In conclusion...

Moved in, in December. In twenty years time I'll own this place, unemployment / expiration withstanding.
Until then...

The Things That Happen When You See A House You Like

You don't give a shit about paying a £999 mortgage booking fee. What's £999 on top of the £200k you're borrowing? A drop in a very deep ocean of debt.

You want to get things moving. Get the deal done. But there's red tape as thick as an exterior wall between you and those keys in your hand.

You want second third fourth opinions. So the blame can be halved, quartered, eighthed when the house falls down.

You start obsessing about money. Not spending it. Cutting back. (In other words, you become dull.)

You don't want anyone else looking, sniffing or smelling 'your' house. So you insist the estate agent takes it off the market (and you check their website to make sure they're true to their word).

You start thinking about the vendor. Are they decent? Will they pull out at the eleventh hour after you've spent a fair whack getting checks and surveys done.

You start writing your house buyer's blog again, because you might have something interesting to say.

Waiting Game

Saw a house. Liked it. Waited. Put in an offer. Waited. Rejected. Put in a higher offer. Waited. Accepted. Stomach churned like yoghurt. Went to the bank. Waited for man in suit. Asked for a mortgage. Got grilled like fish fingers for two hours. Waited. Got OK'd for a mortgage. Went looking for a solicitor. Waited. Got one. Paid for a survey to be done. Waited for the results. Hmmm. Some things need looking at. The gas electrics windows. Now waiting for the gas electrics windows to be looked at.

Redundancy Off. House Hunt Back On.

Another bullet dodged. The cull has been survived. So the house hunt is back on. My original September deadline is going to missed by a long way as I've had no viewings for months, no second viewings ever, no offers made.

My problems remain twofold - I don't like any houses that fall within my price range, and I don't like any mortgages on offer for the 15% deposit I've managed to scrape together.

Really looking forward to the next few months then. Hope to be moved in time for Christmas. Ho, ho bloody ho.

Nothing Like The Threat Of Redundancy To Stall Your House Hunt

Hence the lack of entries in this blog. The house hunt is in stasis until I find out one way or another whether I can guarantee a regular income, and satisfy those pound hungry money lenders. I suspect they don't appreciate a man with no guarantee of work coming in and asking to borrow a couple of hundred grand with a vastly inflated interest rate attached to it. I'm still saving properties I like the look of from the emails I'm getting sent, but that's more in hope than expectation. We shall see!

What's This - Mortgage Fees Getting Cut

Seems some lenders are seeing sense and realising that the random payment of mortgage fees is putting people off.

Still don't understand how the fees can be as high as £999. But it looks like some lenders are knocking 50% off what they're randomly charging. It's a start. A step in the right direction...

Affordable rates? They're lost on me...

This article says that first time buyers are benefitting from fairly cheap borrowing rates.

Hmm. Not from where I'm sitting. It does go on to say that a 25% deposit is needed to benefit from the best rates. That's at least 50 grand for the type of houses I'm looking for (and we're not talking mansions here).

Until mortgage companies offer similar low borrowing rates for, say, a 15% deposit, I can't see how many people are going to be able to (or will even bother to) get on the property ladder.

The banks know they are putting big mark-ups on their mortgages, and they're charging extortionate mortgage booking fees on top of that. Time that all came to an end...