buying house, land, the whole dream. How did you do it?

We also have done it (just about to move) by living in expensive areas, working our butts off, and ploughing everything in to the mortgage. To move from S Bucks to S Staffs and live the dream, sans mortgage, I will be commuting to London and staying away for three days/week. After six months, if we get planning permission, we will fund our living costs by having a glamping business with yurts in one of our fields. Then I will run that instead. Yes we've been lucky with house prices, but are having to move a long way, and have worked very hard. For thirty years.
 
undergroundoli said:
*waves* Hello generation rent. At least we'll never need to learn about fixing things.
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Hello generation rent :)

You'll also never learn about never going out, living in a dank bedsit to save a deposit, never going on holiday, having bare floorboards in your first house, and no bed, for three years because you were paying a mortgage at fifteen per cent, not being able to afford a washing machine, counting pennies on Sunday night to see if you had enough for a takeaway ....


Oh, sorry, am I ranting?

Apart from in London, which is crazy, things are no different now for buying a house than they were in the seventies and eighties.

What is different is what generation rent appear to want as well as a house, which sometimes includes both children and renting the kind of place that they eventually want to buy.

To anyone who wants to end up in my place when I leave it, my advice is to work your butts off, take every promotion going no matter where it is, retrain to more lucrative areas of work, buy the most expensive house you can afford each time which you can work on to make better, sell, move, repeat and take risks. And even then luck plays a big part, don't get me wrong, I am incredibly lucky to be looking out of my bedroom window at my boys.
 
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We bought a dated cottage in 2001 for £89.000 it had 1/3 acre gardens. We built stables in the garden and I rented land opposite. In 2007 a property came up in the next village with 4 acres. It need lots of work in and out . we put ours up for sale and sold to first viewers for £280.000 same as we paid for new house. We were extremely lucky with the rise in property values here in lincolnshire.
We borrowed more on the mortgage and did it up. We did a lot ourselves but got a man in to lay concrete yard 60x25 and lay block work for stables .we put the roof on and made the doors ourselves to save money. Yard cost us £12,000 for 4 big boxes and a big feed/tack room far cheaper than bought in sometimes flimsy, timber ones. The more you have a go at yourself the more you appreciate what you have in my experience. I find it hard looking after the land and fencing and we are looking to downsize next year but the best feeling ever is going out in my dressing gown to see my lot and looking out of the window to stunning countryside views priceless!!!!
 
cptrayes said:
Hello generation rent :)

You'll also never learn about never going out, living in a dank bedsit to save a deposit, never going on holiday, having bare floorboards in your first house, and no bed, for three years because you were paying a mortgage at fifteen per cent, not being able to afford a washing machine, counting pennies on Sunday night to see if you had enough for a takeaway ....


Oh, sorry, am I ranting?

Apart from in London, which is crazy, things are no different now for buying a house than they were in the seventies and eighties.

What is different is what generation rent appear to want as well as a house, which sometimes includes both children and renting the kind of place that they eventually want to buy.

To anyone who wants to end up in my place when I leave it, my advice is to work your butts off, take every promotion going no matter where it is, retrain to more lucrative areas of work, buy the most expensive house you can afford each time which you can work on to make better, sell, move, repeat and take risks. And even then luck plays a big part, don't get me wrong, I am incredibly lucky to be looking out of my bedroom window at my boys.
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and we looked back at our parents and thought they had been lucky. over the course of a lifetime, swings in house prices, interest rates, wages, inflation will work for and against you. Like cp I lived without mod cons for the first five years at least of owning property, and I wouldnt be in this position now if I hadnt deliberately gambled on buying at the top of my ability to repay. Yes, lucky that I retained my job through the recession, but there is an element of making your luck, and choosing your sacrifices...
 
I am not saying it used to be easy, but other than a few schemes, it is harder to get a mortgage as banks are most cautious. however, i also think people are not as good at saving! I know people on the same amount as me (not a very good support assistant salary!) who are living with their parents pretty much cost free as well, but have absolutely no savings, where as on the same salary i pay rent (a small 1 bed flat with my BF) and have 2 horses, dog and cat, plus, a small (and regularly dipped in to in emergencies thanks to horses!) savings. They get brand new cars on finance, and if they do move out of parents they refuse to rent a cheaper, smaller, less desirable flat like mine, and get a 2 bed house for hundreds more a month.

hopefully in about 2 years my BF and I will have a big enough deposit for a 2-3 bed, but unlikely to be a place with land, as west berkshire is expensive.
 
It's been my life long dream but I came to the conclusion a couple of years ago that it's never going to happen :( Me and my OH could work our arses off every hour god sends, save every penny and we still wouldn't do it in this part of the country. We can't move to a cheaper area 'cause OH's work just wouldn't allow it. You only have one life, live the dream if you possibly can!

Agree with the above, the young of today just want it all and aren't willing to compromise on the non essential things to afford property, eg, they would rather drive a new car and live in a council house than make do with a banger and get themselves a mortgage.
 
