Buying Second house to live in - Stamp Duty

Cakeguts

You have missed the most important point in this plan. Not every house that is bought is going to make a good rental property. You could have a house that is extremely difficult to let. If that is the case you are not going to get a choice of good tenants and if you don't get that you could find that the new bathroom and other improvements you have made get wrecked by the tenants.

If you want a buy to let property buy a property that you have bought with letting it as the design for purchase. Don't expect that a property bought to live will work the same way. People who buy properties are likely to be happy to make compromises that tenants won't.

Jenniefour

jackouk1234 wrote: »

...paying a mortgage off is the most cost efficient investment... Is it? Have you checked that out? I overpaid my last mortgage and got rid of it early, but not at the expense of paying into a pension.

I have a pension, just not paying into it at the moment until I figure out my plans. Why on earth not? You're self employed so the tax man effectively gives you money. And that's before considering how the pot will grow over time.

"I'm now earning enough to upgrade to a bigger house". You don't have to move just because you're now earning enough to do so. Why not post on the Pensions board and see what they have to say? About your wealth creation plan, which I think is your aim. Put it to them. Wildly off topic, but I think you're taking it as a given that property always outperforms other forms of investments.

jackouk1234

"I'm now earning enough to upgrade to a bigger house". You don't have to move just because you're now earning enough to do so. Why not post on the Pensions board and see what they have to say? About your wealth creation plan, which I think is your aim. Put it to them. Wildly off topic, but I think you're taking it as a given that property always outperforms other forms of investments.

Aha but I do need to move. I have hugely outgrown this house. I've got storage boxes everywhere. My garage is overflowing and I can barely get into my second bedroom. If, for example, I was to buy/sell the same day I'd need to rent a storage unit for the switchover and start piling things in there weeks in advance, and take another few weeks to empty it.

Pension is indeed off topic and whist I commend you for stamping your foot there's many, many reasons why I'm not paying into my pension at the moment - I know it comes with substantial tax relief and I am missing out but for the short term I'm happy. Every so often someone will have circumstances that break the norm, and I'm one of them. So yep. I'm loosing out but at this time I'm content.