Owning your own home

Depends on what condition you buy it I guess. I wanted as little done to mine as possible. Mal went mental and painted everything.

I want a bedroom to sleep in, a kitchen, a room for a comfy chair, books and a desk, and one tiled room with workbench and hooks for my bike. Oh, and a bathroom I guess.

I have half of all my earnings from the last two years to pay for it (a little more than bugger all). Anyone want to do a deal?

I want a bedroom to sleep in, a kitchen, a room for a comfy chair, books and a desk, and one tiled room with workbench and hooks for my bike. Oh, and a bathroom I guess.

I have half of all my earnings from the last two years to pay for it (a little more than bugger all). Anyone want to do a deal?

buy something in berlin

I have just bought a place, and can I just ask, what the fuck did I pay the surveyers for?!

You paid them to supply a report to your mortgage providers, stating that the property is (in their opinion) worth the money you are borrowing to pay for it. When you read it you will see that there is a caveat for every area that cannot be inspected.

If you actually want to know what condition the place is in, you'd have to employ several experts in field, structural engineer, roofing expert, plumbing expert etc.

Berlin is cheap as chips. My cousin bought a 2 bedroom flat in a nice area for under 50,000 euros last year.

How soon after buying your first property do you start knocking walls down 'because you can'? My mates just got a house on a part ownership scheme and i must of suggested it about 50 times in the first hour of seeing it. Do you get a lot of 'pimp my home' feelings like with a bike, or is it like a car where you just keep it in good nick but don't change lots.

I do absolutely nothing unless it is essential.
Except painting

I want a bedroom to sleep in, a kitchen, a room for a comfy chair, books and a desk, and one tiled room with workbench and hooks for my bike. Oh, and a bathroom I guess.

I have half of all my earnings from the last two years to pay for it (a little more than bugger all). Anyone want to do a deal?

I have a 1-man MacPac tent. Piss outside. Live near a stream for bathing.

Do we have a deal?

Berlin is cheap as chips. My cousin bought a 2 bedroom flat in a nice area for under 50,000 euros last year.

I wanted a place in Berlin when I first visited and found out how cheap it was. I'd still have one but I'd rather spend my money on pints to stimulate the British economy. You can't say I don't think of you guys..

Do you get a lot of 'pimp my home' feelings like with a bike, or is it like a car where you just keep it in good nick but don't change lots.

I have been a home owner for over 30 years and have never once had one of these urges. My wife occasionally has them and when I can't put her off, I encourage her to "get a little man in".

I've always rented, and always been happy renting. It's never (or almost never) been about not having the money to buy. A lot of what makes buying a house work or not has to do with what you want to do with your life, and how you want to spend your time. Your values.

Some people love having domestic projects. It's a form of nesting. Building a conservatory. Fitting a kitchen. Lagging the boiler. Endless projects: always something more to be done. Then they sell the house they've done all the work on and start again on another one.

You can't really do this when you rent. Well, you can, but it's unusual. IThe usual thing is to move into a flat you like and keep it that way, or make sure the landlord keeps it that way.

A lot of the horror stories about renting are really horror stories about not having much money. If your landlord thinks he can fuck you over because you're penniless, he might be tempted. If he's already spoken to your city lawyer on the phone to talk through the lease he'll think long and hard before acting against your interests. Poverty is intrinsically bad; renting, not so.

wise words sharkstar.

i'm not poor. but i don't have much of a buffer for when things go wrong. i've been paying off debt for the last 5 years or so and don't have any savings to speak of. as such i'm heartily sick of being ripped off by landlords/lettings agents too, their money grubbing tactics often leave me seriously hard up for months at a time. the previous landlord "stole" £400 of our deposit spuriously claiming the flat hadn't been cleaned (not only had it been cleaned way more thoroughly than when we moved in but it had been decorated!). they essentially held us ransom refusing to release any deposit till we agreed to their made up deductions. total crooks.

the current landlord just tried to charge us a hefty renewal fee for "negotiating" a temporary 6 month extension during which they put our rent up £300 a month and simultaneously served notice. i refused to pay their fees for this "service" and am now fully expecting to be bummed by them on the deposit.

on top of all that because the way things have worked out we're going to be paying two rents for the entire duration of january as well as having to come up with the new deposit before (and if) we get the old one back.

and i was already skint and overdrawn from the december feastings before any of this kicked off. ouch ouch and ouch.

i'd love to buy but the amount of deposit required in london is so wildly beyond the realms of possibility even for a couple with a fairly healthy joint income that i can't even bring myself to start saving for it.

Start saving. Seriously. It felt really daunting to me as well, but you hit little milestones every now and then, and that helps keep spirits up. After a while the direct debit just becomes another bill you have to pay and you work around it.

I have been a home owner for over 30 years and have never once had one of these urges. My wife occasionally has them and when I can't put her off, I encourage her to "get a little man in".

