can i sell now or do i have to wait ??

where2start

I was wondering we bought a house in december 07, having done all the necessary research on schools, area location etc it has now been the biggest mistake ever.Neighbours both sides are a problem, one side the property was bought same time as us but has now go tenenats that are really noisy, the front and back gardens are almost forests and have full grown trees !! i have suffered from racial abuse on 3 occassions, my son doesnt seem to be enjoying the school and i havent been able to find ONE friendly person on the road i live on, in fact no is friendly its really depressing .my question is we have a 5 yrs fixed mortgage with Bradford & Bingley and i need to know if we are able to sell the house (or remortgage) now or do we have to wait till the 5 yrs is up.Or any suggestions on how to sell up fast without cause mortgage problems

mizzbiz

Why not try to let it out and rent somewhere else until the fog clears in the housing market.

As sure as eggs are eggs you won't get back what you paid for the house, so I imagine that wouldn't put you in a great position mortgage wise. You will also probably have to pay a hefty percentage of your original loan in early redemption fees if you do decide to sell up.

Moving into a new area is always difficult, especially if you rely on neighbours for your social circle.

moneysavinmonkey

There will be a couple barriers to selling:

1) If you sell within the fixed rate period you will need to either a) port your mortgage to you new house or b) pay an early redemption charge (likely to be a fair few thousand) You will need to speak to your mortgage company to explore these options

2)AFAIK you are not allowed to sell your house for less than the value of any outstanding mortgages/debts secured on it, without prior authorisation from your lender. You don't say anything about what equity you have/had in your home so this may not be relevant.

3)In the current market conditions in order to sell fast you are going to have to offer your house at a very attractive rate... not many people are buying so it needs to be a really good bargain to secure an early sale.


Moving house is pretty expensive, and of course there are no guarantees that where you move to will be any better.. as you said you did all the research on this one!

Is there anyway you can stick it out and do things to help improve your lot.....
e.g. you boy could move schools within the area (although unless he is being really badly bullied then changing schools repeatedly might do more harm than good)
Find ways to make friends outside of your immediate neighbours.. e.g. join local groups - am dram/cooking classes/ yoga etc.
Are there any local groups for kids too, could help your boy?
Take some confort in the fact the neighbours are tenants... they may not be there that long. You can find out who owns the house and write to them to complain, or else if the noise is really unbearable then bad then get local police or environmental health/noise people involved. Certainly if you are being racially abused then report this to the police.
As far as the next door neighbours garden containing trees!! Is this really a problem to you??? :rotfl:

where2start

many thanks for the replies, i will contact our mortgage lender to find out the pros and cons To "moneysavingmonkey" well the issues of the trees growing out of control is that their branches are growing towards my bedroom and kitchen windows and i heard that trees such as sycamore trees have very large roots that often damage the foundation of the house over years thus meaning if i do want to sell who would want to live next to front garden that looks like hell and the back that looks like an out grown forest !!Would i be able to let it out ? do i inform the mortgage lender or justbe quiet about it.

moneysavinmonkey

some people on here will tell you not to inform your mortgage lender but that is not the 'correct' thing to do.

There are a number of threads on here, and if you are really wanting to go down that route of letting out your property i suggest you read up on it extensively and then come back with some questions as it is a big big topic!!

If the trees branches are overhanging your property I think you are entitled to chop 'lop'/chop them down (the overhanging branches not the whole tree!) Hopefully this will solve the problem of the ones near your windows.

You can't really jump to the conclusion that the tree routes are damaging your property, I think this is very uncommon and isn't going to happen overnight! If there are signs of cracks of pavements bumping up then fair enough, but i think it is just that you don't like the look of it!

Whilsn't maybe you don't like living next door to a load of trees, there isn't much you can do about that so probably not worth worrying. There are plenty of examples of people going to court over the neighbours trees and it just ends up costing everyone a load of money and not getting anywhere. It is just one of those things, and you can't force your neighbours to enjoy gardening!! Unless you fancy forming some kind of desperate housewives style neighbourhood committee and policing your neighbours lawnmowing and weeding? [joke!]

where2start

ah ah thats a really good idea !! well thank you ever so much for the replies and help one more question before i hand my towel in - would it be an issue to change from a resident to letting the property out

lonestar1

Dont forget if you report neighbours to police/EH you will need to declare it to future buyers which will almost certainly put folk off

where2start

thanks for that, funny enough the police just came last week to give up smart water liquid to protect our valuables as the property was listed as having had a burglary 3 years ago , and the previous owners didnt even tell us this !!

moneysavinmonkey

depends on who is your lender, (B&B used to be a big BTL lender but I think they are much less keen now) what is your LTV, what your repayments are, what rent you would get... etc etc. You should ask them when you phone to find out about moving??

Getting permission off your lender is just the start of it, there's tenancy agreements, inventories, deposit schemes, landlords insurance, changing your building insurance, gas safety certificates, understanding about different types of tenancys and what you can and can't do, (e.g. the legal way to gain access to the property, or give notice,) landlord registration (in certain areas) ... etc etc.

As I said, it's a big topic and a lot of work. If you read this forum with any regularity you'll get an idea of the kinds of things that can and do go wrong! As a start why not look at local letting agents/rightmove to find out what kind of rent you can expect to receive...if that covers your mortgage repayment with a bit spare for other costs then your on the right track.

where2start

cheers moneysavingmonkey i think i will defintely start reading and doing my research on letting , many many thanks