties for sale at all in your price range & area, then think about another close by area, it may not be ideal but it would be yours.

The thing is that we currently don't believe the market is stable enough to want to get ourselves into so much debt, at a time when interest rates could well continue to rise and/or house prices could start to fall.

There are some houses in our area within our price range, just, but they are few and far between, unfortunately - perhaps one or two pop up in the paper each week. We could consider some other areas and may do if and when we decide we are ready to buy, but due to working constraints, we are fairly limited in the number of locations we can go for.

oasisfeverish wrote: »

I'm assuming there are two of you? Does that mean you want 2 bed/ 3 bed house, rather than 1 or 2 bed flat. Originally I wanted a 2 bed house in a certain area, however the best I would of got was a 1 bed flat

We would like a house, and we would need at least 2 bedrooms to fit all our junk in! But again, if & when we look to buy, we are going to have to be willing to compromise on some areas, I agree.

Thanks for your comments.

before_hollywood

oasisfeverish wrote: »

This isn't a dig at anyone specific, but everyone wants to be in a nice area with a nice home and nice neighbours, but it doesn't always work like that, if you want to get on the ladder accept that it may not be ideal first off, but at least you are on it.

Good luck to everyone, with hard work, determination and help from these MSE boards, you will get there, maybe not as quick as you want but you will get there.

It isn't a dig at anyone specific, yet you quote me.... hmm interesting.

the housing market is messed up, blair allowed it to get that way.

i read a lot of these ''you need a better career'' type quotes and people are talking absolute carp, i earn £5k per year more than i did a year ago when i walked out my old job and i still can't afford a house, i retrained i work (and will continue to) work my backside off and can i afford a house? no, and i live just outside north manchester, a really cheap place to live. there is some patronising bull on this site and it does my head right in

nicola1982_2

chocolatechipcookies wrote: »

I haven't even started my career yet. I need to save some money to get my licence first, I want to be an estate agent. Plus finding a job as an estate agent is hard (well maybe not as hard as I think) because they usually don't advertise. As soon as I can drive, I'm going to write letters to every single estate agent in Hull. My income is very low, but it's a lot higher than any other job I've had. :rolleyes:

If you've not began your career yet then it is not a wise idea to buy anyway. What if your dream job takes you to another city?

And seriously you've earned a lot lower than £12k??:eek:

What sector is that in? I'm glad you're moving out of it because that is terrible money and barely more than min wage. Good luck with the career - try www.prospects.ac.uk for career advice.

RHemmings

Melissa177 wrote: »

Northern Rock particularly lends fairly high multiples (which is why I think it might all go t*ts up for them at some point - they're not quite sub prime, but they are getting there).

But surely it will only go t*ts up for them at some point if it goes t*ts up for a fair proportion of their customers. I wouldn't recommend the high multiples route myself. Especially since those on a low income are quite exposed to inflation in other essentials/compulsory expenses such as council tax.

Running_Horse

before_hollywood wrote: »

It isn't a dig at anyone specific, yet you quote me.... hmm interesting.

the housing market is messed up, blair allowed it to get that way.

i read a lot of these ''you need a better career'' type quotes and people are talking absolute carp, i earn £5k per year more than i did a year ago when i walked out my old job and i still can't afford a house, i retrained i work (and will continue to) work my backside off and can i afford a house? no, and i live just outside north manchester, a really cheap place to live. there is some patronising bull on this site and it does my head right in

Patronising bull, or the truth? I wish we lived in a world where everybody could buy a nice house regardless of salary, but the current stage of the house price cycle simply doesn't allow that. Would you rather a pat on the back and a "there there"?

I bought a £47,000 house in a not so nice area in the 80s on a salary of £8,500 and endless overtime. When the overtime disappeared I took in lodgers. If it had been easy, would I have worked so damned hard?

Melissa177

RHemmings wrote: »

But surely it will only go t*ts up for them at some point if it goes t*ts up for a fair proportion of their customers. I wouldn't recommend the high multiples route myself. Especially since those on a low income are quite exposed to inflation in other essentials/compulsory expenses such as council tax.

You've articulated what I was trying to say - it's the couple struggling to meet the mortgage that means that the bank defaults on it's CDO (or whatever package it's put its debt into).

[Which is why we're seeing various casualties in the financial markets at the moment - hedge funds going under, the Tunisian government having to pay more to raise money, Blackstone's IPO dropping like a lead balloon... It's like the butterfly effect, and it all stems from mortgage defaults by and large]