I recently bought a house after years of renting, and let me tell you, it’s the best thing I ever did. If I’m honest, I’ve been hoping to own for years, but circumstances never seemed right. I went straight from maternity leave to becoming a student, then when I got my degree I became self employed.
These were all barriers to saving money and passing the affordability criteria to get my own place. Luckily things are a little different now and I was able to get a mortgage with my husband, even though I’m still self employed. It’s worthwhile checking out places like Ascot Mortgages who will be able to give advice on how much you can borrow and over what term.
We’ve been in our first house a year now and there are some massive positives I’ve noticed along the way. Here’s my faves.
No more waiting
When I rented, any issue I had with the house had to be reported to the estate agent, who told the landlord and the landlord would take an aged to fix it. In my last place we completely lost use of the back door and 6 months after we reported it, we moved out and it hadn’t even been looked at.
At our own house, our mixer tap for the shower stopped working. I ran a handyman and he had it back in action within two days. It’s such a treat being able to put things right as soon as they go wrong, without having to live with the fault for ages.
You can decorate how you like
We haven’t really got around to properly decorating, but we have big plans. My son wants a very dark green wall, my youngest daughter wants unicorn wallpaper, and my eldest daughter has covered every inch of her walls in Britpop posters – a landlord’s nightmare. But the best thing is, we can do all of those things and not worry about asking permission or being told off if we don’t.
Being able to decorate your home however you like is liberating. I just need to convince my husband the a pink stripey hallway would look cool.
It doesn’t matter when your kids do something weird to the walls
Okay, I didn’t say it’s not annoying, but its definitely not a problem. Since moving in, my youngest has had some mishaps with the walls. The first issue was she threw a squishy toy at a wall that had been painted with matte paint. Squishy toys leave an oily residue you can’t really get off matte paint, so that would have been an issue if we’d rented.
She also noticed a small gap in the wallpaper on the way upstairs. Her inquisitive nature got the better of her and she pulled it – ripping about 10 inches of it, snaking upwards. Not ideal, but no one is coming over to tell me off. We wanted to decorate the hall and landing anyway, so I might see if she’ll pull a bit more off to get us started.
These are the biggest benefits I’ve noticed since I bought, aside from the usual things like owning your home gives you a lot more security. I’m sure I’ll uncover even more positives the more years I’m here in my own little home.