…All you need to do is have fewer takeaways, give up the avocados, and barista coffee, and boom! A house is yours!
BUT is that house unfurnished, in the middle of nowhere, and leaving you without a social life? How’s that for living?!
Now for some background
I’ve lived in London all my life bar a short stint at uni in Surrey. I’m not fun to be around when I have no travel plans on the cards, and my foster parents rent their council home. The opinion that a home of one’s own is the ultimate goal has never been forced on me. Maybe this is because they rent, or perhaps it’s because there’s always something more pressing to save for. Read my nieces, nephews, grandkids, relationship breakdowns, weddings – the list goes on #theirlifeisbasicallyasoapopera
Cut to, my getting into a relationship with a partner whose parents have owned their home for 40 years and the same job for 35 years. For my inlaws, the family home is the centre of the Universe, and why would you be ruled by a landlord’s whims? Call me swayed but the boyf has convinced me that renting is dead money. However, we most definitely do not have a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, or an inheritance windfall to fund a deposit, and the stark difference between our lives and friends that did is a flashing neon sign outside a late-night bar.
I need to caveat all this by saying that my inlaw’s home is not in England, though it is in the UK, so it’s not a straight comparison (say a difference in average house prices between small town Wales and London of a casual £400,000!), so there is the gulf of a small island in our different realities.
So what are we to do – move to Wales? Should he leave his well-paid corporate job so we can have three spare bedrooms and a car? I’ve got three freelance jobs, he’s a full-time working citizen and we’re looking at needing a 5% deposit of on average £25000 for a city home with the 95% mortgage scheme before we can scratch the surface of our own doorstop.
Why didn’t we take better advantage of the Help to Buy ISA I hear you ask….
It’s because we both know our ideal home is not a new build. Our London flat is quirky (read a mural in the garden and the room layout flipped upside down), and we know we need some character for it to feel like home. And if it doesn’t feel like home why compromise our happiness?
So staring down the stark mortgage tunnel, is our solution adding more side hustles (hello burnout), living frugally to the extreme, and then hopefully getting a shell of a building? Or finding a BFF who can listen to my tales of woe and hopefully help me make some changes that aren’t detrimental to our quality of life.
Enter Women’s Wealth –
I’m budgeting, I’m being honest about my short, mid, and long-term goals and I’m educating myself all while being a Money Mentor, with a supportive community around me. There will still be theatre trips, the odd leopard print splurge, and a few cocktail nights with the ladies and I’m not ashamed to say it!
Whilst we can’t promise you’ll have the keys in your hands in record time unless you really like living off beans on toast three meals a day forevermore, I promise if you are in a sticky situation shouldering the burden of adulting, I feel your pain. I’m in your shoes and we’re in this together. Let’s keep talking money and there’s absolutely no judgement here!