Sell property and move in with parents (or rent) vs buying straight away?

Adamc

Hi 

We've outgrown our current house and want to buy something new. Properties seem to get snapped up very quickly around here. I'm wondering about the pros and cons of selling up and moving in with parents while we try to find the ideal house vs trying to find the ideal house while ours in on the market?

Obviously rising costs are an issue but we want to find our forever home. Previously we felt a little rushed to view and make offers as they were being bought and sold so quickly. 

What have others done?

t1redmonkey

I put my house on the market in early March and sold it a week or so later with completion due on 3rd May.  I was expecting to find somewhere else by then, but also had a bit of a nightmare trying to find somewhere suitable, so I'm moving back in with my parents for now (they only live a few streets away from me anyway).  At least I can save some more money in the meantime and not feel as rushed into buying something.

Depends on your own situation though, I'm just a single person and my parents have quite a large 3 storey house anyway, so I can use the top floor all for myself so I'll still have an element of privacy.  If you have a partner and maybe your parents have a smaller place and your bedroom is going to be right next to your parent's bedroom, I can see that potentially being harder to live with.

julicorn

Con: having to move twice. 
Pros: being in quite an attractive position as a buyer, less complex chains. 

We're currently in the process of buying and selling at the same time. Accepted an offer on our flat early February, and then lost out on quite a few houses after that went to chain-free buyers. We found our next property in early March, but are still waiting for the chain to fully form now. In the event that it got too complex (we're currently looking at a minimum chain of 5 properties) or our purchase fell through, we'd be very tempted to go rent somewhere for a little while. It'd likely be a different scenario if the market wasn't quite this manic though. This whole 'you can only view when you have accepted an offer on your property' situation paired with having 20-30 buyers competing for each property seems to just result in chains forming quite slowly at the moment. 

youth_leader

It's great you have the option of moving in with parents, it might be restrictive but preferable as it's short term.  I had to move into rented and had all the paperwork of going through financial checks/putting all the utilities in my name etc.  Good luck!

lookstraightahead

How do the parents feel about it? 

Woolsery

lookstraightahead said:

How do the parents feel about it? 

Hurrah, someone has asked at last. 

It looks highly likely to me that one of our children+husband will be moving in with us before the year's end for similar reasons. We won't mind too much, but every situation is different. If it were our other child+husband and children it's possible I would suddenly be inspired to go on a lone camping tour of Scotland!

Being more serious, I think the market is bound to cool significantly before long, so if it were me I'd certainly take low cost accommodation and the inconveniences, the only problem being that a more depressed market may mean even fewer houses coming up for sale.

K_S

Adamc said:

Hi 

We've outgrown our current house and want to buy something new. Properties seem to get snapped up very quickly around here. I'm wondering about the pros and cons of selling up and moving in with parents while we try to find the ideal house vs trying to find the ideal house while ours in on the market?

Obviously rising costs are an issue but we want to find our forever home. Previously we felt a little rushed to view and make offers as they were being bought and sold so quickly. 

What have others done?

@adamc If it is practical to do so, and you're looking for a good quality family home (big supply crunch in most parts of the country), then it might we worth considering going into a rental/family-home before buying. Generally speaking, my clients who've done that (either pre-planned or to break a chain) have had a far smoother buying journey than those in a chain and been able to get good offers in for properties where the transaction had fallen through and the vendors preferred chain-free buyers.

propertyhunter

Just remember that what you think is a short time with the parents could actually be much longer given the supply constraints.

Also, you will have to be mindful of the fact that you will have different habits and ways of living from your parents - which could grind on both parties. Remember your relationship with your parents changes once you leave home, and then returning home you forget how much you've changed in that intervening time - and sometimes the archetypal parent-child dynamic manifests itself (clear your room, wash your dishes etc.). It depends on the relationship of course, and whether you have children, as the grandparent dynamic changes things (they might be more accommodating, or maybe not!). 

You will have to compromise on many things, but I'm sure the pros will outweigh the cons.