steviedeluxe

Not completely sure about this. For a start you can normally survive without a car in London (unless your job needs one of course) but I imagine it's fairly essential in parts of north Yorkshire. Heating - almost bound to be more expensive up there, as the heat island effect in the big city means you need it less. Things like eating out are normally more expensive in London I agree, but the availability of good markets means the normal grocery bill won't differ by much. I suspect it's really accommodation (either renting or buying) that would make London more expensive.

linz3112

We currently live in the East Midlands and earn approx £1800 between us. We have a Mortgage on a 3 bed house and a 5 year old. We run a car and do a weekly shop of approx £50. We also have a loan that costs us close to £250 a month to pay back and we are fine financially! Granted, we don't go out every weekend etc but when we want to go out we can.


HTH
Good luck with the move.

dunroving

A mortgage on a 3-BR house could mean £250 pcm (if you bought 10 years ago on a lifetime tracker at 0.5% above BOE), or £1,000+ pcm (if you bought in 2007 on a fixed rate at 8% interest) ... I think this is for most people potentially the biggest expense by far and yet it is the one that is least often dealt with explicitly.

paranoidandroid

Good comment, and makes sense considering house price increases over that time, although obviously the price of a 3 bed house is widely variable depending on the location. Maybe the reason it's dealt with less explicitly is because of those potential variables? You're right though, for most people that has got to be the biggest (percentage of income) expense, no matter where they live.

dunroving

In 1987 when I was living overseas, I bought a house in the UK. Within months of me putting in the offer, the interest rate went up to some ridiculous rate, and at the same time, the pound went from the $1.50's to about $1.80 (I was earning in $$'s and paying my mortgage in ££'s). My mortgage thus went from about 65% of my take-home pay to about 125% of my take home pay (I ended up taking on 3 part-time jobs for almost two years). It was a stressful time. LUCKILY, during those two years, house prices went up and I sold at just the right time, weeks before the house crash of the 90s (and used the "profit" to put myself through grad school in the States). I say "profit" because I calculated it was about the same amount as I'd have had if I had just taken the monthly payments and stuffed them under my mattress for the three years...

Conversely, in 2007 (March) I bought my current house with a lifetime tracker 0.59% above BOE (try getting anything near that these days). Shortly after, a friend bought her house with a 4-year fixed at 8% interest. So now I'm paying 1.09% interest and she's paying 8%. Her house cost £30k less than mine but her monthly mortgage payment is considerably higher than mine. However, my house is now worth about £30k less than I paid for it.

So yes, I think houses are the single biggest cause of financial misery, or joy, depending on your situation and your timing.

nun

I've looked at UK mortgages and frankly they suck. The seem expensive and it's impossible to get a fixed rate for any length of time. In the US the 15 or 30 years fixed mortgage is a standard product and makes it easy to budget your housing expenses as you're insulated from interest rate changes. I'm half way through a 15 year, 4.5% fixed mortgage (today I could get a 15 years 3.9% fixed), but when I come back to the UK I won't get anything as good. So my plan is to rent for a while until I find a place that I like and just buy it out right using the equity form the sale of my US house. I'll be spending a lot of capital, but I'll need far less annual income so my tax will be lower.

linz3112

Good Point - I bought in 2007 and my monthly mortgage payments are £500 per month, this is after i went onto a variable rate, when it was fixed it was £670 a month!

I also need to point out that our income is our NET earnings, not sure if the wage that the OP mentioned is Gross or Net.

HTH

nun

I'm interested in the cost of living.....so what it actually costs to live in the UK. Food, TV, council tax etc. I'm budgeting 650 pounds /month for rent (until I buy), but wanted to get a feel for the rest of the costs. I'm now budgeting 1000 pounds in addition to the 650 for rent. I'm single and will be living in the NE.

linz3112

I know you are trying to find out about cost of living, I was trying to give you a positive in that i think you would be fine on £1800 a month which is what you asked about in a previous post.

My outgoings (including a £230 a month loan payment and Mortgage) add up to approx £1140 a month.

HTH

cheers

Thank you for bring that up because when I look to rent on RIGHTMOVE I use £600 to see what is available in the different parts of the country.

I've never thought of it but I think I can get by on another £600 for food, power and play.

Yey... no TV license fee for SENIOR, seniors.

paranoidandroid

You're a Senior? Then apparently you'll get a heating allowance too, which is more than you'll get in the USA

cheers

I'm not a senior yet. I have 18 years to go before I'm 90 years old. Then I'll be a senior and old.

paranoidandroid

Please accept my apologies!

dunroving

Yes, it's odd that UK and US have their own unique "norms" when it comes to mortgage preferences. I mean why is the US norm 15-yr or 30-yr, and the UK standard is 25-yr? Why don't UK lenders have much in the way of full-term fixed-interest, and why hasn't the US ever taken up the idea of an offset motgage (which I think is a fantastic idea)?

It might be worth your while using half your capital in order to get a low loan-to-value offset, full-term tracker. That way, you can offset the rest of your capital (therefore paying almost no interest each month), but have the flexibility to use up the capital if you ever needed it in an emergency. To me, that makes a lot more sense than long-term renting (unless you need flexibility to move location). Renting is probably a good idea initially, though, until you know where you want to stay more permanently.

Current best-buys for full-term ("lifetime") tracker mortgages are just over 2% (HSBC, 40% deposit, £99 fee). There are several offsets between 2% and 3%, but none of them are term/lifetime - check First Direct for a 2.39%, 35% deposit, £99 fee.

(I got these out of the "Best Mortgages" section of the Sunday Times Money section)

sallysimmons

Is there any way you can explain what that means to someone who's been away for 21 years? I tried googling it and didn't come up with anything I could understand. Use short words though ;-)