Buying a house (and renting)

Victor Mildew wrote:Its so ridiculously easy to get in and out of Bristol from this side that any gooseberry fool you get about moving is just being petty on their part. On a good traffic day you could be from your house to central Cardiff in under an hour if we want to go to a gig in Bristol it's 35 or so mins from my door to being parked up. My mates act like I'm asking them to drive to the north pole when I suggest meeting here - "Can we meet half way?!". It takes longer to get to Bristol from theirs than it does to my area

I think going over the bridge makes people think it's a long trip. My mum keeps suggesting Weston/Worle as cheap places, but doesn't listen (or understand!) when I tell her that's further away than a lot of South Wales.

Moggy wrote:

Victor Mildew wrote:Its so ridiculously easy to get in and out of Bristol from this side that any gooseberry fool you get about moving is just being petty on their part. On a good traffic day you could be from your house to central Cardiff in under an hour if we want to go to a gig in Bristol it's 35 or so mins from my door to being parked up. My mates act like I'm asking them to drive to the north pole when I suggest meeting here - "Can we meet half way?!". It takes longer to get to Bristol from theirs than it does to my area

I think going over the bridge makes people think it's a long trip. My mum keeps suggesting Weston/Worle as cheap places, but doesn't listen (or understand!) when I tell her that's further away than a lot of South Wales.

But that's in a whole other country!

Moggy wrote:Still, bargains like this are tempting: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/85696741#/

Holy Moley!

It's things like this that make me dislike the market round here.

For comparison, this is the Cheapest home available in my area:

£240,000!



And this is the cheapest 3-bed in our area:

£415,000!



Bedroom 3 playing pretty fast and loose with the term "bedroom" there

£415k for a 3 bed and it's barely a 3 bed! Christ.

LewisD wrote:
And this is the cheapest 3-bed in our area:

£415,000!



Bedroom 3 playing pretty fast and loose with the term "bedroom" there

Pfft, you're better off saving £75k by getting a 2 bed flat in Bristol.

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/90742513#/

Tomous wrote:If anyone deserves a bit of good fortune in the housing market after everything you've been through, it's you Moggy

Absolutely.

Moggy wrote:

Victor Mildew wrote:Sounds promising Moggy. Now move across the border past Chepstow and reap the benefits.

I'm still waiting for your expert advice via a PM.

Also this.

240k for 42 square metres of space.

I find house pricing very bizarre. The house opposite mine has less floor space and a smaller garden but it sold five years ago for an extra £85k over what I paid for mine. Okay it is detached, in better nick, and not a bungalow, but that much of a difference? Mental.

Lex-Man wrote:

Moggy wrote:All three estate agents were really positive and valued the flat at a similar amount. I keep saying it but Bristol property prices are strawberry floating crazy, I just can't comprehend how this place could be worth that much.

My socialist side is disgusted, my greedy side is cackling in glee.

I've told the estate agents that I have a few more coming to value the place and that I'll make a decision by Monday. Honestly have no idea which to go with, they all valued similarly, have identical fees etc. One offers a free EPC so they are top of the list at the moment as that's one less hassle for me to sort out.

I live in Dunstable a place that somehow combines all the worst aspects of city life with all the worst aspects of country life but somehow my house is worth over a quarter of a million. I really don't understand it.

My parents live there. London commuter belt. Not as good as Luton with an actual train station but still within a reasonable commute (by London standards)

Pure gooseberry fool hole otherwise. But my parents paid £60k for their house 20 years ago and it's worth about the same as yours so that's a tidy investment. Though my old rental in Crystal Palace was similar size and quality, bought at the same time for the same price, and is now worth closer to £700k.

Bunni wrote:

Lex-Man wrote:

Moggy wrote:All three estate agents were really positive and valued the flat at a similar amount. I keep saying it but Bristol property prices are strawberry floating crazy, I just can't comprehend how this place could be worth that much.

My socialist side is disgusted, my greedy side is cackling in glee.

I've told the estate agents that I have a few more coming to value the place and that I'll make a decision by Monday. Honestly have no idea which to go with, they all valued similarly, have identical fees etc. One offers a free EPC so they are top of the list at the moment as that's one less hassle for me to sort out.

I live in Dunstable a place that somehow combines all the worst aspects of city life with all the worst aspects of country life but somehow my house is worth over a quarter of a million. I really don't understand it.

