FTB house prices!

PlumLuck

p00hsticks said:

[Deleted User] said:

Moving to another area is pointless, house prices reflect local wages.

Not entirely true - if you look at large companies, or public sector areas, they may still operate a London weighting and/or have regional pay scales, but any pay difference across areas is in no way proportional to the difference in house prices.

Teachers outside 'London and the fringe' are on the same scale all the way across England, for example.

This is very true. Where I work, salaries are equal both in Leicestershire and Fife. There's quite a big difference between the two.

[Deleted User]

first_time_stressed_buyer said:

Thanks all for your comments!! To try and answer as much as I can:

- I'm in the North West and already looking as far and wide as I can for something to crop up within a reasonable commute. I am willing to compromise. 
- I am unable to buy with someone else. 
- I  a skilled worker and love my job, I have a good wage working for a good company. I am not willing to leave it. I have looked at other companies in the area just to see if I could negotiate a pay rise... I'm already being paid more!
- I have looked at shared ownership, there is currently not much available other than 25% share plus the rent, I would be paying more out than I currently am in rent! (so much for affordable housing) 
- help to buy looked promising but again, not much currently available and again, do not seem to feel very affordable!
- I have family willing to help, we have looked at family deposit mortgages to top up the difference but after speaking with lenders it doesn't seem to increase the price I can buy for 😔.

Thanks all for the input though! 

I hear the same story over and over again.

You identified the issue with shared ownership. There were some okay schemes in the past, but these days they are mostly a very bad idea because you end up paying out a hell of a lot of money, stretched to your limit (which makes affordability checks harder to pass anyway) and if interest rates rise of the value of the property decreases (unlikely but possible) you could be in a real mess.

What kind of job do you have? One possibility is to work from home permanently, or at least most of the time. My brother does 1 day in the office every fortnight, and it's a 2 hour commute each way. Means you can live in an area with low wages and low house prices. Of course it needs to have good internet connectivity for many jobs, and such areas tend not to be very nice.

maisie_cat

When I bought my first house in 1983 I could only afford it by buying with somebody else, commuting 90 minutes each way to work and buying in a less than desirable area. 
Over time I gained qualifications and experience so earned more, moved to a better area, and could afford to buy alone.

It's not new

BikingBud

maisie_cat said:

When I bought my first house in 1983 I could only afford it by buying with somebody else, commuting 90 minutes each way to work and buying in a less than desirable area. 
Over time I gained qualifications and experience so earned more, moved to a better area, and could afford to buy alone.

It's not new

The OP is a skilled worker and one has to consider that gives a fair wage certainly from their comments the highest wages in the area. Where do you go to from being skilled and at the top of the local wage bands?

The fallacy that everyone can improve and lazy people with low motivation are sitting around feeling sorry for themselves rather than getting better qualified or moving to cheaper areas so they can feed the ongoing HPI frenzy is fundamentally flawed.

Those that cannot see how migration of staff, skilled or otherwise, away from the area where work needs to be done are missing the reality of the absurd situation where workers cannot afford to live where they work. Committing large amounts of time and funds to commuting is not the answer.

Providing cost effective local housing is.

first_time_stressed_buyer

[Deleted User] said:

first_time_stressed_buyer said:

Thanks all for your comments!! To try and answer as much as I can:

- I'm in the North West and already looking as far and wide as I can for something to crop up within a reasonable commute. I am willing to compromise. 
- I am unable to buy with someone else. 
- I  a skilled worker and love my job, I have a good wage working for a good company. I am not willing to leave it. I have looked at other companies in the area just to see if I could negotiate a pay rise... I'm already being paid more!
- I have looked at shared ownership, there is currently not much available other than 25% share plus the rent, I would be paying more out than I currently am in rent! (so much for affordable housing) 
- help to buy looked promising but again, not much currently available and again, do not seem to feel very affordable!
- I have family willing to help, we have looked at family deposit mortgages to top up the difference but after speaking with lenders it doesn't seem to increase the price I can buy for 😔.

Thanks all for the input though! 

I hear the same story over and over again.

You identified the issue with shared ownership. There were some okay schemes in the past, but these days they are mostly a very bad idea because you end up paying out a hell of a lot of money, stretched to your limit (which makes affordability checks harder to pass anyway) and if interest rates rise of the value of the property decreases (unlikely but possible) you could be in a real mess.

What kind of job do you have? One possibility is to work from home permanently, or at least most of the time. My brother does 1 day in the office every fortnight, and it's a 2 hour commute each way. Means you can live in an area with low wages and low house prices. Of course it needs to have good internet connectivity for many jobs, and such areas tend not to be very nice.

I wish working from home were an option 😔 I'm a tree surgeon so unfortunately, there isn't much scope to work from home 😅😅😅  I appreciate your comments though 😊

SavingPennies_2

p00hsticks said:

[Deleted User] said:

Moving to another area is pointless, house prices reflect local wages.

