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Home Buying Help & Advice

So you are home buying , have found some suitable a properties . You've contacted prospective lenders and have an approved mortgage application and made a mortgage offer.. Until recently when you bought a home with the aid of a mortgage or other secured loan you were entitled to somehelp with income tax relief on the interest under the MIRAS scheme - this ended April 2000 when housing tax relief was abolished .

Buying a house is therefore more expensive today than ever professional advice is more necessary than ever - and with mortgage interest rates slowly on the up it is getting tougher for new borrowers .
We have listed here some of the best mortgage advice sites
While the mortgage cost may be the largest expense in buying a property, it is by no means the only expense you will incur . Your mortgage lender will require a home valuation survey to be carried out before you buy to ensure the property is actually worth enough to cover the mortgage you are trying to borrow. It's in your interest to have a more detailed structural survey as well which may disclose structural defects which may not affect the mortgage offer but could put you off buying. Some home lenders no longer insist on mortgage indemnity insurance (mig). However, in most cases, if your mortgage or re-mortgage is a big proportion of the total value of the property, say 95% or more then you may be required to pay addtiionally for a mortgage indemnity guarantee. This insurance does not cover you directly , istead , it covers your mortgage lender against fiancial losses should your home be repossessed . You get no benefit from this policy but you do have to pay for it. Stamp duty may also be unexpected for first time buyers . If the property you are going to buy costs less than £60,000 there is no duty to pay but as very few properies other than auctioned propeties are available on the housing market at this price you will probably not be stamp tax exempt . If the property costs more, there will be a bill starting at 1% of the toal value of the property ! You should also consider taking out a mortgage protection policy or income protection policy . Under the regime introduced in 1995 state help for homeowners who run into difficulties with their mortgage repayments was slashed . Mortgage protection policies pay a monthly sum which you can set yourself to cover the interest on your mortgage, interest and capital or you can include the endowment premium as well and perhaps even some monthly household bills such as buildings insurance and water rates. Exact policy terms will vary but in general the policies will require you to have been in continuous employment between three and six months before purchasing the insurance and you will be unable to make a claim on the policy until it has run for a set period, usually three months. It is unlikely that you will find a policy which will pay out for more than two years at most. Policy costs vary from around £7 per £100 down to £3.50 per £100 for cut-price policies which provide limited cover.
If you're buying a second-hand property ( and most of us do ) you may be concerned about the risk of land subsidence . But before you panic about that crack that's appeared in the wall , remember many small cracks happen naturally as home age . They most likely do not require expensive repairs and should not spell disaster . Subsidence depends on the soil on which a house is built and on the age of the property . Those built before 1960 are likely to be more vulnerable to slippage because foundations tend to be shallower. New houses and recently finished properties should have a NHBC  Warranty . The National House Building Council ( NHBC ) is a non-profit making body with a register of around 25,000 professional builders and housing developers . NHBC inspectors examine new properties and , providing the builder is registered and the property meets specific standards drawn up by the NHBC , they will issue a certificate of sound construction . This offers substantial insurance protection against any building faults or structural defects for a time period of 10 years up to a maximum liability of the original purchase price adjusted to take account of inflation . If you can't find your dream home or have specific housing requirements , you could always self build it or contract it out  ! Almost 20,000 people around the country every year cut out the middle-man and build their own homes but you donıt have to be an expert bricklayer or plasterer -most so-called self-builders employ someone else to do the actual construction . Completed self-build homes are often valued at a third to a half more than the total outlay for land , labour and materials. Furthermore, you can claim MIRAS ( until April 2000 ) , though only if you have owned the land for no more than six months when you take out the housing loan . Final note if you are buying a brand new house , you may reclaim the Value added Tax ( VAT ) on materials and labour on the construction of the house , provided you do so within three months of completion -this can amount to several thousand pounds you will get back!

Be aware - rip off britain - if you build without planning permission or not in the place agreed , you could be legally forced to demolish the property and lose everything !

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