Buy now or wait?

IveSeenTheLight

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

I've yet to see / recall an instance where buying was worse than renting over say a 5 year period or longer.

Which area are you looking to buy?

Looking at the land registry, the average UK house price was £167,854 in April 2012.
The latest graph (Feb 2017), its £217,502.

http://landregistry.data.gov.uk/app/ukhpi/explore

I'm surprised as that's 29.57% HPI in just under 5 years

Of course, each area will vary, hence why I asked where you are looking to buy

Dave93

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Adding / sharing ownership in the future is an easy change.
I have done similarly in the past

Thanks for the heads up, this is a bit of good news. I would love her to be on the mortgage as soon as we can whether at the point of buying or as soon afterwards. Although she said she won't - I don't want her to feel like she doesn't own the property with me.

tom9980 wrote: »

Until you talk to a broker you don't know that for sure, our first mortgage in 2014 i was under the same impression but we both were put on the mortgage with no issue at all despite me officially still being a student at the time.

That is encouraging, did you have any income other than student loans?

IveSeenTheLight

Dave93 wrote: »

Thank you for this reply, and I know that you are right; comparing ourselves to others will never end well. I suppose my long term goal personally is to have a good amount of savings so that we can retire earlier than 67 comfortably. If that meant taking a hit on the size of the house we owned I would be happy with that, and if that meant saving and hanging on now I'd be happy with that also if I knew that buying in a few years was the more sensible decision than buying now. Buying now we would have a cheaper mortgage than in 2 years time but would have to spend money renovating the property anyway whereas in 2 years time we would need much less renovation and have a bigger home but with a bigger mortgage and 2 years extra paying rent.

Some people may say there is no right and wrong in this situation but I think there is, I'm just lost as to what the right thing to do is. A crystal ball to see the future of both outcomes would be nice.
.

A crystal ball is not available lol.

That said, its sounds like an ideal situation for you.
Renovation projects provide the best house price growth than paying through the nose for a place someone else has done up.
My first flat, our bed was in the living room along with a garden bench as our only seat whilst we did up the bedroom.

Its up to you, but I'd be wanting to get in and get on with the project, what an exciting time for you.

IveSeenTheLight

Dave93 wrote: »

North West UK, anywhere between St Helens/Warrington. And I do feel like you are right, the doom and gloom in the news with articles expecting housing market crashes etc are just muddying the water for us. The thought of buying now fills us with excitement and joy, but at the same time a feeling of dread not knowing whether its right to buy now or wait given potentially uncertain times coming up.

Looking again at the land registry: -

Warrington April 2012 = £145,167
Warrington February 2017 = £180,250
Warrington HPI = 24.17%

St Helens April 2012 = £105,071
St Helens February 2017 = £122,214
St Helens HPI = 16.32%

Both areas appear to have slow sustained YOY growth since they dropped in the credit crunch on 2008.

Of course there are odd months negative growth, but over the picture, not anything to suggest its a bubble about to pop and that you'll make any significant gains by waiting.

I really do urge you to look at the land registry, consider your local market and form you educated opinions over the risks and rewards

Dave93

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Looking at the land registry, the average UK house price was £167,854 in April 2012.
The latest graph (Feb 2017), its £217,502.

I'm surprised as that's 29.57% HPI in just under 5 years

Of course, each area will vary, hence why I asked where you are looking to buy

Yeah one worry we have is that house prices are at an all time high so maybe a drop in price is due, but I guess we would only know that in 5 years time when we look back. At which point we would have rented,

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

A crystal ball is not available lol.

That said, its sounds like an ideal situation for you.
Renovation projects provide the best house price growth than paying through the nose for a place someone else has done up.
My first flat, our bed was in the living room along with a garden bench as our only seat whilst we did up the bedroom.

Its up to you, but I'd be wanting to get in and get on with the project, what an exciting time for you.

We have found a couple of 3 bedroom semi detached houses within our price range that require a lot of TLC (largely replastering and decoration, nothing structural) and we are excited at the prospect of spending the next year or two fixing it up.

We estimate until my girlfriend starts working we would be able to throw £600-800 per month into renovating at an absolute maximum if we temporarily stopped saving. Not sure how sensible that would be though...

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Looking again at the land registry: -

Warrington April 2012 = £145,167
Warrington February 2017 = £180,250
Warrington HPI = 24.17%

St Helens April 2012 = £105,071
St Helens February 2017 = £122,214
St Helens HPI = 16.32%

Both areas appear to have slow sustained YOY growth since they dropped in the credit crunch on 2008.

Of course there are odd months negative growth, but over the picture, not anything to suggest its a bubble about to pop and that you'll make any significant gains by waiting.

