Buying a house or flat for the first time is a pretty daunting experience. It’s ranked as one of the top three in terms of stress (the other two being death and divorce), and this stress is only made worse if you don’t know what is happening.

Elsewhere I’ve done the best first time buyers guide in the world…. Ever… (parts 1,2, & 3) but that’s quite long – probably 2 cups of tea worth. For now I thought I’d throw down 10 things that first time buyers should know

1. What is a mortgage
   A mortgage is simply a loan. The difference is firstly that the loan is attached to the title deeds of a house or flat – so that the property can’t be sold without having to pay the mortgage off. Secondly it’s a loan spread over a much longer period than most other loans – usually over 20-30 years.
2. What is a 90% mortgage?
   When people talk about percentages in relation to mortgages they are talking out the percentage of the money being borrowed against the value of the house (or “Loan to Value”). So for example if a mortgage company say the maximum loan to value they will lend is 90% then that means if you’re looking to buy a house for £100,000 the maximum that mortgage company will lend on that house is £90,000.
3. What is a deposit
   In relation to buying a house the deposit is usually referred to as the amount you’re putting down. So in the example given in 2 above the deposit you’re putting down is £10,000.
4. What is ‘Equity’
   This is the amount of money you have ‘in the house’ – i.e. if the house was sold and the mortgage paid off then it’s the amount that you would get. When you first buy a house the equity will be the same as the deposit – the amount you’ve put down. However, as house prices rise (and they do normally) so does your equity. So if your £100,000 house is worth £120,000 when you sell it then your equity will have increased by £20,000.
5. How do I look around a house?
   This will usually be clear in the advert for the house (either online or in an Estate agent). You’d normally go through the Estate agent to arrange a viewing. Sometimes you’ll go round with the sellers, and sometimes it will be with someone from the estate agents. It’s a good idea to take someone else with you when you are looking round – partly for personal safety reasons but mainly so you can discuss it afterwards.
6. When and how do I make an offer?
   When you’ve found a property you are interested in you can make an offer. What you offer will depend on the property market in your particular area at that moment, how this property is priced, and the attitude of the seller. For example if it’s a sellers market then anything less than the full asking price will be rejected. If it’s a buyers market then sellers may well entertain an offer below the asking price. It’s worth doing a bit of homework first – maybe finding out if the seller is open to offers, and how long the property has been on the market – if it’s been on for ages with no offers then they may be more open to negotiating. Also ‘sellers market’ and ‘buyers market’ are just general terms – what happens depends on this particular property – great properties in great areas will always sell strongly – no matter what the rest of the housing market is doing.
7. How do I know what I can afford?
   What you can afford will be a combination of how much the mortgage company will lend to you based on your income, the percentage they are prepared to lend (see point  2 above), and the amount of depsit you have saved up (see point 3 above). You can check the amount the mortgage company will lend against your income online. When doing this you’ll see  phrases such as ’4 + 1′ and ’3.75 x joint’. What “4 + 1” means is that if you have two incomes they will work out how much to lend you by taking 4 times the higher annual salary plus 1 times the lower salary. So if one of you earned £20,000 a year and the other earned £10,000, they will lend you a maximum of 4X£20,00 plus 1x£10,000 which equals £90,000. “3.75 x joint” means they’d add the two salaries together and multiply them by 3.75. So in the 20/10 example they would lend 3.75x £30,000 (£20,000 plus £10,000) which equals £112,500.
8. How much is it all going to cost?
   It’s worth working this all out before you start. We can give you an instant conveyancing quote online. You will also have to factor in other costs – mortgage companies often charge an arrangement fee (basically a fee for saying ‘yes’), and will always charge a valuation fee (the amount will be specified when you check out the offers). You also need to think of the cost of moving – will you be using a removal company, hiring a van, or making lots of trips in a car.
9. How long will everything take?
   With regard to finding a property you like it depends what’s out there and how fussy you are. Once you’ve find the one you want then it will generally take 2-3 months for the conveyancing process to be completed and you move into your house. I’ve done a separate blog on “what is conveyancing” – but basically it’s the legal process of putting the house into your name  after we’ve checked it’s OK to buy
10. What if I’ve changed my mind?
    Even though you’ve made an offer and it’s been accepted, under the law inEngland &Wales (Scotland is different) you aren’t committed to buying it until you have “Exchanged
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    Contracts”. Up until that point either party can pull out with no comeback. Once contracts have been exchanged then it’s legally binding and any party pulling out after that will potentially face a legal claim running into many thousands of pounds

The stamp duty holiday for first time buyers has not been extended past next March 2012 so if you are a first time buyer you will need to act quickly if you have been putting off purchasing your first home. Please take a look at our website for more information regarding the house buying process.

There does however still seem to be a problem with first-time buyers getting on the ladder so what other options are available to them?

The government has started the right to buy scheme again. Under this scheme families will be offered discounts up to 50% below market value with the money released being used to build new affordable homes. It has also planning on underwriting mortgages

for 100,000 young families looking to buy newly built homes and launching a fund of £400, to promote housbuilders to construct thousands of homes.  

