Rent or buy?

BoomAM

BoomAM

BoomAM

Soldato
Joined
5 Jul 2003
Posts
16,206
Location
Atlanta, USA
Hi.
Im just weighing up moving out, and was wondering, apart from the main question of rent or buy, what other costs are involved?
Upto now i have:

- Gas.
- Water.
- Electric.
- TV Licence.
- Council Tax.
- Insurance.
- Internet. :p.
- Phone line.

Then theres unquantifyable costs, like food/drink (whats average per person?).

Now onto the main question: Rent or buy.
I havnt asked the bank how big of a morgage i can get yet, but going off the usual estimates (according to google), of 2-3x yearly income, that doesnt leave me enough to morgage a house realistically.
So, what im wondering, renting: Pros, cons, pitfalls & is it just a waste of money?

Thanks in advance all. :).
 
If you haven't got a reasonable deposit (I'd say about 10%), stick with renting and live as frugally as possible so you can save one. Bills and council tax can be included in the rent depending on what the owner stipulates. Look around, you appear to have plenty of time so no point taking the first thing you come across.
 
sr4470 said:
If you haven't got a reasonable deposit (I'd say about 10%), stick with renting and live as frugally as possible so you can save one. Bills and council tax can be included in the rent depending on what the owner stipulates. Look around, you appear to have plenty of time so no point taking the first thing you come across.
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Tbh, thats what i was thinking of doing, renting till a deposit can be saved.
But its been argued to me that renting is just wasted money as it doesnt go anywhere. Which is true, but unavoidable i'd have thought.
 
BoomAM said:
Tbh, thats what i was thinking of doing, renting till a deposit can be saved.
But its been argued to me that renting is just wasted money as it doesnt go anywhere. Which is true, but unavoidable i'd have thought.
Click to expand...

A large mortgage is going to cost more, because of the interest rate you'll be paying for having little or no deposit. Perhaps if you give us a rough idea of your location it would help :)
 
If the housing market is heading south, you're better off waiting until house prices have fallen.

Renting isn't a waste of money if you're going to save yourself £20,000 on a house in 2 years time.
 
BoomAM said:
But its been argued to me that renting is just wasted money as it doesnt go anywhere.
Click to expand...

Bit of a dumb argument though - its no more wasting money than servicing the interest on a mortgage is wasting money. You're simply paying for a service tbh.. and if you've not got a decent deposit then you may well waste more money in the long term buy buying now.
 
Renting is not always wasting money.

I chose to sell my house and rent for a year. The intention is to buy the house that we are currently renting.

In a year the rent has cost me £9000. The house value has gone down from £250k to £225k. So in this year I have avoided a £14k hit.

Just my circumstances and yours may be different but it is not always a bad thing to rent.
 
I rent a large flat in a good area of London (zone 3) with 3 mates, with all our bills, council tax, tv, broadband etc etc it works out at just over £500 a month each...bargain really consindering how much it would cost me a month to buy even the smallest of bedsits in a grotty area of london.

I'm still young and dont plan on settling down for a good few years, plenty of other countries to explore, so for me renting suits as i can up sticks easily and take any oppertunities that arrise....
 
We sold our house, made a tidy profit but decided to rent due to the costs involved with another mortgage.

Renting is not dead money imo. Think about it, you buy a house, find you dont like the area and especially at times like this, end up losing money on the house you bought.

My advice would be to rent in an area you may like, save the money you need and if after a few months/years you are dead set on the area then buy.

By then you will probably be in a better position financially and hopefully the economy might have pulled its finger out of its arse.
 
Hmm.
Will have to look more in-depth into renting.

To carry on from my first post, what other costs are there becides the rent?
 
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