Dom Davis (The Blog)

Aft deciding that We Are Going To Rent we promptly had second thoughts. Renting is a pain. It means we could have to move twice in quick succession, which sucks at the best of times, but with a small one in tow is going to be even worse and I just hate the fact that I can do things to the house. That said it’s a temporary measure and I will live pretty much anywhere as long as I have a few basic things¹.

Buying is also awkward. We’re in a God awful limbo whereby tens of thousands of pounds are tied up in other property and yet more money will be coming… at some point². If I could release all of that and go buy somewhere tomorrow we’d be laughing. But we can’t and actual money available for a deposit is small and may need to be used to make Little Cottage fit to rent.

So, our options are:

• Do nothing. Stay in a 1 bedroom house with a little one who lives in the living room.
• Rent and wait for a deposit to either arrive or be saved before buying.
• Buy something cheap temporarily, possibly pushing the budget so we could be asking parents for money if we don’t have rental income one month.
• Sell Little Cottage, almost certainly at a slight loss, but somewhere new with the money that unlocks.
• Sell everything (for a big loss), go buy something (ironically smaller than if we just sold Little Cottage due to lost money) and no longer have multiple mortgages to deal with.
• Sell everything, do a runner, enjoy a year abroad before returning home destitute.

I don’t think selling my flat is really an option so well take that off the table. We’ll know more about the rental and sale potential of Little Cottage on Thursday and in the mean time we’ll just have to continue scouring the rental and property markets. The only thing I assure of from the entire process is that what the meticulous spreadsheet I’ve put together says I should have left in my account each month and what I do have left in the account don’t match. I need to curb my spending :S

¹ Internet, somewhere to set up and play on the play station, that kind of thing
² With some point supposedly last August but actually being any time between tomorrow and… well, whenever really. Could be years.