Whether the schemes are sufficient replacements for the stamp duty holiday remains to be seen.

If you are thinking of purchasing in the near future in light of the deadline above, or are interested in more information regarding the schemes mentioned above please drop me a line on wjames@fidler.co.uk or contact us on 01623 451111.

There was a time when every Englishman’s home, however modest, was his castle. Since the banking crisis, with its knock-on effect of mortgage drought and demands for huge first-time buyer deposits, those days are rapidly becoming a distant memory.

According to a recent survey by the Halifax, nearly half of those who described themselves as having a realistic plan to buy within the next three to five years said they were unable to put aside enough for a down payment.

So for the foreseeable future, many are resigned to renting.

“A generation of young people and young families are being locked out of the housing market without a hope of ever sharing in the asset wealth of the generation before.”
Adam Sampson, CEO, Shelter

But there is an alternative way to access the housing market, by buying with a friend. Buying with friends goes under a variety of names, co-buying, joint ownership or shared mortgage.

For first-time buyers, joint ownership can make financial sense, as long as it’s treated as a business deal with a pre-agreed exit strategy.

At a time when a lack of mortgages is stopping first-time buyers entering the market; joining forces can be a sensible way to ‘break the renting chain’. By buying with one or more friends, one can multiply borrowing power and multiply total budget (for anything from legal fees to decorating and renovating). However, for anyone considering co-buying, the importance of a transparent, open relationship is vital.

It goes without saying, that before entering a joint ownership agreement you need to be confident that you’ve found the right joint owner.

Start by chatting through the pros and cons of sharing a mortgage. Draw up a list of ‘what ifs’ and what you would if those circumstances arose. Be sure to discuss what happens when one, both or all of you want to move on. Once you’ve reached an agreement amongst yourselves, find a reliable solicitor like Fidler & Pepper to draw up a legally binding co-ownership contract (Deed of Trust).

What next? - So the financial opportunity is available. All you have to do is find your co-buyer.
But not everyone has friends who are able to join a group mortgage, so a site where like-minded people share their goals and aspirations is ideal. This is where Propertymates.co.uk comes in. Our aim is to help match co-buyers and property investors online.
Propertymates has guides to co-buying, co-renting (make sure that you can live together before you buy), deed of trust and much more to help you climb the property ladder with confidence.

There’s never been a time when it has been more obvious that co-buying is the answer.

Tips for co-buyers
Shop around for a mortgage look for deals specifically designed for joint ownership
Keep paperwork in order and make sure contracts are seen and signed by all.
Set up a joint bank account for mortgage and joint payments.
To avoid confusion, draw up an inventory of who owns what in the house.

Guest Blog by Propertymates – For more information see Propertymates.co.uk ‘Turning dreams of ownership into reality’



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Here’s the final part of our ultimate first time buyers guide – here we’re dealing with what happens once you’ve found the property and agreed a deal with the seller

Found it! – When you’ve agreed a deal:-

On the face of it you can relax now – you’ve agreed a deal so that’s everything sorted then isn’t it? – - Surely you’ve just got to do a bit of paperwork and everything’s done?

Sorry, but the answer’s no. You may have agreed a deal in principal but it’s a fundamental point in English law that neither party is committed to this deal yet. So both you and the seller could pull out without any reason and there’s no comeback on either of you. Before you have a heart attack please rest assured that most deals will carry on to completion on the terms agreed initially, but I’m afraid you’ve got a while to go before you can relax.

At what stage do I need a solicitor?
NOW! Ideally when you were sorting out the cost of moving house you will have got figures for the conveyancing (Click here for free conveyancing quote). At that stage you would probably have an idea of which solicitor you feel you can work with. Your solicitor’s role in all this is to safeguard your interests when buying the property – they are there to make sure you don’t buy a load of trouble (but if you insist that you’re happy buying a load of trouble then the solicitor will make sure that you do this with your eyes open)

If you’re going to use us then we would recommend instructing us to act at an early stage – even before you’ve decided on the property to buy. As we do no move, no fee, you’ll not lose out by doing this – even if you don’t go ahead. At the point at which the sale is agreed with the seller, the Estate Agent will normally ask for your solicitors details anyway so it’s handy to be able to give them to them.

If you haven’t already instructed your solicitor to act then do it now. They’ll need a fair bit of information about the property – address, price, sellers details, sellers solicitor details, how they can get hold of the HIP on the property, and so on. This will all help them to start the conveyancing

Conveyancing – what’s that all about?
Conveyancing is the legal process of passing ownership of a property from the seller to the buyer. The seller has their own solicitor (it can actually be a solicitor, or a licensed conveyancer, or you can even do it yourself – if you’re mad as a box of frogs that is), and the buyer has theirs.

As an overview, the seller’s solicitor gathers together a load of information about the property – in order to show that the sellers own it, and that the deeds to the property are all in order with no legal problems. They put this information (together with some other documents called searches) in the Home Information Pack for the property (Click here for our Home Information Pack Beginners Guide).

