They only changed the house packs to being introduced in August in the last day or two - they were planned for next week.

The change to 4 bed only houses is new too - it was all houses until a few hours ago.

These packs are a pain in the ass for a seller and probably will never happen now after the last few hours (Gordon Brownw will probably scrap them) but they are for the buyer.

they have very little impact on buyers at all, the seller foots all the costs

While the seller pays for them the buyer benefits - you seem to think that it only effects the person who pays for them.  Thats incorrect.  The pack is like a mini survey on the property but most usefully of all it ensures that the plans and paperwork filed with the local council and the land registry is correct.  Im sick of being halfway through a purchase and then the council finding some obsolete planning application and then dragging its heals. Its only happened twice but its so frustrating that that sort of thing is nt already sorted that the pack is worth it for that alone.  These silly paperwork issues can turn a 1 month house purchase into a 4 month wait.  If youre buying property in order to move in quickly or have a schedule for renovation and then 3 weeks is lost to sorting out the sellers paperwork then you quickly see why the packs are a good idea.

Whether right or wrong Im a buyer - I was waiting for the packs.  If any noticebale percentage of the buying population did the same then the point stands.



Regarding markets, Im in is Newcastle which is a fair way from London and properties are still shifting on the day they come on the market to cash buyers - so its ok up here.  Less than in the past but it was out of control for a year or two.  It can hardly be described as flat up here...  Sister just sold in Manchester - went nearly instantly.  So two northern cities seem ok at least.

I would love to swap into your market if its really that slow as that would be ideal for buyers.  Unfortunately its a sellers market here right now.

yeah - we had an outstanding compulsory purchase order from like 15 years earlier on one house and the other was because neither house either side of a shared wall officially owned it on the plans.  Youve got to think these houses have changed hands several ties in the last 15 years and it should have been sorted by the previous owners but no.  It should be the house owners responsibility to make sure the documents on the house are correct.

those buyer packs are worth it just so the buyer doesnt have to sort out the paperwork.  They shouldnt cost £1000 (or whatever silly amounts they were quoting originally), it should literally just be the land registry search and a document from the council saying the purchase deeds and paperwork is all in order.  Would have been a better solution than trying to bring it in later, only for 4+ bed houses and all these last minute alterations.  Theyre just going to end up killing it off in its current form but the original idea of the packs was a good one.

Well, that just got more complicated.

Im thinking 100% mortgage (raising 5% whilst renting might be a problem for us), 2 years interest only payments, over 35 years. Sound good?

Well be looking for around 125k, although 149k would buy a house Ive seen that I would die for  :mrgreen:

you will get a better rate @ 95%
You can raise the other 5% by getting a gift from the seller (say the £150k house will sell to you for £142.5k - 5% below the asking price... a good brooker will work it out for you

Our mortgage company based the value of the house on what the survey/valuation said that THEY got done, regardless of what we paid for it...

We did however pay £124999 which helped avoid stamp duty using a similar "gift" idea..

You just give them a bit of cash to reduce the actual contract value below a threshold which can massively reduce stamp duty.

IE < 250,000 its 1% so rather than buy at 259,000 you might do 249,999 and 10k in cash.

a vendor gifted deposit is what egg is talking about

basically it works like this

you are looking at a notional property valued at 100k and you want to make an offer in the 95k region. You agree with the vendor that you will pay 95k, but the total price will be 100k on paper, the 5k difference will be vendor gifted, so this will count as your deposit for mortgage purposes, allowing you to go for deals at 95% ltv or better.

Thats basically it. You & vendor agree 95K Price
On Mortgage App, your paying 100k.
This is made up off 95K (95%) mortgage & 5k (5%) Vendor Gift...

its a housing bubble at the moment, which cannot go on forever. There hasnt been an economic bubble in history which hasnt burst in a spectacular fashion. Yet I hear endless panglossian drivel about how house prices will keep rising in value endlessly. Think VERY carefully about signing up for any deal with is going to put you in 6 figure debt. a 100% mortgage (and banks are rapidly withdrawing these deals, another ominous sign), gives you absolutely no leeway against negative equity.

I doubt there would be too much of a crash - more of a dip and then slower than inflation growth. Though getting a 100% mortgage is a bit silly at a time when interest rates are on the increase. Some people are too leveraged though - quite a few might well end up in negative equity and I reckon a few of the buy to let landlords could go bust if the property market took a bit of a dip.

Few things to consider Goldman Sachs recently agreed to sell its London HQ and rent it back. Swiss Re have done the same with the Gherkin. Also the owner of Foxtons is looking to sell. There are certainly some fairly switched on people calling the top of the London Housing market this year (though that isnt to say they are predicting a crash more that they feel that the rapid growth we have seen so far is slowing and they want to cash in.)