Tom1983

The US mortgage crisis, I agree was a disaster

But, the very least - it's not reasonable to request a 10% deposit, especially for FTBs. By all means scrap the 5%, but certainly don't punish FTBs etc who now require to get a further 15% minimum

I know HSBC still has the 90% LTR, even when you become home movers.

Plus there were other factors that caused the financial crisis.

Mark Smith

We came here after giving up on the UK housing market. Trying to buy a first home and being self employed after the GFC was getting silly. The banks wanted 40-50% deposits as a reaction to self certified mortgages being sold to any old tom, dick and harry. The way the banks looked at you, I might as well had paedo tattooed on my forehead. I understand credit may be a little easier to come by, but I don't think house prices in my old home town have dropped much. The overall cost of living (council tax, water, heating, petrol, insurances) and lack of savings interest, meant we would never be able to stump up the 50-60k needed.

davros1984

Hi Tommyluck, the first house I provided a link to was within London itself - not hampshire. Its between Stratford and Barking (Plaistow) . For a city that has over 8 million people and over 20 million people commuting into London every day - that is incredible value. Doesn't tempt me, but if I was a first time buyer in London, that is exactly what I'd be looking for.

Also the tube journey from Plaistow to Liverpool street (a classic stop for IT workers) is 15-20 minutes.

I think you got confused with me talking about Surrey and Hampshire - that's a separate issue. If Surrey is out of budget, Hampshire is considerably cheaper etc.

Here I live in Beach Haven/Birkdale, my commute on the bus to the viaduct is about 30 minutes. If I drive its about 1 hour (so thats the same time as commuting from Fleet or Farnborough).

A house we wanted here had a CV of $370,000, it sold at auction for $552,000. Likewise a house just up the road from us, small 3-bed house that my friend bought, he got it for $460K. The house that sold yesterday, CV of $390K sold for $610,000.

Even if prices are comparable, Auckland is far bigger than London and has a fraction of the population. London is the proper city experience plus you get incredible public transport. It is seriously wrong here for properties to be as expensive or more expensive as they are in London.

davros1984

Sorry for you, I guess this is something we have in common - although we do not own a house in the UK or anywhere, so we're real "first-time" buyers.

I will have to take a pay-cut if I go home, i.e. in the region of 10-15K GBP, but... the price of a 3-bed house will only be 3 times my reduced salary (that doesn't even take into account my partners income). With the lower deposits required and the governments recent scheme, logically the only option seems to move home and make the best of it, or we will just be stuck here renting for at least another 3-4 years.

We are really sad as well as we generally love it here and would easily stay here if we could buy a house out west or on the N.Shore of Auckland at a reasonable price.

In truth, I have already made a decision on this, but it really feels like we have been forced to now move home.

I'd understand the deposit restriction IF they had a capital gains tax or something to penalise the rich from buying lots of properties.

TommyLuck

Is owning your own home really the be all and end all?

If so, why?

On the London thing, like I say the cost of the commute whether in Fleet or East London would cost £1,000's per year, so over any length of mortgage you're already adding costs and train/tube travel isn't going to get any cheaper.

I doubt your commute here is comparible in terms of cost, given your earning potential in NZ and the UK?

Tom1983

I'm not sure if they do something like that already here. I'm sure I read in one of the comments on the press that they did something like this, but not set at a high rate (can't put off the rich from coming here)

It wouldn't bother me that much if I was happy just chucking money away from renting. Not forgetting that the landlord may require the house for someone else, or rent could increase significantly (as they seem to be doing in Christchurch!), or landlord might want to sell property etc, etc, etc.

Continue renting and just throw money away for another 5 years minimum just to get the deposit required, or go home, get on the property ladder and have a job living away from London. Our house in London is less than 200k, we've got a lot of interest on it.

Rental prices I doubt will decrease, especially not in Christchurch given the demand for rental properties. We were lucky our landlord kept the rent as it was - the agents wanted her to increase it by $100 a week.

Hopefully, peer pressure makes them change their mind but I doubt it.

davros1984

I know the cost of commuting is more in the UK, but then a 5-6 quid tube ticket is fine per day. The season tickets do give quite a discount. For instance my friend in Maidenhead, his season ticket is 3.5K GBP a year. If I caught the Ferry up at Gulf Harbour to Auckland, my commute suddenly becomes quite expensive.

Owning a house is really important to me. I've been renting for 10 years now and I'm tired of paying someone elses mortgage. I want to begin to address my financial future and not have to be in a high-pressured job until I'm 65-70.

I have a skilled job and give a lot of hours to my job each and every week - as a lot of ordinary working people do. I put myself through Uni and took out a student loan to do this and I feel in general I've made a lot of sacrifices in life to get where I am. MY 20's has been about career, development and constant learning. Its only in the last year or 2 in NZ that I've started to do more holidays and try new things.

Ultimately, the reason I do that is partly that I enjoy my job, but the main reason is to buy a house and provide. I think that's the case for most working adults. In Auckland I simply feel that is an unrealistic aim, even when earning a 6-figure salary.

If I can't buy a house or do the normal things that our parents generally could, I may as well be a bum and scrounge off of the state!

BEVS

I'd ask that back to you. After all you're going to be doing the same I though from your posts , especially since having sadly come into some real estate inheritance here. Makes good sense to me. Seems like it makes good sense to you.

Most people these days wish to own a home of their own & also hope to eventually own it outright. I think it is about putting down sound footings for an adult family life.

Mark Smith

We did, it was called Scarborough (UK), life was passing us by. The harder you saved the more prices we going up. It was probably the biggest factor behind why we left.

davros1984

Hi Mark,

So yes you guys made a similar decision by the sounds of it. That is now the issue we have here in Auckland and it seems that its only going to get tougher to buy a house here (i.e. going to need a 100K NZD deposit at the very least). In the UK the government has recently introduced a number of schemes to help first time buyers (and encourage it) and... mortgages now require less of a deposit, i.e. around 10%. So I can buy a 100K GBP house with a 10K deposit - which seems much more reasonable.

I had asked the question, but then deleted it. For all of you: if you were living somewhere where it was near-impossible to buy a house, would you stay or would you leave and go somewhere more affordable?

M_and_M

Owning a house IS important because I don't want to be scraping pennies together to pay rent put of my pension like my parents are now.

dannigirl

This is such a hard question. One of he biggest reasons we wanted to leave London was the seemingly impossible prices of housing. Well extorniate prices for small houses - no thanks!

We bought a fair chunk of equity with us but still feel we couldn't afford to live in Auckland. I wouldn't be prepared to pay 600,000+ for a do up! So, I would leave somewhere unaffordable. My only caveat would be if there was close family in the unaffordable place. That may sway me.

Spacecake799

Hi,

Just wanted to ask. Did I see you were in IT? I notice that leeds is now the 2nd biggest place for IT and finance after London.
One of the reasons we just returned was not owning a house anymore.
Good Luck

Charismatic

Firstly I actually welcome any move by the Reserve Bank to bring house prices back to sensible LIR values and reduces systemic risk to Australasian banks. However this is a very short term measure that only defers demand.

Only building more houses will quench demand, raising rates will lower demand and CGT will end speculative activity. To date the rate of consenting and land allocation are still choking supply despite much lip service from government, rates are at historic lows and the tax loophole has yet to be closed.

Chippy Giles

Anybody actually thinking about moving back to the UK (and getting on the property ladder) who is seeing the mortgage rates that are being touted about and the deposits should have somebody in the UK physically check what is actually available in the real world as I know people here who are still being asked for 20% deposits on first time buys - if they can get offered credit at all.