When a buyer is found this information is supplied to the buyers solicitors. They then look through this information and also do some other checking (using things called searches), to make sure that the property is OK for the buyer to buy. If the buyer is having a mortgage then the buyers solicitor will normally act for them as well. Finally the two sets of solicitors sort out the handing over of the money for the property, and registering the buyers solicitors as the new owner of the property.

I’ve written a guide to conveyancing and included that below

Mortgage – getting that sorted out
Although you’ve previously (hopefully) had an indication of the sort of amount you can borrow, you now have to make a formal application for a mortgage offer. A mortgage offer is a formal document from the mortgage company saying that they will lend you X pounds for the purchase of Y property for Z price. If you’ve used an independent Financial Adviser (or IFA) to advise you on the mortgage to go for then they will normally sort out getting the application submitted. At this stage you’ll normally have to pay the mortgage valuation fee, and possibly an arrangement fee for the mortgage (sometimes the arrangement fee is paid later). You may want to have something more than a basic valuation carried out – have a look at the “Survey – do I need one?” section below in relation to this

When you make your application to the mortgage company they will firstly follow up with your employer to confirm that you do actually earn what you said you did. If you’re self-employed they will normally want to see accounts and may require a report from your accountant (your IFA should be able to advise you on what’s required). They will also request a valuer to carry out the valuation on the property. Once all that information has come in they will do some internal processing and eventually send out a mortgage offer to you and a copy of it to your solicitor.

Survey – do I need one?
I mentioned a mortgage valuation fee above – if you’re buying a house with a mortgage then the mortgage company will insist that at the very least you have a valuation prepared (at your expense). Although you are paying for this report, it is being prepared for the mortgage company, not you (although you can see it). As such, they are basically just reporting on what they consider to be the value of the property, and any obvious defects on the property.

For most properties the valuation will be fine for you as well. However if you’re worried about the state of the property itself then you might want to pay more and go for a more in depth survey. Here you’ve got two options – a House buyers report and inspection, and a full structural survey.

House Buyers Report and Inspection:-
This will cost quite a bit more than the valuation but will usually run to 10 sides or more, and will usually make it sound like the house is falling down. They can be useful in giving you a plan of what works you ought to carry out on the property over the coming months and years, including which items are more important/serious. Normally you should be able to direct the surveyor to particular things you might be concerned about to make sure he/she spends enough time looking at them. These reports can be useful but are usually scary to look at – if you’re aware of that before you look at it then it’s not so bad.

Full Structural Survey
If the House Buyers report and inspection makes the house sound like it’s falling down, the full structural survey can make it sound like it’s already happened! It’s basically like the house buyers report on steroids and will go into great detail. For most house purchases this would be overkill.

Guide to conveyancing
This part of the guide is taken from our website – if you want to view it on the website then click here for the conveyancing beginners guide. The version on the website has a jargon-buster built into it which explains in detail all the technical terms used (such as Title Deeds or Searches)

- Step 1 – We will firstly contact the seller’s solicitors and ask for details of how we can get hold of the Home Information Pack (or HIP). This contains the local authority and water searches. If the property is in a mining area we’ll have to request a mining search as well. Searches are simply a list of questions about the property that are sent to the local council, the water authority and the Coal Authority. When we get a copy of the searches from the HIP we’ll have to make sure that the searches are OK for us to use (they have a shelf life of around 6 months and we’ll need to make sure they haven’t ‘expired’. If they have run out then we’ll need to request fresh searches). The HIP will also contain a copy of the title deeds. We’ll also request the Sellers solicitor to let us have a contract, and questionnaires filled out by the seller.

- Step 2 – The only other thing we will need before we can proceed is a copy of your mortgage offer (if applicable). Once we have all of the relevant documents, we will ask you to sign the contract. If you are just buying then we will ask you to for a deposit as well (you will be told how much is needed), but if you are buying and selling then this will generally not be needed.

- Step 3 – We will go through all the above documents with you (either in the office or by preparing a plain english report for you to read at your leisure) and explain any problems there may be with the property. Once you are satisfied that there are no major problems, then you are ready to exchange contracts.

- Step 4 – Once the buyer and the seller are ready, a Completion Date (the “moving date”) is agreed. We then exchange contracts (this means swapping the contract signed by the seller for one signed by the buyers – together with a deposit provided by the buyers). Once contracts are exchanged the contract is binding and neither party can withdraw without incurring massive expense.

- Step 5 – On the Completion Date, we hand over to the seller’s solicitor the remainder of the purchase money and in return receive the transfer document and the title deeds.

- Step 6 – We must then within twenty-eight days arrange for the payment of stamp duty (if appropriate) and, within two months of the completion date, apply to register the buyer’s ownership at the Land Registry.

A word about chains
The above 6 steps set out the procedure for one transaction – one seller(s) selling one property to one buyer(s). What normally happens however is that the sellers are themselves buying on from someone who’s also buying on – and so on until you get someone who’s selling but not buying another property (e.g. they are emigrating, or have already bought their other property or any other reason). This group of transactions is known as a chain.

