So bit of a bumbling, long winded post to ask a question or two if I may, as this seems like the right thread for it!
I’ll be the first to admit I’ve probably picked an awful time to actually think of moving out of my parents (well, I’ve definitely wanted to for ages, but during Covid wasn’t going to be viable with how everything was going), but I’m kind of ready for my own space despite being in the situation of having a standard retail job and being on my lonesome making the whole situation kind of harder from a monetary point of view. Obviously I’ve been paying board, helping out around the place and topping up my deposit in the eternal hope house prices might stagnate or even start to decrease a little but I’ve just been watching house prices go up, people have bidding wars over said houses, energy prices soar while the general cost of day to day living just goes up to. As I said, I’ve probably picked an awful time to give this some proper thought for the first time in a good few years, doubly so with the looming threat of a recession.
But to my questions anyway,
- Should I get a decision in principle before I even start looking for a place? Does this show better intent when you actually go to look at places? How long does a decision in principle kind of last for? Not that it’s at all likely, but I guess it’d need a whole new one filling out if I got a new job?
- Monthly outgoings is the bit where I’ve talked myself out of it so many times in the past, so how do I get a reasonable picture of how much any theoretical monthly outgoings could be? Obviously mortgage is partly down to deposit and how many years its taken over? Building & contents insurance I guess I can just get a rough estimate off a comparison site with a properties post code? Obviously council tax I can just look for on the council site. But the big one is energy/water bills, how on Earth are you meant to know how much it’ll roughly cost for a property before you actually live there? Would the estate agent be able to give a rough idea via the current occupants? Or is this just a huge amount of guesswork and you just won’t know till you’ve moved in and got your first few bills through? This is the biggest area of concern with how much energy bills have risen and they don’t look like they’ll be stopping anytime soon
- Final question, am I crazy for giving it some proper thought in this uncertain economic climate? Sounds maybe pessimistic but I’d feel like a massive disappointment (to myself) if I finally moved out and then had to move back in after a few months if it just wasn’t viable.
Yeah, bit of a ramble, sorry