Tomorrow

[jmo21]

You care to come and try? Otherwise, WTF are you on about?

3 bedroom semi-detached house to rent in Morton Way, London, N14, N14

That's a 3 bed semi, miles outside of Central London.

Rent per year, £21.6k

Add council tax, that's £23k.

Add commuting costs + buying your lunch each day in central London, that's £30k

Add gas, electricity and phone bill, that's £32k.

All POST TAX outgoings. For a SINGLE person.

Now, how much would you have left over from that PRE TAX £60k salary for a full years work? S.F.A, that's how much.

Working in London for £60k salary is fooking pointless.

Oh, and just in case you wanted to buy a very small three bed semi - try finding £500k+. Again, this is N14, miles outside of central London. In central London - double that amount.

Why would a single person rent a 3 bed house? kids coming to visit?

Friends of ours recently bought a 3 bed semi for about 200k, 30mins tube ride south of the Thames, can't remember where exactly but they are pretty happy about the area etc.

Just a quick example, with not much details I know, but surely it can be done?

[oliverson]

Why would a single person rent a 3 bed house? kids coming to visit?

Friends of ours recently bought a 3 bed semi for about 200k, 30mins tube ride south of the Thames, can't remember where exactly but they are pretty happy about the area etc.

Just a quick example, with not much details I know, but surely it can be done?

Bed 1 - main bedroom
Bed 2 - friends/relatives visiting
Bed 3 - home office

That sounds like it can't be in a decent area to me. It's too cheap.

I commuted in from West Sussex for a couple of years. The train ride was said to be around 50 mins but it always took an hour or more into London Bridge or Victoria. Then you have the inevitable transfer to one or more tubes and some kind of walk from the tube station to the client site. Forgot about the journey from my home to the train station btw. All in all a 50 min 'on paper' commute in became 1 hour 45 each way. So, it's early to bed and early to rise. By contrast, staying in central London and it's 08:00 alarm clock and late nights (sometimes).

[redgiant]

Bed 1 - main bedroom
Bed 2 - friends/relatives visiting
Bed 3 - home office

That sounds like it can't be in a decent area to me. It's too cheap.

I commuted in from West Sussex for a couple of years. The train ride was said to be around 50 mins but it always took an hour or more into London Bridge or Victoria. Then you have the inevitable transfer to one or more tubes and some kind of walk from the tube station to the client site. Forgot about the journey from my home to the train station btw. All in all a 50 min 'on paper' commute in became 1 hour 45 each way. So, it's early to bed and early to rise. By contrast, staying in central London and it's 08:00 alarm clock and late nights (sometimes).

Life is full of compromises. A two bedroom place would probably suit you fine and probably means you can live closer to central for less rent.

I live in a decent area in zone 2 and can get to Bishopsgate in under 30mins (door to door).

[nomadd]

Why would a single person rent a 3 bed house? kids coming to visit?

1 room for friends + family stopping over.

1 other room for gym kit + office.

Plus a house gives you a garden for Summer. And a driveway and garage (two motorbikes and usually one or two cars, in my case.)

Besides, who wants to live their life in a dingy flat, surrounded by loud stereo-playing neighbours all night

Friends of ours recently bought a 3 bed semi for about 200k, 30mins tube ride south of the Thames, can't remember where exactly but they are pretty happy about the area etc.

Just a quick example, with not much details I know, but surely it can be done?

Nope, it can't be done. Here's a c-r-a-p terrace in Peckham, of "Only fools and horses" fame: note the pricetag (3.5 times what you quoted): 4 bedroom end of terrace house for sale in Ondine Road, Peckham Rye, SE15, SE15

Still, if you think it can be done for £200k, in a decent area just 30 minutes tube ride, I suggest you buy a few million quids worth of property; and then sell it for £500k-600k a pop the following day. You be a very rich man overnight.

If your friends are serious, then get them to show a few similar 3 bed-semis in this location on Rightmove for £200k, as I love to see them.