If there is a chain of transactions, steps 1 to 6 above need to happen for every single person within that chain. The complication comes from the fact that the exchange of contracts bit (which is the first really important step – it’s when everything becomes binding) has to take place for every party in the chain on the same day at the same time – logistically this can be a bit of a nightmare. The other problem is that every party in the chain will have to agree upon the completion (moving) date. Normally this all takes place on the same day – so that in a long chain of 5 or more parties they will all be moving house on the same day.

The hassle of being involved in a chain comes from the fact that each party in the chain will have their own set of priorities and attitudes – one may be in a hurry, one may now be bothered, and one may be unable to move before a certain date (but hasn’t told anyone that yet!). It’s not unusual to see clients to sign contracts and then phone up the chain to see how close we are to exchange, only to find that the person at the top or bottom of the chain has only just started their transaction. Everyone in the chain then has to wait until they’ve caught up before it can go ahead.

As buyers it’s worth your while trying to find out how long your chain is at the outset, and what stage each party in the chain is at. The Estate Agent should be able to do this at the start – it’s in their interest to know this information as well. It’s good to find this information out as early as possible so you don’t get any nasty surprises later on. There’s nothing wrong if you phone up each of the parties in the chain – if you can all stay in touch throughout the transaction it can help to speed up the process of agreeing dates for moving etc – but don’t agree anything without confirming it with your solicitors first.

At some stage near to completion it’s a good idea to meet the sellers and get them to show you how to work the boiler, thermostats, where the main water stopcock is, main gas tap, main electrical supply switch, and so on. It’s not the end of the world if you can’t do this but it’s nice to know it in advance

After it’s yours – moving in
At the end of the conveyancing process you’ll finally get the keys to your new house. This is a very exciting time (and can also be a bit scary!).

If you weren’t able to go through stuff with the sellers before completion then it’s a good idea to find out straight away where the main shut-off is for the water, gas, and electric – should something go wrong it’s no fun looking for this stuff in the dark with a water or gas leak!

You might want to suggest to the sellers that they redirect their post to their new house – they can do this by telling the local post office – it costs a small amount (can’t remember how much – £30 or so) and lasts for a year I think. It’s worth you mentioning it to them so you’re not continually getting their mail and having to forward it on yourself. This service is useful to them and useful to you.

On the day you move in it’s a good idea to take readings from all the meters and let the suppliers know. The sellers should have done this but it’s easy to forget. You then need to contact them and let them know that you’re taking over the supply – they’ll have their own procedure for switching this to you. You might also want to switch utility suppliers at this stage – it can often save you money. www.moneysavingexpert.co.uk has a good section on this.

You now need to let everyone know your new address. Don’t forget to let the council know as well – you’ll be liable for council tax from the date you move in.

Before unpacking your stuff – put the kettle on and have a nice cup of tea and a biscuit – you’ve earned it. You probably won’t have to do all this again for a few years – the average person moves every 7 years.

I hope this guide has been useful to you – if you’ve got any questions about it by all means pop them onto the form at the bottom of the page and I’ll answer them as soon as I can

Cheers

Mark

Here we go again! This part deals with the next stage – you’ve found some properties that you’re interested in having a look round – where do you go from here? Read on….

Looking around houses or flats

After all your research you’re going to have a number of properties you want to look around. This is new territory for most people and can seem a bit weird and awkward. Sometimes you’ll just be accompanied by the Estate Agent and the house itself will be empty, but more often than not it will be the seller who shows you round their own home.

Tips for viewing properties
It’s important to bear a few things in mind before you go on these visits.
- You are going to walk around a stranger’s home. Whilst you do need to consider whether the house is what you want, be polite. If you do eventually strike a deal with these people your lives will be intertwined with theirs for a very stressful period in each of your lives. You don’t want to irritate them at the start. Also it may be they later have to choose between you and someone else offering the same amount. If you’re the one who laughed at their bathroom suite and pulled a face at the state of the kitchen then it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to work out that they’ll probably prefer the other people.

- Don’t go alone. Although sometimes this is unavoidable, wherever possible take someone else with you. There is the safety aspect of course, but I’m thinking more about the ability to discuss the property with someone else when you leave. Who to take with you? If two of you are buying then you should both go and see the property together. If you’re buying alone then a friend or family member would be useful.

- Come back with someone who knows what they are talking about. If you’re interested in a property it’s a good idea to come back with a builder friend, parent, DIY nut to give you a second opinion. We saw a house we liked and took a builder friend round. He pointed out the roof was rubbish, and the walls were damp – things we had no idea about before speaking to him. A surveyor may spot these things for you later on but it’s a good idea to be able to weed out the bad properties yourself at an early stage without having to pay surveyors

- Photographs – I’ve found it very useful to take my own photos when walking round a property – when thinking back later it can be hard to remember the layout (or even which property it was!) and your own photos can help with this – a camera phone is fine for this. However you must make sure you ask the owners first if they are happy with this and explain why you want to do it– if they aren’t then don’t push it – you’re a guest in their house

- Speak to the estate agent. How long has the property been on the market? Have many people viewed it or not? Has the price been reduced? Have they had any offers yet? In all this be very aware of who you’re speaking to – if you’re in the estate agents office talking to the negotiator he wants to get someone to buy the property. That’s not to say they’ll be lying but just take it into account who they are.