Not entirely true - if you look at large companies, or public sector areas, they may still operate a London weighting and/or have regional pay scales, but any pay difference across areas is in no way proportional to the difference in house prices.

Teachers outside 'London and the fringe' are on the same scale all the way across England, for example.

Also prices can vary a lot in within one area, you don't have to move to the other side of the country. In Manchester, house prices in the cheapest areas are less than half the price of those in the desirable ones - even though the two areas might just be a few miles apart and both equally have access to the same jobs/ salaries based in Manchester or Greater Manchester. I often wonder when people say (not necessarily the OP just in general) that they cant afford anything, if what they really mean is they cant afford anything *they want*, which is fair enough tbh I sometimes think the same myself, but if your budget is low there has to be compromise if you want to buy. As a FTB and (presumably) young/ single, size and area won't be such an issue. As your salary increases or if you meet someone you can buy with you could always move to a bigger property/ nicer area. I do sympathise though OP it's a lot harder buying a single person especially with prices as they are at the moment. 

GoogleMeNow

OP, what's your budget and general area?  Maybe we can help find you something!

MobileSaver

first_time_stressed_buyer said:

- I am unable to buy with someone else.

I think this is the real problem in your case.

Although there are always exceptions, most First Time Buyers cannot afford to buy a property on their own and that's been the case for years; it was certainly the case for me when I was a FTB some 30 years ago.

RelievedSheff

SavingPennies_2 said:

p00hsticks said:

[Deleted User] said:

Moving to another area is pointless, house prices reflect local wages.

Not entirely true - if you look at large companies, or public sector areas, they may still operate a London weighting and/or have regional pay scales, but any pay difference across areas is in no way proportional to the difference in house prices.

Teachers outside 'London and the fringe' are on the same scale all the way across England, for example.

Also prices can vary a lot in within one area, you don't have to move to the other side of the country. In Manchester, house prices in the cheapest areas are less than half the price of those in the desirable ones - even though the two areas might just be a few miles apart and both equally have access to the same jobs/ salaries based in Manchester or Greater Manchester. I often wonder when people say (not necessarily the OP just in general) that they cant afford anything, if what they really mean is they cant afford anything *they want*, which is fair enough tbh I sometimes think the same myself, but if your budget is low there has to be compromise if you want to buy. As a FTB and (presumably) young/ single, size and area won't be such an issue. As your salary increases or if you meet someone you can buy with you could always move to a bigger property/ nicer area. I do sympathise though OP it's a lot harder buying a single person especially with prices as they are at the moment. 

Exactly this.

The first house we bought was an ex council house in a less than desirable area. It was the best of a bad bunch that we could afford. It certainly wasn't an area where we wanted to live.

2.5 years ago we finally got around to moving again after 12 years of living in our first house. We could not afford the type of house that we wanted in an area of the city that we would be happy to live in so we looked further afield and ended up moving 22 miles to a small commuter town where house prices were far more reasonable. The compromise was and still is the commute into work although it is only an extra 15 minutes each way over where we previously lived it is a much greater distance.

We are glad that we did move when we did because prices have rocketed where we have bought. Had we not moved when we did then we could not afford the property that we have now. House prices here have gone up much faster than house prices where we were previously living.

dinkylink

first_time_stressed_buyer said:

[Deleted User] said:

first_time_stressed_buyer said:

Thanks all for your comments!! To try and answer as much as I can:

- I'm in the North West and already looking as far and wide as I can for something to crop up within a reasonable commute. I am willing to compromise. 
- I am unable to buy with someone else. 
- I  a skilled worker and love my job, I have a good wage working for a good company. I am not willing to leave it. I have looked at other companies in the area just to see if I could negotiate a pay rise... I'm already being paid more!
- I have looked at shared ownership, there is currently not much available other than 25% share plus the rent, I would be paying more out than I currently am in rent! (so much for affordable housing) 
- help to buy looked promising but again, not much currently available and again, do not seem to feel very affordable!
- I have family willing to help, we have looked at family deposit mortgages to top up the difference but after speaking with lenders it doesn't seem to increase the price I can buy for 😔.

Thanks all for the input though! 

I hear the same story over and over again.

You identified the issue with shared ownership. There were some okay schemes in the past, but these days they are mostly a very bad idea because you end up paying out a hell of a lot of money, stretched to your limit (which makes affordability checks harder to pass anyway) and if interest rates rise of the value of the property decreases (unlikely but possible) you could be in a real mess.

What kind of job do you have? One possibility is to work from home permanently, or at least most of the time. My brother does 1 day in the office every fortnight, and it's a 2 hour commute each way. Means you can live in an area with low wages and low house prices. Of course it needs to have good internet connectivity for many jobs, and such areas tend not to be very nice.

I wish working from home were an option 😔 I'm a tree surgeon so unfortunately, there isn't much scope to work from home 😅😅😅  I appreciate your comments though 😊

Have you thought about going solo with your work? I appreciate you might need a bit of capital to sort the equipment etc initially, but I have a self-employed tree surgeon friend who earns ridiculously good money