How I bought my first home: 10 years of saving, cheap rented house shares and Help to Buy got me on the ladder

Thrifty living: Clara Ramsdale has  finally been able to buy her own flat, in a new development in Blackhorse Road, Walthamstow (Handout)
Thrifty living: Clara Ramsdale has finally been able to buy her own flat, in a new development in Blackhorse Road, Walthamstow (Handout)

Clara Ramsdale moved to London when she was 21, fresh from university and excited about her new life in the capital.

Back then she was more interested in her social life than bricks and mortar, but always had her long-term eye on home ownership and got into the habit of saving regularly.

What she didn’t anticipate was that it would take more than a decade of house-sharing and saving before she could get on to the property ladder.

This time last year, Ms Ramsdale, now 32, was sharing a house with friends in Clapton, paying rent of £820pcm. In an ideal world, she would have bought a flat in Hackney, but prices were too high, so she looked across the border in Walthamstow.

Last April, she reserved a one-bedroom flat at Blackhorse View (barrattlondon.com), a new development in Blackhorse Road.

I deliberately lived in places where the rent was cheap, stayed in shared houses for perhaps a bit longer than I wanted to, and tried to be sensible

Clara Ramsdale

Not only is the area better value than Hackney, but it is at the centre of a £200 million regeneration and its transport links to central London are fast (Zone 3, Victoria Line). Her years of savings meant she was able to put down a £60,000 deposit and she took out a Help to Buy loan to help pay for the £390,000 flat.

Ms Ramsdale moved into the flat in January and although her monthly mortgage payments of £525 are considerably less than her former rent, she is discovering that solo living is a lot more expensive than sharing.

“What is most noticeable are the bills,” she says. “My council tax is higher living on my own, and there’s the £1,424 per year service charge that comes with a block of flats.” On the upside, the modern flat is well insulated, so running costs are low.

Ms Ramsdale, an accountant for consumer group Which?, believes regular saving is the only way to build up a deposit. “From the second I had a job, I was putting away what I could in a direct debit and saving bonuses where possible,” she said.

“I deliberately lived in places where the rent was cheap, stayed in shared houses for perhaps a bit longer than I wanted to, and tried to be sensible as much as possible. I have never gone into my overdraft or savings.”

Now that saving has paid off, Ms Ramsdale is furnishing her flat and is looking forward to exploring Blackhorse Road’s cafés and bars and the Walthamstow Wetlands, which she can see from her home.

“I am really looking forward to a summer by the water, and my apartment couldn’t be closer — the views from the reservoirs are unbelievable,” she said. “You can see over the wetlands to Canary Wharf on one side and the Shard on the other.”