- Speak to the sellers – it’s a good time to ask questions that might help you to get more of a feel for the place. Also from a social viewpoint things can sometimes get a bit stilted and awkward, and having a few questions up your sleeve can help to get them talking about the property. Things I’d normally like to know include:-
o How long have you lived here?
o What are the neighbours like?
o What’s the area like?
o Why are you moving?
o Have you found somewhere else to buy yet?
On asking these questions you are really just trying to find any potential problems – such as that they are moving because the area has gone to the dogs, their neighbours are a nightmare. Again when hearing their answers you’ve got to make a judgement call on it – it all helps you to get an idea of their position.
o Are carpets and curtains included?
Carpets and curtains are one of those things that can cost a lot and (usually) have to be custom-made for the property itself. Whether or not you want to pay anything extra for them is up to you – even if you don’t like them it can be nice to have some sort of covering in the property giving you time to wait until you can afford to replace them with ones that you like. Sellers often over-value what they think they are worth – going on what they paid for them as a base value. If carpets and curtains are not included then it may be worth asking if they’d be prepared to throw them in. It’s one more thing that can be brought into negotiations later on if you’re interested in the property.

(altogether now..) “Fallink in luff again, vot am I to do”
Sometimes you come away from a house and you absolutely love it – this really depends on the sort of person you are – some people fall in love with property and to others it’s just a place to live. I fall into the first category and can easily get carried away. And it’s exactly that – getting ‘carried away’ – that you want to avoid.

When you come away from the property you really need to analyse why you love the property (or if ‘love’ is a bit strong, why you really liked it). When we bought our first property we did this all wrong. Looking back on it we bought the property because the sellers made us a cup of coffee and sat down and talked to us about the house. Seriously that’s why we chose the property. We viewed 2 houses that evening, both 2 up 2 down mid terraces, and in the next streets to each other. The first one was empty and the agent showed us round. It smelled a bit damp (all empty properties will smell a bit damp because they usually haven’t been heated properly), but it had a good sized dining kitchen, and it had central heating. The second one had stone cladding (which we hate – sorry if you’ve got it – it’s just personal opinion) but it was warm (because they’d had the fire on – it didn’t even have central heating) and they made us a cup of coffee. It was also marginally more expensive.
If we’d sat down and analysed what we thought of the two properties in terms of what they had to offer I’ve no doubt we would have bought the first one. But we didn’t and basically bought the second one because of a cup of coffee.

So please learn from our mistake and if you’ve fallen in love with a property, try and analyse why this is so, and make sure you’re buying the best property for you, and not because someone made you a cup of coffee. Viewing on a sunny day can show a property in a great light, and conversely viewing on a damp foggy evening can make many houses seem dreary (especially if they are vacant and lit by bare light bulbs)

How to negotiate on the price
OK so you’ve found a property in your price bracket, in the area you want to buy and you want to make an offer – what do you do next? Well it’s up to you really. There’s nothing to stop you discussing price when you’re in the house with the seller. That really depends on your personality and theirs. If you’re not comfortable going the whole hog and negotiating then you can ask them if they are open to offers on the price. From their response you can get an idea of how low you can go.
Most people do their offers and negotiations through the Estate Agent. There’s no rule that says you have to do this but it’s more comfortable to most people.

In deciding what offer to make you should take into account all the information you’ve gathered so far :-
- what houses are going for in the area (and by the way in relation to this you can actually find out what they actually sold for – not just asking prices – you can try www.houseprices.co.uk www.hometrack.co.uk – both give you the information very quickly – some other sites require registration and jumping through hoops before they tell you. When looking at these make sure you’re comparing like for like though – the property may be in the next street but it could also be twice the size of the one you’re interested in)

- Any work needed on the property – for this you’re going to need a ballpark figure for what you think needs doing, and take that into account in your offer. So you can say, for example “ We know the asking price is £245K but we reckon the damp proof course has failed, a couple of rooms need replastering and the roof needs some repairs. Because of all those things we want to offer £235K”. The danger of this approach (linking your requested discount in to specific works) is that the sellers say they can get all the work required done for £4K so if they sort those things out will you increase your offer to £241K. There’s nothing that says you have to link a lower offer in to actual works – you can just offer a lower price.

- The information you already know about the seller – if you know it’s been on the market for a while and that they are selling to move their child to another school and they’ve found the one they want to move into and it’s June and they want to be in the new house before the start of the new school year in September – then they may be desperate to sell – so they may take a lower offer. On the other hand if you know they’ve already had two offers slightly below the asking price which they’ve rejected then you know it’s probably not worth you doing the same.

- What’s included – carpets, curtains etc. If you want them to be included then you’ll need to make that clear when you make the offer – otherwise you can beat the seller down and reach agreement only to find them later coming back and saying they want another 2K for carpets and curtains
- What you can afford. Bear in mind you may well be entering into negotiations here so if the house is at the limit of what you can afford it’s probably wise from your own point of view to be offering less – you can always then increase your offer and still be within your budget. If you start at your maximum then you’ve nowhere to go. If you do this (make the lower offer first) then also psychologically the seller has moved you up a bit. There are no real rules on this – some people come up with a take it or leave it offer and some keep coming back for more (or less!).

