“First Time Buyer Series”

Safety Nest – a ‘Plan B’ for First Time Buyers

Landmark events in life are some of the most thrilling and exciting times!  Becoming a First Time Buyer certainly qualifies for this particular award.  But as with most things in life, it often pays to have a Plan B.  And certainly, the conveyancing process in England means that having a Safety Nest – a Plan B for First Time Buyers is recommended.

As with many other big steps, you might feel as if you are operating without a safety net and that if anything went wrong you might not have any options to fall back on.

Thankfully your first property purchase is most likely to work out fine.  If you’ve done your research, agreed a First Time Buyer mortgage with a good interest rate, chosen the right property and got all of the arrangements in place, then things should go smoothly. You can find out all the details you need to know in our Guide for First Time Buyers.

Even so, it’s always good to have a back-up scenario ready and waiting, a ‘Plan B’ that can launch into action just in case you need it.

Why would you need a ‘Plan B’?

There’s an old saying “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. No matter how carefully a project is planned, something may still go wrong with it”.  This is one that I’ve come to appreciate as an experienced estate agent. Sometimes something beyond your control can come along and derail your carefully arranged timetable and put everything in chaos.  For example, something like a novel Coronavirus global pandemic followed by the complete shutdown of the property industry for instance!

Many people who were expecting to complete property deals and make moves in the spring of 2020 had to put their plans, and their lives, on hold through no fault of their own or of anyone else involved in the process.

It’s a great example of how things do sometimes happen out of the blue and why you should really always try to ‘expect the unexpected’ when it comes to buying a new home.

Safety Nest

There are plenty of much more mundane real life scenarios that make having a backup plan a good idea too. Some First Time Buyers will be moving in with a partner they haven’t actually lived with before, and things might not always work out on a personal level. Others could find that their new dream home falls short of expectations in some way that they hadn’t anticipated, for instance making a commute longer.

So what could you do if this happened to you? Would your parents welcome you back temporarily to their ’empty nest’.  If so, might a younger sibling have already taken your old room? Or might your parents have repurposed it  into a completely different space (like a new home office)? Anyone moving out of rented accommodation would most likely find flatmates had found a replacement, or landlords a new tenant.

Obviously every First Time Buyer’s situation will be different in all sorts of ways.  There’s no ‘one size fits all’ solution. All you can really do is have an awareness that sometimes things don’t always go to plan.  Justifiably, it can be a good idea to have some kind of emergency scenario solution up your sleeve.

For professional property advice for local high street agents, Callaways, call 01273-735237 or enquiries@callaways.co.uk.