Moving to Brighton

So, we start renting and as if that is the magic catalyst the Estate Agent comes back to us and we agree on a lower price for the property in Brighton. We exchanged last week (anyone beat an exchange from offer acceptance within 13 days!) and complete in Mid-Jan. A nice quick turnaround, not si sure what to do about the 6 month rental contract we are now commited to though. Let's hope we have a very understanding landlord!

 

So, by the time we are living down in sunny Brighton we will have almost completed a year of selling, finding and completing...inthat time a lot has happened in the market in general. How we bought at the wrong time? No.....we need somewhere to live and if we are there for the long term then we should ride out any small dips. No point sitting around for years on end waiting for the marke to recover - life's too short!

Well, thought I would update on the current state of affairs. We did indeed complete on the sale of our place at the beginning of October. With the market seemingly unpredictable we have decided to rent for 6 months in London (from next week). It will give us a chance to have some fun with friends again without having to worry about catching that last train home. Bliss.

 

We will still be looking in Brighton, but this period of rental just takes a little bit of pressure off things. Living with family in recent weeks, whilst the best solution does have its downsides..we're practically living out of a suitcase! 

 

So Brighton.....eventually, but who know's what's going to happen in this market. I don't think it's going to go up, and I'm not sure it will go down by much, but then again if I was always acurate with my predictions I'd be a millionaire! 

Well, sale and purchase seem to be going through smoothly, fingers crossed. It's just taken a while. Had the survey on our place doen in Brighton, which has thrown up a few spanners, so having the damp/woodwoorm people as well as an electrician look over it. Hopefully nothing to serious there.

 

Other than that, keeping one eye on the housing market / mortgage rates, which to be honest don't provide much reason to smile. It would be just our luck to be buying at the top of the market and fix ourselves in to a  high interest rate! Then I could be wrong. If you read the papers they all tell a differerent story anyway!

Well, not much of a blogger am I - a whole 6 weeks of radio silence. 

 

To be fair, not that much has happened. We have endured a typical English summer of rain and more rain (arguably worse than in normal years!) and there has been a glut of good property on the market as people have made their seasonal rush abroad (not bloomin' suprising!)

 

So we have been down to Brighton on several occasions looking at pretty average property that didn't quite fit our spec. Until recently that is! We have just had first refusal on a property we looked at back in March. We couldn't put in a serious offer then, but we can now. So, we went in at the offer of the previous buyers and have had it accepted. So we're both very pleased with ourselves. It's on the right road and only 10 mins from the station. 4 bedrooms as well. However, whilst it is a nice Victorian terraced property like all the others on the street, we have to say that is is has the most ugly dormer window we have ever seen. It's about the size of a small conservatory bottled on the roof in some grotesque fashion.  

 

We will upload some photos to proudly display our 'ugly duckling' in due course. Meanwhile is the property market finally turning, could we be buying at the top?   

Well after the excitement of accepting an offer we are now preparing ouselves for the long haul of finding somewhere we like. We, or rather I have always managed to find places not quite right for us in the past andthis time we want to get it exactly right. However we are right on the limit of being able to afford a 3 bed in Brighton, so we will have to be lucky with what we find.

 

There is also a distinct lack of any properties with our spec in the area we are looking. We even did a letter drop at the weekend on some of our favoured roads, so it will be intersting to see if we get any response. So please cross you fingers for us!

 

The sale of our house is proceeding okay so far. Looks likely there will be a gap between selling our place and buying the next so we are going to need to speak to our mortgage company to sort out 'porting' the mortgage. Bit of a pain as we will have to pay the redemption fee up front (over £7k!) and then we will get it back once we resume the mortgage when we move into the next place. We'll be in for a shock in April when our two year period ends. Don't think we'll be getting the 4.59% we've been enjoying up until now!

 

Hoping for some interesting properties to come our way this week. If they do we'll stick them up!