There are a couple of points in your favour though:-
1. You’re a first time buyer. You are like gold dust in the property market. Most other people looking round will also have a property to sell and therefore they can’t actually do anything about buying until they have sold their own property. You on the other hand can move as soon as they can.
2. The Estate Agent must communicate any offer you make to the seller – even if it’s a stupid one. So whatever you offer the Estate Agent needs to let them know about it – if the estate agent says ‘I don’t think they’ll go for that’ then that’s fine but they’ve still got to put the offer to the seller to get their instructions

Don’t be afraid of making a stupidly low offer – that’s the advantage of making your offer through the estate agent – it takes the emotion out of it. Even if the seller is insulted by the offer, the estate agent will normally explain to them that even though it’s low it’s still an offer, it’s from a first time buyer, and you may be prepared to increase.

Conversely if you make a stupidly low offer don’t be surprised when they say no. You can always then increase your offer. In the example above of a property where they’ve already rejected 2 offers just below the asking price you’ll probably be wasting your time in doing the same (Never say never though – the other two offers may have been from people who weren’t yet ready to move – you’re a first time buyer).

What happens here really depends on so many things – the attitude of the seller, the marketplace, the particular type of property, the area, and so on. Until you ask the question though, you don’t know the answer – on a property we bought in the early 1990’s the previous buyers had pulled out because of a defective roof (which the seller was having to get sorted out). The sellers had already moved down south because of their job and so were keen to move. We actually didn’t know any of this but made a low offer – which was accepted straight away. If we hadn’t made the offer we wouldn’t have got the property.

At some stage in all this you should eventually get the call saying that the sellers have accepted your offer – you’ve got a deal! So we move onto the next stage. That will be covered in the final part of this blog – part 3, coming next week.

To go straight on to the final part of the ultimate first time buyers guide click here

Moving house – the ultimate first time buyers guide

I’ve seen a few guides for first time buyers knocking about but I’m not sure that any of them really hit the mark – they tend to just cover the bit that the person writing it is involved in – so if written by a solicitor they just cover the legal bit, if by an estate agent then just the property selling bit. I thought I’d have a go at doing something a bit wider (and hopefully more useful) than that – and here it is.

This guide is meant to cover buying a house or flat in England, Wales or Northern Ireland – note that Scotland has a different legal system in relation to buying a property. Also during the guide I’ll often talk about buying a house, but exactly the same applies if you’re buying a flat.

There’s a lot here! Because of that I’ve decided to split the guide into 3 parts – I’ll be doing the second part next week and the final part the week after.

Part 1 deals with your research – before you start looking round houses
Part 2 deals with the process of looking round houses – what to look out for and so on
Part 3 covers what happens when you strike a deal – the process from then until you move into your new home

Research – before you actually start
You can’t just jump in there and start the process off – you need to do a bit of research first, starting with…

1. What can you afford?
Good question – and it’s probably the most important one to answer before you start. Unless you’ve got a shedload of cash hidden away then the likelihood is that you’ll need to get a mortgage. The bad news is that even with a mortgage you’ll probably still need to have a small shedload of cash available.

What exactly is a mortgage?
It’s a loan, normally over a longer period of time than most loans – often over 25 or even 30 years. The other difference to ‘normal’ loans is that a mortgage will be fixed onto the title deeds of your house (they actually just write details of the mortgage onto the title deeds). That means whenever the house is sold then the mortgage must be paid off. It also means that if you stopped paying the mortgage then they could repossess the house and sell it to clear off the loan.

Can I get a mortgage?
In deciding whether to give you a mortgage the bank or building society will basically look at 2 things
1. Can you afford to pay the mortgage?
2. The value of the house

Deciding whether you can pay the mortgage involves looking at your income – they normally use a multiplier on your salary here – so for example they may lend you up to 5 times your annual salary as a mortgage (this multiplier in turn is affected by your credit rating). If there are two of you then they usually have a slightly different formula (e.g. 4 times the joint salary). So if you’re earning £20K a year they’d lend you a maximum of £100K as a mortgage. Don’t take these figures as gospel – they are just examples.

The value of the house is important to the mortgage company because it affects the amount of ‘security’ in the house – they need to be sure that if it ever came down to selling the house to get their money back, that the house would be worth enough to cover the debt. They link this in to the percentage that they are lending.

So for example if they lent £50,000 on a house worth £100,000 then if they eventually had to repossess they wouldn’t have a problem – even if they took a price reduction for a quick sale and sold if to £90,000 then they would get all their money back.

If however they lent the full 100K, and later had to repossess then there is more of a risk of them being out of pocket – they will have legal costs in repossessing the property and also will want to get back the interest they should have been paid. So from the lender’s point of view a 100% mortgage is risky

It’s a bit difficult to advise properly here because I’m writing this in August 2009. The mortgage market has been on a massive roller coaster for the last year, and it’s hard to see how things are going to be going forward.

