How to split rent as a couple?

Dis86 said:
I have a lifestyle here that most Londoners can only wish for.
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What you have isn't what everyone wishes for though. The kind of people attracted to London are more interested in world-class culture than beautiful beaches. Some people also like to feel important and there's plenty of jobs in London for people with big egos. :)
 
Tunney said:
What you have isn't what everyone wishes for though. The kind of people attracted to London are more interested in world-class culture than beautiful beaches. Some people also like to feel important and there's plenty of jobs in London for people with big egos. :)
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Like I said, half hour away is a city with plenty of it. Theatre. Art. Museums. Music. All there.
 
£2600 rent :eek: isn't it cheaper to commute in from somewhere outside of London? (I don't understand the logistics so apologies if this is a stupid question). My mortgage is a quarter of that and I've only just recently bought with a small deposit. I feel for you OP.

Stand your ground and make sure you get a good deal from your housemates.
 
you pay mental prices if you live in over-priced areas! I live in croydon(boho pop hole etc) and me and my brother rent a 2 bed house(small but enough for the two of us) for 1k/month, usual prices are around 1.2k!

we have kitchen, bath, garden, parking spot, living room, reception and two bedrooms upstairs.

I am on way less than 100k, not even half that and we do fine.

it takes me 50minutes on a bicycle to get to work(central london) and I have no problems with it, I would hate leaving 1k of my wages on rent alone! :)
 
dowie said:
for posters on here with a few years experience it should be - IT contracting in the city could get you on 100k+ easily
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I wouldn't say easily. The average contractor rates for London are around 450pd (and can sometimes be less).

There are usually around 250 working days in a year. Assuming most people want to take at least 20 of these off that means they are left with circa 220. So capable of earning roughly around £99,000 before tax.

This also assumes you have a year long contract and do not go through any down periods in the year.

I see very few contractor roles in excess of 600pd unless it's a very specialised role in a very specialised industry vertical.

Even at 5x earnings that will only land you £500k.. which gets you pretty much a luxury one bed or average two bed in London.
 
I am looking for a house to buy and there are no houses (as in not flats) within the entire m25 for less than £200k. Right move comes up with 34 houses but most of them are listed wrong, a house boat for £140k, a garage for £75k. Even if you go out to reading or woking or guildford it is still not possible to buy a house for £200k

I can't think of anything more depressing than buying a house in the UK. There is just nothing on offer. Imagine you work hard save up £10-15k for 10 years only to find out that there is nothing on offer to buy. :(

With all this demand for housing no one is building houses and if they did build they are crappy little apartments and they want £500k for a matchbox size with kitchen in the living room.
 
anything I don't mind said:
I am looking for a house to buy and there are no houses (as in not flats) within the entire m25 for less than £200k. Right move comes up with 34 houses but most of them are listed wrong, a house boat for £140k, a garage for £75k. Even if you go out to reading or woking or guildford it is still not possible to buy a house for £200k

I can't think of anything more depressing than buying a house in the UK. There is just nothing on offer. Imagine you work hard save up £10-15k for 10 years only to find out that there is nothing on offer to buy. :(

With all this demand for housing no one is building houses and if they did build they are crappy little apartments and they want £500k for a matchbox size with kitchen in the living room.
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The UK doesn't just mean everything inside or near the m25 you know...
 
I was somewhat amazed to see a friend selling his extended 3-bed ex-council house in Guildford for about £350k. Particularly amazed since he bought it for about £250k in early 2008. That's a huge increase given overall housing market movements from the 2008 economic contraction.
 
cheesyboy said:
I was somewhat amazed to see a friend selling his extended 3-bed ex-council house in Guildford for about £350k. Particularly amazed since he bought it for about £250k in early 2008. That's a huge increase given overall housing market movements from the 2008 economic contraction.
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Yeah. Don't even get me started on the house price increases. There's a house down the road from me that 'made' on average circa £90k a year for 7 years if you look at bought and sold prices. Disgusting. That's probably more than the owner earned him/herself. Bricks and mortar earning more than actual real life people that go out and work for 40hrs a week. Now that's just crazy.
 
I was watching that basement building documentary and one of the woman on there said she bought her council terraced house 20 years ago for £80k now she just sold it for £1.3 million, its only two bed room.

All these people who got cheap council houses are now million airs.
 
If they expect you to pay double, they are taking the ****. It is bad enough that in the UK our hotels like to charge extortionate amounts when a second person stays in the same room, I certainly would not agree to it with roommates.
 
garyh said:
Assuming most people want to take at least 20 of these off that means they are left with circa 220. So capable of earning roughly around £99,000 before tax.
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20 days off... thats £9k lost of pay. I've haven't taken a holiday in 2 years, I only break between contracts.
 
Dis86 said:
Like I said, half hour away is a city with plenty of it. Theatre. Art. Museums. Music. All there.
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But not of the same quality and diversity of what's available in London. The cutting edge of food, music, theatre and art is in London.
 
Tunney said:
But not of the same quality and diversity of what's available in London. The cutting edge of food, music, theatre and art is in London.
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True. But here's the thing...you can visit London for those special things that can't be had here. Plus we get most of what London does just a little bit later.
 
I'd happily move further out and commute if/when I want to start a family - at the moment I'm quite happy with my flat and London life - 15 to 20 mins on the train for work, gym, doctors surgery, Tesco metro on site, communal gardens, park 100 meters away with public tennis courts.. always stuff on

sure other large cities have fun events too but there just isn't the variety - pop up cinemas, restaurants etc.. sure other palaces have a few theaters London has the west end and numerous small productions in theaters above pubs etc..

I've got no particular bias towards the place - I'm not originally from London and have spent several years living in three other large UK cities, London simply does have much more to offer and if you're earning a good wage it is a fantastic place to live while you're single.
 
Dis86 said:
True. But here's the thing...you can visit London for those special things that can't be had here. Plus we get most of what London does just a little bit later.
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And that works out great for you and many other people. However, not everyone has the same priorities in life. Not everyone cares about the great outdoors, or at least doesn't mind jumping on the train for an hour to get there.

Moses said:
There's the vast majority of the cutting edge of food in terms of Michelin star stuff, but does the average professional ever go to those places?
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Again, the appeal is diversity. Yes, that's lot of great Michelin star restaurants but there's also great street food. London is also now home to a lot of fantastic breweries.
 
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I'm not selling anything, simply stating the different people want different things out of life. Some want a pint of real ale, some want a pint of American-style double IPA. And there's nothing wrong with either.
 
Tunney said:
I'm not selling anything, simply stating the different people want different things out of life. Some want a pint of real ale, some want a pint of American-style double IPA. And there's nothing wrong with either.
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And what we're stating is you don't have to live in London to get those things. Believe me, I lived there for 15 years! There is nothing that was available there that I can't get here. As you say there may be less variety in some aspects but there are on the other hand many things you can get here that you cannot get in London.
 
Having grown up in London then moving away for career reasons and buying a house in the north east, it shocks me when I look at house prices in the south east. The country is far too south east centric and something needs to be done to address it. I don't think I'll ever move back unless inheritance kicks in y0.

Also - I love London but it sucks because of beer prices. Just saying.

[on topic]Split the rent per room, bills per person. If your housemates don't agree to it then they're not the sort of people I'd want to live with.[/on topic]
 
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