I really do urge you to look at the land registry, consider your local market and form you educated opinions over the risks and rewards

This is beyond useful and I didn't know about this!! Thank you.

mollycat

Dave, although making a decision and acting on it is obviously causing some anxiety, can I just concur with the majority of posters here who are advocating buying now rather than waiting.

I think it is an 100% no brainer not to delay, (with the caveat you make a considered and sensible choice re: which property you two purchase(clue..location )

Nothing more to add to the excellent advice already given, other than that the future you would very likely be frustrated with the present you should you decide to delay (say) another 5 years.

Edit due to cross posting....

"worry that house prices are near an all time high"

House prices are nearly always are at an all time high.....that's the point!

Dave93

mollycat wrote: »

Dave, although making a decision and acting on it is obviously causing some anxiety, can I just concur with the majority of posters here who are advocating buying now rather than waiting.

I think it is an 100% no brainer not to delay, (with the caveat you make a considered and sensible choice re: which property you two purchase(clue..location )

Nothing more to add to the excellent advice already given, other than that the future you would very likely be frustrated with the present you should you decide to delay (say) another 5 years.

Edit due to cross posting....

"worry that house prices are near an all time high"

House prices are nearly always are at an all time high.....that's the point!

Thank you for your response, this thread has blown up way more than I expected and I can't thank everybody enough for how grateful I am.

You're right, house prices always seem to be at an all time high and I guess if we buy now and spend time renovating the property, in 5 years time if we looked to sell again I couldn't imagine a scenario where we would be massively out of pocket. But, as a fist time buyer at 24 I lack experience of these things so the input you are all providing isn't just helpful but its probably the extra nudge we need to go for it.

IveSeenTheLight

Dave93 wrote: »

Yeah one worry we have is that house prices are at an all time high so maybe a drop in price is due, but I guess we would only know that in 5 years time when we look back. At which point we would have rented,

Actually, not as plain cut as you might thin.
In Warrington, house prices on averaged only peaked in January and February this year and when you consider in real terms, they are cheaper than they were at peak in November 2007

St Helens is still £10k below its peak of July 2007 and thus even better in real terms from peak

Dave93 wrote: »

We have found a couple of 3 bedroom semi detached houses within our price range that require a lot of TLC (largely replastering and decoration, nothing structural) and we are excited at the prospect of spending the next year or two fixing it up.

We estimate until my girlfriend starts working we would be able to throw £600-800 per month into renovating at an absolute maximum if we temporarily stopped saving. Not sure how sensible that would be though...

It sounds ideal and it will give you great delight and pleasure to work on something together and you will feel a great achievement as you refurbish each room to your and modern tastes.

We also ploughed all our available money into the renovation and honestly, it was money well spent.

Once you own, what would you be saving towards?
Investing in the property will also be saving by increasing value

Dave93 wrote: »

This is beyond useful and I didn't know about this!! Thank you.

Your welcome, it's always best to research your facts and help aid your decision

Dave93

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Actually, not as plain cut as you might thin.
In Warrington, house prices on averaged only peaked in January and February this year and when you consider in real terms, they are cheaper than they were at peak in November 2007

St Helens is still £10k below its peak of July 2007 and thus even better in real terms from peak



It sounds ideal and it will give you great delight and pleasure to work on something together and you will feel a great achievement as you refurbish each room to your and modern tastes.

We also ploughed all our available money into the renovation and honestly, it was money well spent.

Once you own, what would you be saving towards?
Investing in the property will also be saving by increasing value



Your welcome, it's always best to research your facts and help aid your decision

Knowing St Helens is still 10K below 2007 is very interesting seeing as it is most likely the place we will buy. Once we own we would be saving for pension, and building up a healthy amount of cash so that later in life we are not job reliant, can cut our hours and hopefully even retire early. We are also unmarried with no children and that seems to be the next step after buying a house, so there is that to think about as well.

Thank you for all of your research and insight, it has genuinely helped me more than any bank, article or friend/family member and I am already feeling in a much more confident and knowledgeable to help make a decision.

mollycat

Dave....thanks, I wish you well

Something that may or may not help, from the perspective/experience of someone much older....

Self and partner have had long term desire of living in London.

10 years ago could have afforded to buy someplace, thought prices a bit dear, so decided to wait.

Could have bought 5 years ago but this would have taken pretty much all of our free cash, so decided to wait, (for a crash).

Forward to present day; nothing remotely affordable for us now, likely never will be.

Do I wish I'd bought 10 years ago? Yes.

Do I wish I'd bought 5 years ago? Yes again!

I know this tale has limited relevance to yourself, but there's a lesson in there someplace.

Like I say, good luck.