Buying a house without a mortgage

newgirly

Congratulations on your new home!

SeriouslySeekingtoSave

Oh my goodness. Congratulations!

(and I fully agree about the internet, I'd rather be without water than Broadband now...)

pavlovs_dog

Frugaldom wrote: »

And I don't really want to have to pay two lots of council tax, electricity, telephones etc nor do I want to waste a fortune on petrol driving between the 2 houses.

assuming things work the same oop north as they do down here, you should be able to get a discount (50%?) on your council tax whilst it is uninhabitable due to renovations. M&FIL have paid half rates for 18 months whilst doing up a house in the past

Frugaldom

Many thanks.

Have now arranged to get a BT line and broadband installed, so that should be done before we move at the start of June.

Pavlov's - No worry about paying two lots of council tax, as I called them today to notify them of the purchase and we've been awarded a 100% exemption for a maximum of 6 months while house is uninhabited and undergoing renovation works, so that's another couple of hundred pounds saved.

April to May's rent paid, so that means that the May to June payment will, hopefully, be the last one we'll ever need to pay. We have a bottle of champagne sitting at the ready, compliments of a neighbour, and I have gallons of rhubarb and elderflower champagne style homebrew ready for the housewarming, which will probably need to be a garden-warming party, as the house won't be anywhere near finished when we move into it. Have stuck a few photos on my blog forum, just in case anyone's interested in what your money buys about here.

On another point, the 3-storey 19th Century house with large garden and separate garage we looked at in Wigtownshire has, this week, dropped to offers over £75k! It really is shocking how the prices are crashing in the area. The original sellers were hoping to get £145k for the house, when they first spoke about selling it in 2007/8. It's tragic.

Edited in: Exemption on council tax has to be cancelled as soon as we move in, so ours is only going to be for the 2 months. Council Tax office said it's 100% for first 6 months followed by 50% up to 18 months. If property is empty longer than that, I think she said they could reduce it to as little as 10%.

These renovation exemptions and discounts are completely different to those available for longterm unoccupied properties when owners are hospitalised etc.

Frugaldom

May-June rent paid and this is HOPEFULLY the last time we'll ever have to pay rent! :j

As of 7th June 2011, we will be rent and mortgage free, living in our very own fixy-up and wondering how we'll ever get it all fixed up! :rotfl:

Bottle of champagne at the ready, courtesy of a neighbour, by way of celebration when the time comes. :beer:

4 more weeks of running between two houses means around £140 extra on petrol,but it will be well worth it when we're moved in, working from home and doing whatever we want without having to worry about any landlords.

Frugaldom

Nearly 8 months since I updated this? :eek:

Well, that's 8 months of no rent and every available penny being ploughed into the renovation. Meanwhile, house prices are still falling all around us, so I'm posting in here to remind everyone that it is still possible to save up and buy a house without needing a deathgage, sorry, I mean mortgage. There are loads of really cheap properties just begging to be bought, so long as you don't want to live in the southern half of England. :rotfl:

We now have a fully functional shower room, hot water, some solid fuel heating, a new kitchen roof, insulation & ceiling, a new front door and a new back door. Next job is to replace the kitchen window then make the place properly draughtproof.

Getting there slowly, but there is no rush - home to stay, no rent to pay.

SnowMan

What a lovely thread this is and very inspirational

Thanks for the update and good luck with the ongoing work :beer::T

pavlovs_dog

all mod cons

hows the garden coming along?

Frugaldom

Thanks, SnowMan and Pavlov's

The 'garden' here was so overgrown that it had to be totally cleared. Here's how it looked when we got here:



The property had been lying empty for a couple of years, hence the reason we'd to replace part of the roof, rewire and do so much plumbing work before we could move into it. Almost all the pipes were burst when we got here. We managed to clear most of the 'garden' and transplanted absolutely everything from the old one. It was such a fantastic early summer last year that we even got some temporary vegetable beds coggled together, so we've had a fair bit of produce from the garden. Did I mention we have a stream running through it?



The hens now live at the bottom of the garden with the stream separating them from what will hopefully soon grow into my orchard. We've already installed a pond for the ducks and started work on an old outbuilding, so DS had somewhere for all his gym equipment.



I do a photo diary on my blog and daily updates in my frugal living challenge forum, so that's where you'll find me most days.

What's next for this 'buying a house without a mortgage' challenge, I have been asked? Well, let me just say that I've absolutely no intentions of moving out of here for many years - I love it! BUT... I'm still keeping an eye on the property market, still living on my frugal £4k per year budget and still saving whatever extra I can while we're renovating this house.

As you'll can tell from these photos, the garden kind of took priority, as my plan is to turn it into a microholding. (Quarter of an acre isn't quite big enough to call a smallholding! :rotfl:)

It has been a fantastic challenge over the past five years. So much has happened that it could probably fill several books, but I think what I am happiest about is that my parents managed to visit 'Frugaldom' and see me settled, at last. Sadly, their summer visit proved to be the first and last visit here for my dad, as he died very suddenly just a few weeks ago.

Everything for a reason... so never give up on your dreams!

My challenge continues... only now it's about turning a mortgage-free fixy-up house into a debtfree home.

pavlovs_dog

OMG what a transformation, I am in awe! Is the first pic from the end of the garden looking back at the house?

Sorry to hear about your dad, hope you're holding up ok. Promise to come visit blog and forum on the weekend when I have time to read properly and catch up on all your news. In as much as you ever can feel you know a fellow forumite it feels like we've been on the home ownership journey together, it's lovely to see your plans (and garden ) come to fruition xx