SAVING for your first home requires making big sacrifices – and for Yasmin Fisher and her husband Richard, that meant selling both their cars and swapping them for cheaper ones.
Although teacher Yasmin, 30, and her husband Richard, 32, gave up the flash cars they loved, it meant they had nearly all the money they needed to put down a deposit to secure their £255,000 first home.
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The couple made a total of £10,500 from flogging their motors and were left with £8,000 after buying replacement old bangers – a big wedge of the £12,750 deposit needed for their four-bed house in Essex.
It wasn’t the only thing they gave up in order to bag their dream home.
Yasmin put her designer handbags, straighteners and electronics on eBay and Facebook Marketplace to raise an extra £1,500.
They also used TopCashback to pocket £800, and switched supermarkets from Morrisons to Lidl to save a whopping £120 a month on their groceries.
The couple were lucky to secure their home with just a 5% deposit, as they signed their mortgage deal just two days before the country was plunged into lockdown in March last year.
Following that, Brits struggled to even get a property with just a 10% deposit, as nervous lenders pulled funding as Covid wrecked havoc across the nation.
Yasmin and Richard took out a mortgage of £242,250 and their mortgage repayments are £868 per month.
They are both basic rate taxpayers.
They were lucky enough to receive a little bit of help from their parents, who put £1,200 towards fitting our their new kitchen.
We sat down with Yasmin to discuss how the couple kept on track while saving for their home for The Sun’s My First Home series.
Tell me about your house
It’s a detached four bed house in Tendring, Essex in a nice quiet cul de sac.
We have two bathrooms, a separate lounge, and an open plan kitchen and dining room.
There’s also a downstairs loo.
We have an average-sized garden with a decking area where we put the dining set.
We bought a do-er upper to get the right size house we were looking for.
How did you decide on the location?
We used to live in a new build flat for six years in the local area – and we were sick of living in a new property.
We wanted something older so we could put our stamp on it – and get more for our money.
Where we live is perfect location-wise – it’s near work as well as friends and family.
We saw the house pop up on Rightmove at the start 2020, and went for a viewing in February a month later, putting an offer in straight away.
How much did you pay for it?
The house cost £255,000 in total, and we took out a 35-year mortgage of £242,250 on a fixed rate for two years at 2%.
We only had to put down a £12,750 deposit for it – we were lucky to get the house with such a low deposit.
Our offer on the house was accepted at the end of February last year, and we signed off the mortgage just two days before Boris Johnson announced the country was going into lockdown.
Almost straight away, mortgage lenders started to pull 95% loan-to-value mortgages because the property market came to a standstill.
It meant we got our mortgage on just a 5% deposit by the skin of our teeth – we were very lucky on timings.
Our mortgage repayments are £868 per month, and we moved into our home in June last year.
How did you save for it?
It took a year and a half to save up enough money for the house – and for doing it up.
Selling our cars and old clothes, bags and electronics helped us pay for the majority of the deposit needed.
We were paying a lot on our cars each month. I was paying £275 per month for my car, plus £200 a month in fuel, while my partner was paying £230 for his and £50 filling it up.
We decided to sell the cars and get cheaper, older ones instead.
I sold mine for £6,500, while he got £4,000 for his.
It meant we got £10,500 in total – but had to spend £2,500 getting two new ones.
That meant in total, we got £8,000 which we put towards the deposit.
I also made around £1,500 from selling my old things on eBay and Facebook Marketplace.
I got £80 for my straighteners, £150 for a Michael Kors handbag, £70 for a Ted Baker handbag, and £200 for selling my old iPhone.
Then, I used TopCashback to get a total of £800 back on my shopping.
I would use the site to buy every single Christmas and birthday present I needed to buy, and used it to renew my home insurance too.
The biggest amount of money I made was by changing my energy supplier through the website – I got £165 in cash back just by swapping.
We also cut our budgets for luxuries in half from £400 to £200 a month.
I stopped getting my nails, hair and eyelashes done as much, and we massively cut down on going for meals and drinks out.
Shopping in Lidl also helped us to save £120 a month on groceries.
Before, we shopped at Morrisons and were spending £60 a week on food.
But we swapped to Lidl and spent just £30.
How have you afforded to furnish your house?
Because our deposit was so low, it allowed us to save more money for doing up our home.
It needed work doing to it, so we had to make sure we had enough savings to give it a makeover.
We did get a little bit of help from our parents – they paid £1,200 towards our new kitchen, which was really generous of them.
We saved even more money by getting a friend of ours to fit the kitchen.
A professional builder came in and quoted us £19,000 to supply and fit our new kitchen.
But that was way too much money – so we bought one from B&Q for £5,200 and paid our friend £1,800 to fit it out.
We’ve also saved around £2,000 from upcycling our old furniture.
We were renting a new build flat for £600 a month before we bought our new place, so we already had a bed, dressing table, wardrobe and cabinets.
Instead of buying new ones, we painted them all light grey and bought some new nobs from Amazon for £20 for a pack of 10.
The only things we bought for new were our sofas.
We also sold a lot of things that the previous owner left behind for us – we made £600 in total from this.
The seller left an oak dining table and chairs, washing machine, tumble dryer, and cooker, among other things.
The money we got from selling all these items helped pay for our carpets.
What’s your advice to other first time buyers?
My advice would be to see a broker.
We didn’t realise how much we could actually borrow and that we could get a house with such a low deposit.
We thought you could only buy a house with a 5% deposit on new build properties.
As soon as you get paid, put aside a certain amount of money straight into your savings.
If you feel demotivated, keep looking on Rightmove – it helps to keep your goal in mind.
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