My parents live there. London commuter belt. Not as good as Luton with an actual train station but still within a reasonable commute (by London standards)

Pure gooseberry fool hole otherwise. But my parents paid £60k for their house 20 years ago and it's worth about the same as yours so that's a tidy investment. Though my old rental in Crystal Palace was similar size and quality, bought at the same time for the same price, and is now worth closer to £700k.

And Crystal Palace is a bit of a shithole. I personally don't think that Dunstable is that great for commuting due to the lack of a direct train station. If it had one house prices would double overnight though.

Hopefully as we move to greater remote working as the norm these shitty "commuter town" housing price bubbles will become less of a thing

Jenuall wrote:Hopefully as we move to greater remote working as the norm these shitty "commuter town" housing price bubbles will become less of a thing

It would massivly change the focus of the housing market, places that are nice to live rather than near a city.

It could also really help with investment in smaller towns and seaside places etc. as they become more desirable for people to live and not just visit and time to commute becomes less of an issue.

Jenuall wrote:Hopefully as we move to greater remote working as the norm these shitty "commuter town" housing price bubbles will become less of a thing

Yeah WFH looks more and more like something that will continue for the long term.

I've no idea when I'll be expected to work in the office but senior management have all been moving much further from London so I expect that the flexibility will continue, perhaps a 1 day a week in the office situation would occur.

Which really widens my options up. I plan to sell next year but I'm going to need to visit so many different places that would have been ruled out due to train season ticket cost and/or commute time. If I've only to go in 1 day a week then the cost is minor and the long commute is much more tolerable. I really don't even know where to start looking now that my potential locations are limited just by cost rather than distance from work.

Could even be mortgage-free neighbours with Moggy in a Welsh Valley!

Errkal wrote:

Jenuall wrote:Hopefully as we move to greater remote working as the norm these shitty "commuter town" housing price bubbles will become less of a thing

It would massivly change the focus of the housing market, places that are nice to live rather than near a city.

It could also really help with investment in smaller towns and seaside places etc. as they become more desirable for people to live and not just visit and time to commute becomes less of an issue.

Smaller, satellite towns with strong communities sound much, much nicer places for people to live.

The utopian housing market dream is going to come true everyone!


Of course in reality it will probably just mean that everywhere gets a bit more gooseberry fool and overcrowded and house prices inexplicably rise to the same extortionate levels everywhere!

Jenuall wrote:Hopefully as we move to greater remote working as the norm these shitty "commuter town" housing price bubbles will become less of a thing

Hopefully it'll open things up and help ensure wages across the country are more fairly distributed. We have somebody in Edinburgh on our team now, as we are all remote workers it makes no difference. There should be no wage disparity between somebody in London and somebody in Wigan, location doesn't matter.

Grumpy David wrote:Could even be mortgage-free neighbours with Moggy in a Welsh Valley!

Small towns sound great in theory until you actually live in one and engage at all with the community... although that is undoubtedly a result of decades of focus and investment in major cities.

Perhaps it's just my experience, but I've gone from living in Birmingham with its enormously diverse and very active, young population to a small town full of stuffy old white banana splits who post things on Facebook like "watch out, I just saw a car with Asian men sat in it, could be nothing but stay safe out there x" (with drastically worse spelling/grammar).

It's all about the suburbs folks, the best of both worlds!

Oblomov Boblomov wrote:Small towns sound great in theory until you actually live in one and engage at all with the community... although that is undoubtedly a result of decades of focus and investment in major cities.

Perhaps it's just my experience, but I've gone from living in Birmingham with its enormously diverse and very active, young population to a small town full of stuffy old white banana splits who post things on Facebook like "watch out, I just saw a car with Asian men sat in it, could be nothing but stay safe out there x" (with drastically worse spelling/grammar).

I have some mates who live in a little outside Cardiff centre and one of them went round to visit the other and was told to go straight to the garden in the back (obeying the covid regulations) and the neighbours called the police As he's Indian, he took it as racial profiling.


But yeh, the idea is the makeup and mix of these small communities will change as remote working takes off.

Decided on an estate agent and emailed one of the others to say I wasn't going to use them.

He came back to drop their fee from 1% to 0.9% but also said they have around 7 people lined up to view the flat.

Sounds like bollocks to me, why would they have people lined up before I've agreed any contract with them?

It's made me hesitate though, if they have a few lined up, it sounds like investors rather than first time buyers, which could make things easier.

Hmmm.

Can you only pick 1?