House Prices #4 Property market, buying and selling

[Shinythings]

Great. A bird has done a massive shit all over my windows that I had cleaned YESTERDAY. No one has space to come and do them again by the viewing tomorrow. As the poster just said, selling is so stressful

 

[Megansnarkle]

I’ve been pondering housing and realised I don’t know any of the older generation who continued to rise the ladder; they all purchased a home, and then stayed there. My in laws are worth a fair bob but still live in a 3 bed semi, when I asked them why they said they had no need for bigger, and now they’re living a VERY comfortable retirement from the extra that they saved. I wonder what it is about our generation that makes us all feel that need to upsize? I know I certainly do, but other than “I should” or “it would be nice to have” I don’t have solid reasons for a need!

A global pandemic has had something to do with a recent need to upsize for many people. Our 'spare bedroom' is an office as is half of our dining table. In order to have our own spaces to work, we'd need three bedrooms and that's without us having kids. With an increase in the amount of time spent at home, the desire to have a space that isn't both work, leisure and laundry room isn't unreasonable.

 

[secretsquirreling]

This doesn’t matter anymore - the house sale has completely fallen through, the chain is in a mess, we are all packed and I’m going to turn to drink.

Just a message of solidarity - our buyer has pulled out and the sellers we were buying off are putting theirs back on the market. We were right at the last hurdle!

 

[Shinythings]

We’re saving up and we are about 30% there. Living with my boyfriend’s parents. God I miss our own space. Think we have a while left and we’re debating just renting instead my mum said she also thinks we should rent because it’s so hard to get a mortgage now and we’re not overly happy in our living situation.

Would anyone advise against this?

Yes, renting will massively hinder your ability to save and she's talking nonsense. Mortgages are absolutely fine to get

 

[wideopenspace]

I don't understand why anyone got involved with Help to Buy especially outside of London where often they were overpriced flats which haven't retained their value. Yet again people won't take responsibility and will expect the government to bail them out.

 

[epl000]

Personally I'd go with the one that you liked best, if you feel confident they will do a better job at selling your house then it is worth more than the £2k price difference

 

[Yel]

There’s often a “greed” narrative around these things to shame young people who overstretched themselves

I definitely don't think it's anything to do with age. There's people approaching retirement age who re-mortgaged their property with no plan for the future or act dumb pretending they didn't know they signed up to an interest only mortgage and now that's coming to the end claim they're a victim.

Financial institutions pray on people of all ages to be short sighted and sign up for debt that'll often become a crippling burden for the future.

 

[101d]

Got our inventory note thingy today and the old homeowners are taking the curtains (fine, we'd want new anyway) but also the curtain poles?

Maybe I'm a minority here but I reckon I'd have left them behind - what are the chances that they'll definitely fit in the new house? Just seems a bit tight to me

Ours said that, so I told my solicitor to tell them I want any holes repairing, and then they said they'd leave them lol

 

[Shinythings]

Update on yesterday, after trying to organise a second viewing on the house it has now gone SSTC for full asking price. Think we were probably used as leverage in negotiations to get a full price offer. Snakey agents!
Bit disappointed but also telling myself if it’s meant for you it doesn’t pass you by! Given the current market we are probably better staying where we are and not taking on more debt.

Guess it was one of those rare occasions where an offer comes along out of nowhere. I always found in house hunting that ones that didn't work out always led to something better.

 

[anonesk223]

We’re currently saving to buy. Nowhere close to a deposit and will probably take another couple of years. I absolutely hate this doesn’t even feel worth it at this point

 

[MissTeddy]

1% interest rates ARE NOT NORMAL ... we've been in an anomaly.

 

[Folkevermore]

This isn't about house prices as such. I looked on Spare Room for rooms to rent and couldn't believe how many were £700 - £800. I'm not in a city, just small towns! Renting would be too much alone and since the end of last year, mortgage rates are too high for me to consider buying alone. What do you do?! Move back in with parents in your 30's?

I’m 30 and moved back in with my parents a few years ago to save for a house deposit (hopefully should be completing on my house next month)
Its honestly such a depressing situation. I’m very thankful to my parents, but it’s soul crushing to not have independence

 

[Megansnarkle]

Not cheeky. You can only ask. I’d definitely try £350k. (If it had been on the market much longer than it should I’m cheeky enough to try £340k)

——

anyone have any advice….?

