It's a wild ride, this whole house buying thing. I was getting quite excited about this flat I spoke about in my last entry...

The majority of mortgage providers are unhappy giving mortgages on leasehold properties where the remaining term on the lease is less than the mortgage term + 30 years. I'm looking to get a 25 year mortgage, so that puts my lease threashold at about 55 years.

The remaining lease on this flat I'm interested in is 59 years, so I could get money for it no problem. But when I then come to sell the property, I'll have a lot of problems doing so (because any new buyers won't be able to get a mortgage on the place).

It would cost about £8,000 to £10,000 to renew the lease on this flat back up to 99 years. And I'd have to do that before I wanted to sell on. Thus, I put in an offer of £107,500 (asking price £114,995). I was told (after a night waiting whilst she thought about it) that this wasn't quite enough. So I went back with a revised offer of £110,000. Again she said it was just a little too low. With the risk of having to renew the lease, I wasn't going to go above £110,500.

Eventually she got back to me, through the agent, and was adamant that she wans't going to take less than £113,000. This was mid last week. I spoke to the agent yesterday and the vendor has not had any more viewings and there has been little interest in the flat.

So at the moment, it's off. And there's nowhere else that's a suitable price in a suitable location. So my house hunting is on the back burner at the moment. But who knows, when she realises that she won't be able to sell her flat at £113,000 she'll come back to me.