What’s changed then?
Well if you go back to mid 2008 and earlier – for the previous 30 years or so it was not too hard to get a 100% mortgage. Although 100% mortgages are more risky for the lender, prices have risen so consistently over the last 30 years that if there was a problem, then by the time the property was being repossessed it had gone up in value and there was plenty of money for the mortgage company to be paid from.

During the credit crunch/recession/bank collapse mortgage lenders came under a lot of pressure not to take any risks. Because of this and a whole host of reasons that I don’t fully understand (but about which everyone seems to have an opinion) it’s not as easy to get a mortgage now as it used to be. At the time of writing 100% mortgages have only just started to come back onto the market. Anything I write here any what deals you can and can’t get will be out of date, so the best thing is to get yourself a broker to let you know what you can actually borrow.

An excellent source of information on mortgages generally is www.moneysavingexpert.com – they have quite a big section on mortgages. When I remortgaged a while ago I followed a recommendation on their site for a broker that looks at the whole of the market – I used London & Country (www.lcplc.co.uk) – I phoned someone up and they gave me examples of what I could borrow. I get no incentive for recommending these sites – I just think they’re good.

Personally I’ve found a lot of the online stuff so confusing (i.e. with so many conditions, and exceptions) that it was easier to speak to a human being and let them tell you what deals they can get you.

One last point on this – Don’t believe the hype. Don’t listen to what you hear in the press – their role is not to tell you whether or not you can get a mortgage, their role is to sell newspapers – nothing more, nothing less. So don’t be put off by press speculation about mortgage availability – speak to someone who knows and find you what you can actually borrow.

So from all that, you should have an idea of what sort of money you can borrow on a mortgage and how much money you will have to chip in towards the purchase price yourself. It’s also a good idea to work out what other costs you’ll have to fork out when you buy a house (e.g. conveyancing, stamp duty etc – if you can’t wait then click here for an instant conveyancing quote) but I’ll come back to that later – this talk of mortgages is practically sending me to sleep – lets get onto the house itself!

2. Finding the property of your dreams
The good news over the last 10 years is that with the help of the internet it’s got a lot easier to search for properties – you can search within a given area, London borough, price range, whatever. Perhaps the best known of the property portals is www.rightmove.co.uk but there are a fair number of others out there too such as www.primelocation.com and www.home.co.uk

Using these sites helps you check out a whole area quite quickly. However it’s still worth taking a drive around areas you’re interested in – you sometimes get a feel (good or bad) for an area that doesn’t come across on the websites – there could be a scary-looking pub at the bottom of the street – or a wonderful park. It’s also worth driving or walking through at different times of the day (and night).

On the question of where you should buy – although it’s corny it’s still true – the 3 most important factors are Location, Location, and Location. Buying in a good location will make it easier when you come to sell. However if a property’s in an excellent location then of course you’ll pay more for it, and it’s sod’s law that the one you really like is just too expensive. You may therefore have to compromise to get a property that contains all you need and in an area you can afford.

There’s so much out there!
I know whenever I’ve started to look for a property, I’ve found that I get very excited by that massive number of properties available – once you start looking it seems there are loads and loads – you must be able to find something in this lot!

There’s nothing out there!
However when you start looking through you start to realise that this one’s too small, that one’s next to a pub. This one’s got a pokey kitchen, that one smelled funny, and so on. It’s not long before you do an about-face and decide that there’s nothing out there after all. What you’re doing here is narrowing things down – which is very important unless you just want to be viewing properties every day for the next year.

Stuff you might want to take into account to help narrow down the choice includes
- How many bedrooms
- Does it have central heating? If so – is it fairly recently installed?
- Does it have double glazing?
- What’s the kitchen like?
- What’s the bathroom like?
- How big is the garden?
- Is there a garage/off street parking?

Now it may be that because of your price range and where you want to buy some of these things are non-starters. But things like the number of bedrooms is pretty crucial and should help you to weed out a lot of properties quite quickly.

What sort of property should you look for?
Most first time buyers will be buying a smaller, cheaper property. If you’re in London this will almost certainly be a flat, (most of London is divided into flats) and if you’re in other parts of the country flats will still be something to consider because they are generally cheaper than houses. Most first time buyers will either be buying a new or newish flat, maisonette, or town house, or an older mid-terrace property or flat.

New properties
A number of builders have gone into the market of selling starter homes – building developments of flats, town-houses and maisonettes. These can often look very attractive as you can normally move in with no work to do.

Pro’s and cons of a newer property:-
- extras are often thrown into the price such as dishwasher, washing machines. Whilst these are useful they can sometimes be used as justification for a slightly higher price. The only reason I mention this is that if you have to sell the property again quite quickly then it might not fetch what you thought – when you’re coming to sell yourself then things like the washing machines etc will generally be ignored
- Don’t forget you’re buying from someone whose job it is to sell you the property (as opposed to buying from a private seller – an ‘amateur’. That’s not necessarily a problem – just bear it in mind)
- You will normally get a 10 year guarantee on the property from the date they are built
- The rooms in newer properties can be smaller than on older properties
- Insulation in newer properties can be a lot better than on older properties
- You usually have no work to do – you can just move in
- The property has no ‘character’
- People generally love them or hate them

Older properties
As a starter home you’re probably usually looking at mid terraced properties – from around 100 years ago. Usually solidly built but at that time builders paid little attention paid to damp proofing so this has often been a problem over the years. However an injection damp proof course usually sorts sorts this out and most mid terraces should have one.