[Lewis]

Nope, it can't be done. Here's a c-r-a-p terrace in Peckham, of "Only fools and horses" fame: note the pricetag (3.5 times what you quoted): 4 bedroom end of terrace house for sale in Ondine Road, Peckham Rye, SE15, SE15

I know that area well, I think you'll find that house is effecitvely in East Dulwich. An area in which house prices have gone up hugely in the last decade, it is v. close to Lordship Lane which is very popular and East Dulwich train station (short commute into City) plus it has all the private Dulwich schools (Alleyn's, JAGS, Dulwich College etc.). Without sounding like an estate agent it is far from c-r-a-p and absolutely nothing like "Only Fools and Horses" - That Peckham is quite a few miles away!

A house on a Peckham estate wouldn't be close to that price and there are plently of cheaper areas around East Duwlich.

[GillsMan]

I currently live in South Norwood and live in a 2 bed house paying £900pcm rent. 7 minute walk to the station and trains take 11-15 minutes to get into London Bridge. Often, I cycle into work (10 miles, takes me 45 minutes door-to-door). Before this, I lived literally 30 seconds walk from London City Airport DLR station. 25 minutes into Bank tube. This was a 2 bed flat for £900pcm. You definitely do not need to earn £60K to live in London as a single person, even if you want to live in a relatively OK area.

[ChimpMaster]

Nomadd didn't you say you had been contracting in the City for years? Why didn't you just buy a house - anywhere within a hour's commute of the office? I live out towards Heathrow and I can make it into Bank in just over an hour: a decent 3 bed semi could be had for £250k here.

Renting is a black hole for your money. You're living away from home only because you are contracting away from home, and the point of contracting should be to maximize your profits - not live luxuriously on company income! Yes I know there's a work/life balance but then you should have bought a house, especially as you knew all your (higher paid) work was in London.

Maybe I'm getting the wrong end of the stick here, but long-term renting is for suckers. I should know, I've got plenty of tenants.

[nomadd]

Nomadd didn't you say you had been contracting in the City for years? Why didn't you just buy a house - anywhere within a hour's commute of the office? I live out towards Heathrow and I can make it into Bank in just over an hour: a decent 3 bed semi could be had for £250k here.

Renting is a black hole for your money. You're living away from home only because you are contracting away from home, and the point of contracting should be to maximize your profits - not live luxuriously on company income! Yes I know there's a work/life balance but then you should have bought a house, especially as you knew all your (higher paid) work was in London.

Maybe I'm getting the wrong end of the stick here, but long-term renting is for suckers. I should know, I've got plenty of tenants.

Not really a debate for this forum.

Post the above as a new thread on HPC.co.uk and we'll get into a serious debate.

And I mean that, genuine offer.

[ChimpMaster]

Not really a debate for this forum.

Post the above as a new thread on HPC.co.uk and we'll get into a serious debate.

And I mean that, genuine offer.

Yes but you've been renting for 9 years, isn't that right? At £20k per year, that's £180k you've paid in rent when instead you could have been paying down your own mortgage. Do you expect house prices to crash that much?

I'm not having a go, I'm just trying to understand. Maybe I'm missing a point and could learn something.

[nomadd]

Yes but you've been renting for 9 years, isn't that right? At £20k per year, that's £180k you've paid in rent when instead you could have been paying down your own mortgage. Do you expect house prices to crash that much?

I'm not having a go, I'm just trying to understand. Maybe I'm missing a point and could learn something.

My rent is less than a third of what you've quoted. Read the entire thread to understand the context of the comments made. My rent is spectacularly cheap for where I live. The rent I quoted was based on someone wanting to move to London now; they wouldn't have access to the sort of deal I have. My current housing costs are less than 1/12th of my "take home pay" after tax as a contractor.

A mortgage over the same term - the 9 years you quote - would have cost me substantially more than the rent I've paid. And even housing HPI over that period wouldn't have made up the difference (Hint: my savings from contracting will hit seven figures - post-tax - by the end of this year; so a mortgage will never be an issue for me.)

And now, we find ourselves at the tail-end of the biggest housing boom in history. Outside of London - and even in N14 where I live - prices are falling. So I'm happy to stick with the dirt cheap rent deal for 5 years more, as prices are falling faster than my rent (and a mortgage at this point in time would mean even higher loses, as well as the capital loss.) I think prices will continue to decline here and elsewhere across the UK over the next few years. Other may feel free to disagree; as I say, that's a topic for a better forum for this type of subject.

Also, I don't like London (at all) enough to ever want to own a house here!

EDIT: Just posted today: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/ar...=feeds-newsxml