Asg123

Reading the useful link that you provided I see that there was quite some assistance- two-thirds of over a billion dollars of assistance to owner-occupiers. Makes me a bit more comfortable not having earthquake insurance with my house right on top of a fault. But like you I don't like to think about it.

Lilly77

We've rented our property for 2 years now in London

MMcD

That's so funny (to me)
course you could also say: "over $666,666,666.667"!

Whatever - but glad it provides some re-assurance

Asg123

Yes I didn't put it very well. I was thinking of this piece from under Table 3 in the article
"out of an estimated $1,130,000 spent on earthquake recovery 66% ($750 million) was spent on assistance for owner occupiers".
(they've missed 3 zeros)

MMcD

It was clear that was the reference...
The thing is if you've ever been thru a "big one" (and maybe you have ) it's harder to take comfort in number$ eg a Panglossian panacea.
I just want to survive it

Mettski

This week i've been considering doing exactly this, which is how i ended up here on the site!. Cannot believe what i've been missing for the past 12 yrs stateside! this feels like home. might have to PM you if you don't mind.

Cherrysoda

We bought here but kept the UK property till we understand tax implications. We did wait for green cards but saw prices go up in that time. I would be tempted to find a better rental and wait for green cards. The London market will go up more than LA I reckon. Maybe your tenant will still want to buy a year from now? I have heard the London market is cooling. Maintenance costs much less here. New asphalt roof 10$ k. New hvac system $5500. UK flat always has crazy high bills on it.

Pulaski

You are the first person I think I have ever seen say that. IME, and everyone else's I have ever seen post on the topic, maintenance costs in the US easily outstrip maintenance costs in the UK - and to your two examples, a roof in the US often only lasts around 20 years, and an HVAC (heating/AC) as little as ten years.

Wintersong

Seems to be a maximum payment of $21,500 for "real and personal property replacement", which wouldn't go very far towards replacing the contents of an average home, let alone the home itself, in the event of a total loss.

We don't have earthquake insurance as the cost is simply prohibitive - I console myself with the thought that a large part of the value of our home is in the land, which of course we'd still own: the actual rebuild cost (according to AAA) is less than half what we paid for the house.

There's always GoFundMe

Cherrysoda

Well I can only speak of our personal experience Pulaski. We own a Victorian flat that is tiny in the UK and every year we have to fork out for something-now it is a 39K$ bill on putting steel into the front of the house to support the wall- that is just our share so you can multiply that by 5 for the cost the company is billing us all- 125 K sterling plus extra costs due to it being a listed building. The lease will be another 20 K to get back up to 100 years when we come to sell.

In the US we have a mid century home- 60 years old. The hvac system we have was put in in 87 so we expect it to go pretty soon. 5500 to put a new unit and furnace in. The roof is coming up to 30 years- asphalt...so we have to replace this soon but no leaks yet. We know these dates as I called the city before we bought and they send a folder with every date of every license that was issued.

So it may be we find standards have dropped and we will now only find hvac units that last 10 years and the same for roofs.....but going on the evidence available so far.....cost on our 400 square foot uk property vastly outstrip what we spend here. We spent 120$ on maintenance last year-due to having a home warranty so I guess we will continue to have that.

Maybe you live somewhere with adverse weather? You are obviously having a different experience of costs to us.

I agree having a home incurs costs but so far the costs of the UK property are way higher.
I just checked travel costs in the UK to get a train up North and was astounded having not visited in a while. I really do not know how people survive in the south east of the UK with an average income. We find living costs lower here for most things and we are in an expensive city.

Pulaski

The weather chez Pulaski is about as benign as anywhere in the US - very little winter weather, modest rainfall, and very little wind. The last hurricane was in 1988.

I am citing a blend of my personal experience, that of friends and colleagues, and reported by others on BE.

My ten year old heating and AC system was "condemned" three years ago, but with a few relatively modest repairs it is doing quite nicely at the moment, and I know enough to push back on contractors trying to sell me something - others likely don't have my knowledge or experience to push back as effectively

Your experience in the US is far from typical, and in fairness your UK benchmark home is also atypical for the UK. Consider yourself lucky(US)/unlucky(UK). Generally speaking someone from the UK cannot expect to have the same experience as you.

Cherrysoda

That could be one way to look at it Pulaski- we have to see ourselves ultimately as lucky it has gone up 400 % in value since we bought it, which we realise is modest compared to London gains, but we accept a small chunk of any profit will now be spent on these expensive repairs.

I think Victorian homes are not uncommon in the UK so these bills will not be so unusual. Ten years for a hvac system is terrible- were you unlucky to buy a home where someone had put in a cheap system?))
Surely roofs in climates with little rain last longer than an average UK roof, which not being asphalt will be more costly to replace? We have not owned a UK house, only a flat, so we cannot compare on that front, but when we come to replace our hvac we will do plenty of research to get a good one that lasts longer than 10 years. The owner who lived here before us engineered for NASA so maybe he brought some bits and bobs back from work and adapted our hvac system making it last three times longer than the ones you speak of.)) That would indeed be lucky for us.

Pulaski

I think your lack of knowledge and experience of construction and household systems is lacking. A roof in the UK lasts almost indefinitely - my parents house is sixty years old and the roof is still original and in perfectly good condition. Most people in the UK will go through their entire adult life and never have to pay for a roof. A "modern" (they've been around for about 90 years, maybe more) concrete tile roof in the UK is virtually indestructible - sun and rain do no damage, even strong wind is unlikely to, and snow and frost do very little damage either.

Here in the US roofs often get damaged (maybe they're badly installed or with cheap materials?), and get replaced after less than the usual 20 or so years. A neighbouring house to us was built 26 years ago and the owner knows the roof is now on borrowed time. Over say 50 years of adulthood and home ownership in the US, you can reasonably expect to have two or three roofs to buy, OR see a depressed value of your home at sale because the roof is "old" or "damaged".

My parents had new central heating installed in the late 1970's. It still runs just fine, with an annual service, more than 40 years later, and I am sure has many more years life in it yet. Over the same period in the US a heating/AC system would likely have had to be replaced, twice! Remember, the systems are completely different technology, with a US heating/AC system having more in common with a fridge than with a British heating system.

And yes, my heating system is cheap and has been badly maintained.

Matt Sabre

Tile roofs are very good. Luckily I have one on my primary here in CA. I'm always amazed when I see those wood shake jobbies that appear to be disintegrating.

MidAtlantic

Your UK bill for a flat in a listed building and with structural problems is UNUSUAL. You really cannot treat that as regular maintenance costs.

Guidance here in the south is for hvac to last 10 - 15 years.