The Costs of Buying a Home in Cardiff

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Estate agency fees

Property survey fees

Mortgage arrangement fees

Solicitor’s fees

Stamp duty

Mortgage broker fees

Removal fees

With purchasing a home, regardless of if you’re a First Time Buyer in Cardiff or have experience in this business before, you will understand how costly and stressful the process can be.

Buying and selling at the same time can make everything even more costly. Below is a list of the expenditures you will need to take into account when looking at your options in buying a new home.

What are the costs involved in buying a home?

Estate agency fees

If you are looking to sell a property, you will need to utilise the service of an estate agent.

The price of this can vary depending on which agents you approach, therefore, it’s good to do your research to find the best estate agents with a favourable price tag. There are online estate agents that are usually cheaper as they don’t have to keep up with costs of running an office.

You might be looking a more tailored and accessible service and are not too concerned about fees as these usually require to pay an extra 1-2% of the price of your sale.

Normally, the fees are negotiable, in particular, those in a “seller’s market”. This usually means that agents are fighting to your instruction because of the lack of houses on the property market.

Property survey fees

In the process of taking out a mortgage, the lender needs information on whether the property is worth the amount that you’re paying for it. You may in the fortunate situation where your lenders offers you a free service. however, they may not send you a copy of the report.

In some cases, the lender may not offer a free valuation, therefore, you may need to pay a few hundred pounds for the costs of one. If you are looking to upgrade your property survey to a more detailed Homebuyer’s Report.

With the more high end surveys, these will be more expensive option and you can expect to pay a four-figure sum for those types of survey.

Each survey varies in terms of what it details, therefore, it’s best to have an insight on the types and which one is best for you. For more information about this, speak to your Mortgage Advisor in Cardiff who will advise you and help you choose the best type for you.

A situation where a more detailed survey should be carried out is if you have a property that is old or not in the best shape structurally. From this, you can have insight on whether anything needs repairing or replacing when it comes to move in.

Get in touch with our team today where we can connect you to dedicated Mortgage Advisor in Cardiff that provides an open and honest Mortgage Advice in Cardiff.

We usually, find that he cost to upgrade a property survey is a lot less than what it would cost for repairs over the years. Instead of buying a property and having little idea of what you’re getting, you do have the option to upgrade and end saving yourself a lot of money further down the line.

Mortgage arrangement fees

In most cases, the mortgages with the lowest interest rates are usually accompanied by the highest fees. Setting up mortgages can be quite costly with the fees varying between zero to a few thousands pounds.

Your dedicated Mortgage Advisor in Cardiff will recommend the most cheapest and most appropriate product to fulfil your financial goals and circumstances, working out the total amount to pay over the product including all fees.

There is a high chance of being able to keep the interest as low as possible if you borrow a large sum of money. On the other hand, you may want to borrow a smaller amount of money. If you are in a similar situation, then you should be aware that it is normally cheaper to take out a mortgage without fees as a rule.

Normally, lender arrangement fees go onto your overall mortgage total. If you do decide to add a fee, you will be charged interest on the fee which can begin to accumulate over the course of the mortgage term.

Solicitor’s fees

For the legal aspects of your property purchase, you will need to seek the services of a solicitor.

Your dedicated solicitor will need to run through a variety of things like whether the seller owns the property, who is in charge of maintaining adjoining fences and walls as well as finding out any future developments happening in the area.

All these different factors can affect your ability to sell the house further down the line.

Solicitor’s fees can vary with some ranging towards around the thousand pounds mark, however, this comes down to many factors. With this in mind, you need to know if the quote includes VAT and local searches.

Furthermore, we do suggest that you are careful when finding yourself a solicitor because not every solicitor is ‘on panel’ for all lenders. An expert Mortgage Advisor in Cardiff can guide you with identifying the best solicitor for your situation.

Stamp duty

You may find that your purchase is subject to Stamp Duty which is a tax that you will pay to the government. Be aware that the rules on which purchase are captured by this tax can sometimes change. therefore, it’s good to check on the government to see if this is payable.

Full details can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/stamp-duty-land-tax/

With Stamp Duty, you will usually pay this at completion time to your solicitor who will make the payment to the government on behalf of yourself.

Mortgage broker fees

The majority of mortgage broker will charge you for their expert work. The fee will usually be an amount that is summed up through the percentage of what the lender pays the broker for the work they carry out in their name. You may find that some mortgage broker will only request a charge off your if they were able to get a formal mortgage offer for you.

Removal fees

Many people usually think hiring a van and moving their furniture out themselves is more straightforward than getting help from a removal company.

Through our experience, we do find that removal companies are experienced in moving and transporting furniture around. Therefore, it is normally simpler and less stressful to get them to help you instead of trying to organise it yourself.

Date Last Edited: December 6, 2023