Home / Observations

As I write this, in late 2007, we're almost at the end of the tortuous process that is moving house. This being the first real move, house to house, that my family have ever done, I wanted to record some observations and hopefully give others a heads-up on what to expect and what to watch out for.

The biggest general tips I can pass on are to be patient, even if things go incredibly smoothly, it will still take at least three months from starting to look for a new house to moving in. And usually the process takes over four months. Ouch.

And to be aware of the sheer expense involved. Never mind finding the extra money for a new, bigger home. There will be stamp duty (in the UK, at least), usually 3% of the purchase price of your new home, going straight to the government. It's daylight robbery, but I've tried complaining to the Chancellor of the Exchequer (no, really, I did, and got a letter back!) but got absolutely nowhere. So, on a typical £300,000 house, the government want £9,000 - for doing absolutely nothing. Grrr... On top of stamp duty, there's solicitors fees, typically about £1200 (for both buying and selling), the estate agent's cut of your own house sale, usually 1.5%, so say £3,500, removal firm expenses, also about £1000, and setup fees for your mortgage, also up to about £1,000. So that's a minimum of £15,500 and, in the real world, it's best to allow more and assume there will be extra, incidental expenses - because you can bet your bottom dollar that there will be...

Read on to my huge Tips page, Checklists and Useful web resources.

All text on this site (C) Steve Litchfield

Site updated Dec 2007