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cptrayes said:
Hello generation rent :)

You'll also never learn about never going out, living in a dank bedsit to save a deposit, never going on holiday, having bare floorboards in your first house, and no bed, for three years because you were paying a mortgage at fifteen per cent, not being able to afford a washing machine, counting pennies on Sunday night to see if you had enough for a takeaway ....


Oh, sorry, am I ranting?

Apart from in London, which is crazy, things are no different now for buying a house than they were in the seventies and eighties.

What is different is what generation rent appear to want as well as a house, which sometimes includes both children and renting the kind of place that they eventually want to buy.

To anyone who wants to end up in my place when I leave it, my advice is to work your butts off, take every promotion going no matter where it is, retrain to more lucrative areas of work, buy the most expensive house you can afford each time which you can work on to make better, sell, move, repeat and take risks. And even then luck plays a big part, don't get me wrong, I am incredibly lucky to be looking out of my bedroom window at my boys.
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I think that is a very narrow minded post CPT.

I rent now but I have owned in the past and I bought my flat outright at 22 through sheer hard work. It's a slippery slope to make generalisations like that.
 
cptrayes said:
Hello generation rent :)

Apart from in London, which is crazy, things are no different now for buying a house than they were in the seventies and eighties.

What is different is what generation rent appear to want as well as a house, which sometimes includes both children and renting the kind of place that they eventually want to buy.

To anyone who wants to end up in my place when I leave it, my advice is to work your butts off, take every promotion going no matter where it is, retrain to more lucrative areas of work, buy the most expensive house you can afford each time which you can work on to make better, sell, move, repeat and take risks. And even then luck plays a big part, don't get me wrong, I am incredibly lucky to be looking out of my bedroom window at my boys.
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I don't agree that things are no different than in the 70's and 80's at all. When I bought my first house aged 20 I had a mediocre first job and my house was 3 times my salary, it doubled in value in 2 years and so I had my start. Today an average first proper job salary is what 25k, you try buying a house for 75k - not a chance in gloucestershire I can tell you.

So things are not the same and I really feel for youngsters coming through, they don't all spend every penny on crap but most will struggle without help from relatives.

I have a property with land in France where I lived for my sons primary years, out there houses with land are cheap (also Ireland they are giving them away) but there's no work so maybe planning to live in one of these cheap to buy places when you're retired is a doable aim for the young.
 
I have to agree with cpt and nich.

I know that it is harder now than when I bought my 1st house to get started on the property ladder because I only needed a 10% deposit but when house prices rise, unless you move from one area to another or make some other change, you can still only buy a comparable house to the one you are living in.
Any-one who wants to buy their own equine property, unless they have access to money from some other source, such as inheritance or a lottery win, has to make compromises. It seems that most of us bought a doer-upper and have improved the equine facilities as well as the house. There aren't many who can do that and have all mod cons, brand new cars every few years and regular foreign holidays.
 
We did it by buying , doing up and moving onwards and upwards. Did without and worked our socks off. Always took the maximum mortgage we could stretch to.
We did however have rapidly rising house prices to help us on our way , so not sure it would be so possible these days.
We have just been laughing at one of our old houses just been sold on right move.
2 bed mid terrace we bought for £29000 in the mid 80's just gone for over £300000 !
 
PollyP99 said:
I don't agree that things are no different than in the 70's and 80's at all. When I bought my first house aged 20 I had a mediocre first job and my house was 3 times my salary, it doubled in value in 2 years and so I had my start. Today an average first proper job salary is what 25k, you try buying a house for 75k - not a chance in gloucestershire I can tell you.
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But the mortgage rate was fifteen percent, so we were paying a mortgage that would buy a house for over £200,000 today. Plus it was unusual for anyone single to buy a house, mortgages were offered on three and a half plus one salary. They only people I know who were single and bought properties were professionals well on into well paid careers. People on single starter salaries simply didn't expect to be able to buy a house, at least not in the part of the country where I was at the time.

Mortgages were only available to most people from a building society. And usually only from one where you had a track record of regular saving. And if other people weren't saving enough, the building societies did not have enough to lend and you had to fight to get a mortgage.

As a high street chain retail manager and electrical power engineer, we were turned down by Halifax and Nationwide and ended up paying a broker to get us a deal with Leamington Spa.

I really don't see that it is any more difficult for today's twenty something year olds to buy their first house than it was for me, aside from some severe property hot spots like London, which may as well be on another planet, they are so divorced from reality.

What I do see is bunches of young people who don't want to settle for poky little houses that need a lot of tlc, who drive new cars, go out every weekend, and own horses or even have babies before they think of buying a home for themselves and then complain how unfair it is. Gross generalisation of course :)


Edited to add. I've just done a search on properties within forty miles of Gloucester and was spoilt for choice with a first page full at £70,000, my lower search limit.
 
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