The market is a bit stagnant where we are, my (deceased) dad's property has been on a few months. Lovely bungalow on a nice, small estate that are usually sought after but thanks to a lot of landlords getting rid it’s now one of 6 on the estate up for sale.

was wondering whether to go multi agency or whether that looks desperate? Another problem is that we live in a quiet area and the other local estate agents have got the other properties for sale, so if they’re not selling theirs why would they want another on their books?

My first port of call is Rightmove for a property search so surely a different agent doesn’t make that much of a difference? The agents we're using are usually really keen and have a good selling rate, we can’t fault them as agents it’s just the climate I think.

If you want/need to sell then drop the price. It doesn't matter what agents you use. If priced keenly enough it will sell. If you don't want to or can't sell at a lower price then unless the property has something the others don't you either need to be prepared to wait or pull it from the market for a time.

 

[Folkevermore]

My husband was a “failure to launch” of sorts, he avoided any and all financial responsibility until his mid 30’s, so unfortunately he had zero equity or savings of any kind when we met, and it’s set us back quite a bit. We’re a single salary household so the range we can borrow is limited, and whilst equity in my home is very healthy it’s a drop in the ocean compared to prices in the area (200k equity, average house price 1.4m) we’ve seen a place further afield for 650k that we both love, but borrowing 450k on a single salary is already pushing it, I’m not sure if we can take away another 30k for all the fees we need, plus reno

Honestly, the housing market just isn’t designed for single salary households anymore. It really sucks, and is definitely a big factor in why people have kids much much later now

 

[iieee]

We’ve just started looking at (what is my) first mortgage and I am stressed as.

i am way too risk averse to go down the variable rate route but best fixed option price wise for us Is probably the 5 year one and tying ourselves for that long also terrifies me. But surely interest ratesaren’t going to plummet anytime soon

I could really do with a crystal ball

You will find that 5 year fix are already priced lower than a 2 year fix in anticipation of future rate decreases so you won't really miss out on anything there. If you're risk averse then a fixed rate is the best thing for you as you know exactly what you'll be paying.

 

[IOrderedASandwich]

Renters have been going through this for years and nobody's really given a fuck, though. And now I've heard people say that renters should be taxed more to help mortgage holders when in reality they're almost always paying off someone else's mortgage as it is....

 

[Folkevermore]

Well it all depends on how much they fall.

Things are quite out of balance at the moment, will be interesting to see how it readjusts. Long term young people will be better off if house prices have some correlation to wages.

Now prices are falling and highly unlikely to increase so some may not complete and sit tight. Sentiment is quickly changing.

It's become increasingly hard to get a mortgage in recent weeks unless you have a good job, very good credit rating and good deposit.

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It would have to fall significantly to get to the same level of affordability as before.
Currently a £200,000 loan over 25 years at 5.8% would cost £1264 a month.
A couple of years ago the house would’ve cost £791 (1.4%) interest.
To achieve the same payment level, house prices would have to drop 40%.

 

[Shinythings]

Urgh, there is just nothing coming on the market that interests us. It's all crap.

 

[Upintheair83]

Had to take ours off rightmove over Christmas. We had a white van pull up outside our house at 2am at the weekend, looking into our house- then after a few mins (thank god)drove off. So just a reminder to those of you with homes online, be extra cautious with safety and keeping your homes safe during this Christmas period. And good luck everyone going into the new year xx

 

[Yel]

I think there should be target debt management plans between people and the banks if they’re struggling with repayments, but the idea of pumping more money into the economy to support the housing market is ridiculous.

Quite. It's insanity. But it's the kind of insanity that has got us to where we are today, so I wouldn't rule it out

Any help should be to increase terms, a short time on interest only, negotiations to prevent repo's etc. Not public money being given to reduce people's debts.

When everything is going well people say their home is an investment, when it turns suddenly it turns into emotive stuff that they need government help otherwise they'll lose their homes.

Renters are kicked out of their homes all the time, at least mortgage holders have quite a bit of control.