Homebuy Scheme

[CheGuevara]

Anyone here done it?

My wife and I have got buying or first home on our minds, so that we can get busy with starting a family. We can afford the mortgage on good size place in our area, but it's saving the deposit in a short span of time that's the killer. And then I stumbled across the homebuy scheme...

There's a house a block away from where we live now that's 5br and has a double garage (I'm in love!). The problem is that from what I've read, they allow you one extra bedroom over your current needs. Well that'd make for a tiny 2br place and not worth our time. As-is we rent a 3br and find it a bit cramped. We hope to knock out a couple of kidlets in short order and have a pretty large family overseas (a total of 5 parents, 7 siblings, plus inlaws and neices/nephews that we need space for so they can visit (especially once kidlets arrive). We're also desperate for some home office space.

Anyhow I'm just wondering if anyone has any experience with the scheme and knows if they're reasonably flexible in considering those sorts of needs, or if it's strictly by the book?

[Mr Speirs]

I think it's strictly by the book. The scheme does look really good and something I will consider down the line. Worth phoning up though?

[CheGuevara]

I've rung the devlopers to arrange to see the place, and they're going to get a rep to ring us up. Was hoping to get a rough expectation before speaking to them though. I suppose it depends on how they define our current needs. From my perspective I need more space than we already have, and that's before adding mini-me's.

Here's the place we have an eye on:

http://www.redrow.co.uk/assets/uploa..._floorplan.pdf

spooky.. I've just closed a Homebuy info page, opened the forum and stumbled upon your post...
Let us know how you get on with the scheme as it is definitely something me and my lovely other half would consider

[hindle8907]

Interesting thanks i think me and my partner will be interested in this too.

[CheGuevara]

A rep from Homebuy Direct is supposed to ring us this eve, so if I get any useful info I'll post it up. I'm not optomistic about our chances of qualifying for a place suitably large, but I'll definitely put my best case to them

[dyzio]

Is that scheme for England only? Or have I looked at a wrong website?

[CheGuevara]

Originally Posted by dyzio

Is that scheme for England only? Or have I looked at a wrong website?

Not sure, but I'm looking here:

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/HomeAndC...emes/index.htm

And specifically at this scheme:

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/HomeAndC...emes/DG_171504

[CheGuevara]

Right some positive news. Just got off the phone with the guy, who it turns out is a mortgage broker or something (I'll have his exact role when he emails me some forms) with experience in this scheme and of course with these developers.

He did a quick estimate and figures we should easily qualify for more than the amount we need. A quick check shows a rate of 4.89% fixed for 2 years (better than I had assumed). He say's there's only about 3 lenders participating in the scheme (RBS, Halifax I think, and one other I've forgotten).

On the subject of space/requirements: I told him our situation - married, wanting to start a family right away (min 2 kids), need a home office, plus a spare room for the plethora of visiting family (they'd have no excuse now!). He said there is some wiggle room for those sorts of situations -it's not strictly a case of "married couple currently with zero kids qualify's only for a 2br or 3br..."

This could happen quite quickly really! And we thought it'd be end of the year before we had saved enough for a decent deposit on a much cheaper/smaller home. Roll-on double garage!

Originally Posted by CheGuevara

Roll-on double garage!

...for the double pram