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_oYWWBxuA2MU/TG2XrlJI-YI/AAAAAAAAhcg/kZgXXzhBQqE/s1600/Viz%27s+innuendo-loving+Finbarr+Saunders.jpg
Yip yip! Fnarr fnarr!

wise words sharkstar.

i'm not poor. but i don't have much of a buffer for when things go wrong. i've been paying off debt for the last 5 years or so and don't have any savings to speak of. as such i'm heartily sick of being ripped off by landlords/lettings agents too, their money grubbing tactics often leave me seriously hard up for months at a time. the previous landlord "stole" £400 of our deposit spuriously claiming the flat hadn't been cleaned (not only had it been cleaned way more thoroughly than when we moved in but it had been decorated!). they essentially held us ransom refusing to release any deposit till we agreed to their made up deductions. total crooks.

the current landlord just tried to charge us a hefty renewal fee for "negotiating" a temporary 6 month extension during which they put our rent up £300 a month and simultaneously served notice. i refused to pay their fees for this "service" and am now fully expecting to be bummed by them on the deposit.

on top of all that because the way things have worked out we're going to be paying two rents for the entire duration of january as well as having to come up with the new deposit before (and if) we get the old one back.

That is all small change compared to the money you will lose/waste trying to buy, buying and upkeep once bought.

You paid them to supply a report to your mortgage providers, stating that the property is (in their opinion) worth the money you are borrowing to pay for it. When you read it you will see that there is a caveat for every area that cannot be inspected.

If you actually want to know what condition the place is in, you'd have to employ several experts in field, structural engineer, roofing expert, plumbing expert etc.

Wrong. The lender conducted their own valuation survey, which I also paid for.

True, the caveats were in the surveyors report, but they do nothing except imdemnify the surveyors somewhat useless inspection. So what was the point of the survey again?

That is all small change compared to the money you will lose/waste trying to buy, buying and upkeep once bought.

Dead right.

It sucks you dry.

And not in a good way.

Dead right.

It sucks you dry.

And not in a good way.

I have all this to look forward to, maybe being a tight-wad and home owner don't mix ;-)

Wrong. The lender conducted their own valuation survey, which I also paid for.

True, the caveats were in the surveyors report, but they do nothing except imdemnify the surveyors somewhat useless inspection. So what was the point of the survey again?

You tell me, what was the point?

I have all this to look forward to, maybe being a tight-wad and home owner don't mix ;-)

Unfortunately my problem was the opposite.

I'm shit with my finances, interest rates went all scary, I couldn't afford to maintain the house as diligently as it needed.
I really couldn't afford it.

The only way I'll buy a house in future is if I can pay the whole lot in cash!

I've owned property but only in the US, never here. I rent now and intend to as long as the economic climate is the way it is, very nearly got my fingers burnt over there when it all went pear-shaped, was quite lucky and don't fancy my chances anytime soon.
I can obviously see the pros and cons for both but I'm perfectly happy to rent, I do not see it as throwing money away, it's better to have a minimal return (nothing other than somewhere to sleep) than invest too heavily and lose everything, and people over there did, they walked away from homes that were worth less than the mortgage and going down in value.
Bottom line I think is almost everyone involved in property sales and investment is a liar, if your bs detector works well and you're not led by your heart, and if the economic climate is stable, and you have the money, like really have it, then buy.

Just a quick update: Just placed an offer on a small 1 bed flat in Clapton. Ex local authority so no character but has a lot of space and light which more than makes up for it.

Bought something very similar a year ago, works well for me, flats are purpose designed so room size and shape is usually good, and I find 50s social housing quite charming in it's way.

One bit of advice, check out any proposed works due on the block, replacing roofs, windows, etc. can be very expensive. Probably worth contacting the council yourself, even if it should be covered in the hip best to know now rater than assigning blame when a 10 grand bill hits the mat within 6 months.

Bottom line I think is almost everyone involved in property sales and investment is a liar.

Too true.

flats are purpose designed so room size and shape is usually good

what, and houses aren't? ;)

they've just always been there

The other thing to remember in the rent versus buy equation is that, in the end, we die, and before we die, to borrow a phrase from John Cooper-Clarke, "Things are gonna get worse", in the sense that the quality of the experience that we have will deteriorate, because our mental and physical condition will deteriorate. The pound's worth of experience I buy today will be worth more than the pound's worth of experience I buy in ten year's time, and if I live that long, I probably wouldn't be able to give away any quantity of my experience at 90.

So the money that people tell people who rent that they are "throwing down the drain" may in fact be a wise investment into a rich quality of experience I'll never have again; and the money that those people 'save' into their homes may turn out to be the worst investment of all: daytime TV, a faint smell of piss and both bars on being more or less the same rented or owned.