I would like to buy a flat soon and live in it for a year or so with a normal first time buyers mortgage.
Now after a year i want to leave to go travelling for a year or two, and ideally would like a tennant to live in the flat to cover the mortgage etc.
Are there any obvious implications? (such as having to change the mortgage to a buy to let mortgage)
Thanks for any basic advice
if you live in it for a couple of years then i probably wouldn;t tell them its buy to let.
if you are only thinking of renting it out for a year then i wouldnt do that either, the damage to the property over the year could cut a big hole in profits and thats if they pay you regulary and its a big if.
dont worry about tenants checking what type of mortgage you have..it NEVER happens, you will need the boiler certified though as should they tamper with and it explode you dont want to end up in prison.....yes tenants do tamper with stuff when it stops working
what its really going to come down to is how good are the tenants in the property....its rare that they will treat it as their own paid for home so expect its condition to deteriorate quicker than normal.
if they pay on time and look after the place then you will think the letting agents are amazing when really they will have done little.
problem with letting agents is if they dont go down every couple of months to do inspections and dont chase up late payers then your investment could be pretty costly for you.
even if you do get good tenants but keep needing repairs then that will be costly, not just because of the cost of repair but the letting agencies tend to put a small fee on all repairs so you're paying for the repairs and a bit.
then you have the people who they pay for repairs....good professionls are expensive, especially when called out after hours and cheaper ones may not do a very good job (sometimes intentionally).....they may do a temp fix which in cost would be little difference to a full repair but if it keeps breaking they keep making money.
if you could find decent tenants and get a family member to collect the rent and call someone cheap for repairs and go with repair guy when he is repairing you would be far far better off.....i know it would be a hassle for someone to help you like that but you could always pay them instead of the letting agency.
