Owning your own home

Oh, I know that, but I am just as interested in outsourcing any future painful admin should I need a slightly trickier mortgage.

If it's not costing you anything (fee / worse rate) always go with a mortgage adviser. They usually deal with a different department in the banks which has more senior staff and quicker approval times...

That was something else I forgot, he always had direct numbers and often dealt with their "partner" people, if such a department existed.

Thanks all for the input, I reckon I just needed to sound this out.

The wife works for a large UK bank and has knowledge of these things - they definitely do have different departments dealing with MAs over people doing it themselves...

Your MA should diarise himself to call you in five years time to discuss the next deal. This could be complex, your situation could be totally different. If you like the MA, use them again, let them get their commission. Don't do yourself what someone else gets paid for at no cost to you.

Looks like from the Halifax website that if you overpay, you can claw the overpayments back by underpaying at a later date:

https://www.halifax.co.uk/mortgages/mortgage-information/overpayments-underpayments/

So I'd probably go with one of the cheaper deals (it looks like they don't charge an arrangement fee, which is nice), stash the extra cash somewhere that earns more interest than the mortgage is costing and then decide later on whether you want to dump it into the mortgage as an overpayment or not. You can easily get 5% interest on £300 a month using one of the regular savings products offered by a variety of banks: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/best-regular-savings-accounts

The Halifax site is a bit quiet on what conditions are attached to overpayments, just some mentions of early repayment charges so check that you can overpay without penalty if that's something you might want to do, although at under 2% interest you're probably able to do better by using savings to hoard cash until the time comes to switch deal - you can probably pay off a chunk of the mortgage then if you wish (probably only a good idea if interest rates have skyrocketed or it lets you get into a different LTV band).

Thanks for the input

Has anyone here extended the leasehold on their property? Would be good to hear experiences.
I have 68 years or something left and when selling am aware that lenders will favour a longer lease.
The freehold is owned by a faceless company who only communicate through solicitors.

You're not in e10 are you?

Just finished sorting ours (everything signed and paid for, just takes an extra six months for the land registry to return the paperwork).

The online calculators are fairly accurate and it will depend on whether or not you go the statutory or informal route how much it costs (the latter removing some legal fees and duplicate valuations - but doesn't always remove the ground rent).

If you are not in a rush, contact the freeholders solicitors and tell them you would like to extend and ask for a quote. If you like the quote, instruct your own solicitor and crack on. If not, instruct your solicitor to issue a Section 42 lease extension notice (which you are entitled and protected to do by law if you have owned for more than two years) and fasten your seatbelt.

I was told that as a rule if thumb, lenders will discriminate against anything below 75 years (as at the end of the 25 year mortgage term is will be 50 which means it would be a fortune to extend). In reality, I wouldn't consider buying anything at 82 years or lower as the cost to extend becomes exponentially greater below 80 (remember you need to have owned for 2 years for statutory extension) as you then add the "marriage value" to the premium and legal fees.

17

Yeah I was gonna begin proceedings in the new year, figuring it'd take up to 6 months.
What I don't want to do is sort it all out too early and sit for too long paying the extra ££ (assuming the cost can be added to my mortgage) because I will want to sell before the end of next year.

Did you open communications yourself or instruct solicitors from the outset?

I did it myself first as I was within the two years and wanted to try the informal route first. I knew the solicitors as they are who the ground rent goes to. I got lucky and got an offer with agreeable terms (same as the existing lease and we don't have a service charge anyway).

There's no harm in asking first as even if you do go the statutory route, they cannot refuse or give you a bum deal. Also, with statutory, the clock on the lease stops as soon as the s.42 is issued to prevent them deliberately delaying it to run into the next year and bumping up the premium.

I did some research first so when I spoke to the Freeholders' solicitor it sounded like I knew what I was doing and agreed with them that if they didn't come back with a favourable informal offer, I would be going statutory which would be more of a pain for everyone.

Has anyone bought collectively bought the freehold of a property? We have three flats and all the owners are interested.
What I'd like to know is if we could add the costs of buying the freehold to our mortgage without re-negotiating? I've heard it's possible.

@Greenbank has I believe

Party wall agreements, what's the best way to go about this? I'm in a Victorian terrace and in the process of a loft conversion. Planning has just gone in so now I need to sort out party wall agreements.

I am in exactly this position. We got a basic party wall agreement template from our architect and bobbed round to chat to each neighbour. We are on decent 'stop and chat for 90 seconds' terms with both.

One set of neighbours returned the form immediately, including a permission for us to remove one of their chimneys. Top neighbours. 10/10

The other one thinks that a party wall agreement gives her the right to comment on the layout and aesthetic. It is all in Permitted Development so there is no planning requirement beyond a certificate to say that what we are doing doesn't need planning permission.
She doesn't like the type of roof tiles we are getting.

So now I am in the awkward position of having to humour her and keep her sweet so I can get that signature, while at the same time letting her know that she has absolutely no fucking say over what we are planning beyond a yes/no to putting a steel in part of the wall we share.

Sounds like a ballache. I can see the point of them but it's an added level of stress before the building can get underway.

After a poke around on the Land Registry site I've found that the house on one side is actually owned by the council (down as THE MAYOR AND BURGESSES OF THE LONDON BOROUGH OF HARINGEY) so I need to find out where to send the actual notification and I suspect dealing with the council will be slow.

One of the underlying requirements of permitted development is that works should be in-keeping with what is already existing. So if the roof tiles you're proposing are the same as existing just tell your neighbour you have no say in what you've selected as you're governed by what is existing

Point being - The judgement on whatever I do to my house, as part of a permitted development scheme, being considered 'in keeping' or not is nowt to do with a party wall agreement.

Cheers, problem solved in the end. Estimated using lots of different online calculators and then added legals and "danger money" of another 10% for taking on the lease extension risk. All agreed now and looks like we might be in by the end of next week!

Does anyone know if you pay stamp duty on the discounted price that takes in to account the short lease, or do you pay it on the assumed market value with a 150 year lease?

Oh definitely just trying to give you a reasonable answer to basically say "the tiles I've picked are shit all to do with you"

Whole stack on our side - inside and out.
Taking the top off and lowering down to parapet wall on theirs.

Anyone know where I can buy an arrospoke?

It's a negotiation though. Unless there's a requirement on her not to unreasonably withhold consent / agreement, then it's perfectly understandable that she might attempt to extract something in return for her agreement.

Whether this is a charitable, neighbourly action is another thing entirely.