Owning your own home

4.8% doesn't sound too awful but is obviously a big jump from 1-2%.
If you have the luxury of cash in the bank, you can get 1 year fixed rate savings at 4.25% at the moment (Cahoot). Several regular savings accounts are offering 5% too.

If you had the double luxury of being able to overpay in the past, you may even be able to opt to take a payment holiday and dump the cash that would've gone on the mortgage into savings?

Hah, yeah, I did that, then interest rates went up again - and does anyone think they are coming down this year, now?

The point is that they have already come down in the wholesale market, banks just haven't passed it on yet.

Famous last words but I think it's more likely we get an emergency rate cut due to a crashing economy than the Bank staying the course on tightening. A really warm European winter is bailing us out slightly on the energy side.

Mortgage up for renewal in Sep 2023, but they (Santander) usually start to offer deals 3 months earlier.

4.5% would add ~£400 to my monthly mortgage payment, but given this is the last 5 years of my mortgage I'd probably take a fixed at that rate just to have the certainty of not getting fucked over by any chance of 10%+ rates in those 5 years.

I should probably look to do something else anyway my current mortgage is an interest-only mortgage which makes paying it back difficult as you can only repay 10% of the outstanding capital at the start of each calendar year (and therefore you can't pay back all 100% within 5 years) so I'd have to lump the excess money elsewhere and then pay it off at the end of the mortgage term.

Some kind of fixed-offset mortgage would be best, not sure if they exist. *googles*

https://www.ybs.co.uk/mortgages/offset-mortgages looks ok (except for the 5.44% rate). If I remortgage on a 10 year term we can aim to put more in the offset account each month to try and get it paid down within 5 years or shortly after that.

our renewal offer came up on december 1st for our fixed rate that ends on april 1, i checked twice since then and its been slightly lower both times that it was on december 1st.. so im just going to sit on it for a while and hope it keeps going

Interest rates went up, but mortgage rates went down (except for variable/tracker rates, which were far cheaper than the fixed rates)

Which lender are you with? A lot of the bigger lenders dropped their rates at the end of last year, so I'm expecting some further rate decreases, though maybe not dramatic.

Having said that, 4.8% fixed for 2 years with no fee is significantly better than what you would have got in Nov 22. As an example, Natwest had a 2 year fixed with no fee at 6.74% at end of November.

Pointing on chimneys in Victorian houses - does it need to be lime as elsewhere?

Just seen some photos of mine close up and looks a lot like cement mortar, all the lime mortar here was black as mixed with with coal slag. Surprisingly it doesn't actually seem to have a terrible effect so wonder if it's possibly an exception to the rule of using like-for-like materials to original. Maybe different, harder bricks than elsewhere were used...

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The point is that they have already come down in the wholesale market, banks just haven't passed it on yet.

I understand that, but they don't have to pass it on. And then interest rates are predicted to keep going up, I'm not sure what incentive they have to do so. Maybe if the housing market slows there will be more competition for customers which might make them re-evaluate things?

Edit: I see above some providers have made rate reductions

Famous last words but I think it's more likely we get an emergency rate cut due to a crashing economy than the Bank staying the course on tightening. A really warm European winter is bailing us out slightly on the energy side.

I'd be really surprised if a rate cut so large as to make a material difference would be possible with inflation running at ten zillion percent. It would take a disaster of some magnitude I think for that to happen.

That looks like it's been rebuilt or had significant brickwork repair at some point.

Is there a problem with it? What's the context?

Market is pricing in that the BoE will hike a further 100 bps to 4.5% (from 3.5%). Banks are layering in some extra conservatism on top of that / taking advantage of a dislocated market to charge more / don't want to lend at 80% LTV today because it could be 95% in a year's time.

I just find it hard to believe that the Bank will keep hiking through Q2 2023 even as inflationary energy pressures recede and unemployment starts ticking up (reducing worker bargaining power and wage pressures) as the economy crashes.

For a small / low LTV mortgage I would be really tempted to "white knuckle" it for the next 6 months on a tracker. If rates of 6% plus would be existential then fix ASAP.

Was going to fit cowls, to stop water ingress through disused chimneys, bloke said he could do it off a ladder but once he got up there it was too high to reach, so we're looking at scaffolding and I figure that would be a good chance to do running repairs. I see a few weeds growing from the mortar and need of a bit of re-pointing, but it's not actually causing problems [yet] other than rain coming in the open pots.

our report 4 years ago when we bought sid to keep an eye on it as the brickwork bows outwards, but I don't think it's moved at all.

I guess the best course of action is probably to slap a bit of cement mortar in where there's weeds and leave the fuck alone as it could quickly turn in to a money pit.

That's going to be expensive for just fitting cowls (and some minor pointing repairs). Is water getting in the pots causing problems further down?

I'd be tempted to get something else done at the same time (roof repair, lining a chimney or two for a burner or something etc).

Who is the bloke? A roofer or builder or what?

Could get a chimney sweep's opinion or that of an appliance (burner / gas fireplace) installer. The later will know if cowls and other fitments can be added without scaffolding.

Builder, general 'handyman', which seemed about right for what should have been a relatively small job, probably too small for proper roofers. We were going to remove our aerial and fix my neighbour's aerial cable back down for £150, but now looking at 3x that for the scaffold on top, which is why I was thinking about pointing repairs whilst it's up.

Not much else needs doing, don't want a log burner. Loft conversion and a new roof would be nice but that's a bit more than £450.

I'd ring round some roofing folk and / or arial fitters then. They will be more comfortable working at height and will know what can realistically be done. They might cost more than £150, but they may not need to saddle you with scaffolding and all the shit that brings.

Good shout on the aerial man front, got a guy popping round in a bit to have a look.

edit: the previous guy said he'd broken both wrists before falling from a roof so I can see why he's be jittery about climbing up a chimney stack!

Aerial man can do it from a ladder, will tackle the re-pointing at a later date/hopefully never

...all of the downstairs pipes run under the concrete floor (and it looks like bare copper in the concrete and not wrapped).

Old gravity-fed boiler system swapped out for new (higher pressured) combi...on firing up to test we ended up with an indoor water feature around the uncovered pipework - there's a leak in the what appear to be unprotected pipes under the concrete somewhere so we're going for a full uncover/replace in the front room as I type.

Fortunately we changed our mind and swapped the boiler over seven weeks after moving in and before redoing floors and redecorating rather than a year or two down the line after doing everything else as we had intended to...that would have been a real p*sser, and the best thing to think about as the noise of drilling rattles round the house!

Sort of dodged a bullet there!

May I ask which high-pressure combi boiler you went for?

I'm about to replace our ancient system boiler with a combi (Victorian house way too leaky for heat pump right now...).

Aerial man can do it from a ladder

Yass! Scaffolding can get to fuck, unless you are doing really serious shit

Baxi / main stuff is really good.

Pls, pls pls, someone tell me what ladder to buy if I want to safely reach our guttering at the front of our basic bitch Edwardian terrace. Ideally I want something with four feet.

Personally we just use a three rung ladder and have someone standing at the bottom usually holding it.

Something with a standoff on it.
I got a Krause. Not for feet but wide base feet.

Something with a standoff on it.

Yes, absolutely need this.

I got a Krause.

Which one did you go for? Link please :)

https://www.krause-systems.co.uk/krauseproducts/detail/product/7845-multipurpose-rung-ladder-tribilo-3x9-rungs.html

I'm sure you could get something good second hand, but I couldn't here. Been up 8m and felt very stable on it. Wasn't cheap but will last a lifetime.