Pros and cons of an older property:-
- You’re more likely to have to do stuff to an older property (again though the previous owner may have sorted all this out)
- They can have character
- Insulation etc will not normally be very good (but can be remedied quite cheaply)
- Double glazing – they won’t necessarily have this
- Again people love them or hate them

Finally in terms of the value of houses on the same street, a good piece of advice is to try and buy the worst house on the street – it will be pulled up in value by the better houses; conversely a spanking house on a shabby street will never achieve it’s potential value.

What about a fixer-upper?
Usually when you’re looking round you’ll find something that would normally be out of your price range because it ‘requires modernisation’ – a fixer-upper. Now you don’t need me to tell you whether it’s within your abilities to do DIY work on a house – personally it’s something I really enjoy, but if you’re taking on something like this:-
- Go in with your eyes open – get estimates for all the work required
- This WILL cause hassle with your mortgage – especially if you’re having a high percentage mortgage – they will often make a retention (hold back part of the mortgage money) until key works have been done – you’ll then have to come to an arrangement with the seller on getting some of the work done between exchange of contracts and completion OR borrow extra money to tide you over until the work has been done
- If you’re planning on doing the work yourself you need to make sure you can comply with any statutory requirements (planning regulations, building regulations etc), but also make sure you’ll have the time – fixing up a property yourself is rewarding but knackering. It’s no use having a lovely house and a broken marriage!
- If you have the patience, skill and time, it can mean that you get into a nicer property than you thought you could

3. Is it the right time to buy?
It’s stick my neck out time! I would say that YES! this is about as good a time as you’re going to get to buy a property. Prices are on the rise once again. Interest rates are at an all time low. Although mortgage deals are nowhere near as good as they used to be when compared to the bank of England base rate, in terms of the actual rate you’d be paying they’re still pretty good.

As an example a couple of years ago the bank of England base rate was 5.75% At that time you could get mortgages with special introductory periods of below the base rate – Cheltenham & Gloucester were doing a 2-year tracker deal at 4.74%

Currently the bank of England base rate is 0.5% One of the best trackers you can get (today) is from RBS/NatWest – at 2.89% which is 2.39% over base.

Now if you focus on comparison with the base rate it looks awful – you used to get a deal below base and now the best you can get is way over base. However what actually matters to you is the amount you’re paying out. 2 years ago you’d have been paying out 4.74% – now you’d be paying out 2.89% – that’s about £150 a month less!

So even if the banks aren’t offering great deals when compared to the base rate, the actual rates you can get now are actually pretty damn good!

In terms of house prices we’ve seen house price increases in all the statistics for the last few months. As conveyancers we’ve noticed this in terms of the volumes of people moving house. The low point for us was the 6 months leading up to January 2009 – from February the number of people moving has gradually risen.

It’s impossible to say how quickly prices will rise from here on in, but I do believe they are only going one way now for the foreseeable future and that is upwards.

4. Cost of buying a house (legal fees stamp duty etc)
Part of working out what property you can afford is working out the total costs of buying. Here are some of the things you should take into account:-
- Mortgage administration fee – many mortgage companies charge this – it’s basically a fee for saying yes. They charge it because they can. It can be anywhere from a few hundred pounds to a few thousand but should be made clear to you at the outset of arranging your mortgage
- Mortgage valuation fee – This is the mortgage company getting a valuation on the property – you have to pay for this – it’s normally a few hundred pounds. See note below on Surveys
- Conveyancing fees – this is where we come in – Click here for an instant conveyancing quote. This quote will also include things we need to pay to other people on your behalf (such as Stamp Duty, Land Registry Fees, and additional searches)
- Moving costs – are you going to use a removal company, hire a van, or borrow your dad’s car?

5. HIPs and Energy Performance Certificates
Every house being sold now should have a Home Information Pack (usually called a HIP) prepared on it and available for you to look at. It’s worth checking this out now as any HIP prepared after the 6th April 2009 will include a questionnaire filled out by the sellers – useful to read through this before you look round the house as it can give you a bit of background information. The HIP will also include an energy performance certificate (known as an EPC) – this basically produces an energy rating for the house.

At the time I’m writing this (August 2009) this information is largely irrelevant – other than that if the house is inefficient it will cost more to heat than one that is more efficient. However, in view of the importance of all green issues politically, I think it can only be a matter of time before we start to see tax implications for inefficient houses – so for example if your house is very inefficient you may pay more in local government tax. It’s not relevant yet, but it may become a factor in the future. Having said that, even if your house is inefficient you will be able to take steps to help it (such as more insulation, energy-efficient light bulbs and so on).

If you want a quote for providing you with a HIP, then click here for a free HIP quote.

That’s it for now. Next time we’ll deal with the process of looking round houses, and making an offer to buy one.

To go to Part 2 of the ultimate first time buyers guide click here

Cheers

Mark