You’ll need to earn £70k to buy this new home
The high cost of trying to own a home can be revealed – as one development launches homes for £450,000.
This eye-watering price is what you would pay for one of the 100 properties at Chantry Green, Harrietsham.
According to basic calculations we made with a mortgage calculator, a salary of £70,000 would be needed to buy at this price, plus a deposit of £50,000.
That deposit may seem on the high side, but latest figures from Halifax show the average first-time buyer deposit is now £32,321, up from an average of just £15,168 in 2006.
Kent County Council data shows the average annual wage of people living in the county is £28,700.
The government launched its Help to Buy scheme primarily to help first time buyers and those who used to own a home but cannot now afford to buy.
Crest Nicholson, the developer behind Chantry Green, advertises properties through Help to Buy but they would still cost £360,000. Many of the Help to Buy offers are shared ownership, meaning a homeowner pays a mortgage on a percentage of the
‘It is absolutely ridiculous…the prices are astronomical’
purchase price and rent on the remaining share.
Four homes with four bedrooms on the Harrietsham estate are expected to be ready at the end of April but people can also buy off-plan for those not yet complete.
The sales blurb shows houses with large halls and contemporary open plan kitchens.
But estate agent Martin Randall, of Simon Miller in Lenham, queried the prices, saying: “It is absolutely ridiculous. “Where are your first-time buyers coming from paying that kind of money?
“I have been dealing with some people who are reselling and they want to stay locally in Harrietsham and they are being priced out of the market because the prices are astronomical.
“If they are trying to appeal to regular families and the public they are going to fall flat on their face.”
The Office of National Statistics (ONS) has looked at the average prices for so-called starter homes, aimed at first-time buyers.
In Harrietsham it calculates the average cost for one of these is £267,500, meaning buyers would need a salary of £50,528 and £45,500 in savings.*
West and North Maidstone offer the cheapest entry-level properties, requiring earnings of £26,000 and £28,000 respectively. Those figures are for properties priced at £185,000 and £139,000.
In Boughton Monchelsea and south Maidstone starter homes are £225,000 on average and need earnings of around £48,000 to secure a mortgage.
Other developments include Bellway’s £360,000 properties at Hermitage Lane, while the cheapest on offer at Snodland’s Holborough Lakes is a two-bed flat for £300,000.
A Hermitage Lane home would need earnings of £60,000 and a £36,000 deposit, while the Holborough apartment could be snapped up with a £30,000 deposit and salary of £54,000.
One of the cheaper new build options is Langley park of Sutton Road, where a two-bedroom flat is £199,995.
A small development in Burial Ground Lane, Tovil, included a limited number of two-bed homes for £229,995.
ONS figures show the average costs of starter homes across England increased by almost 20% to £140,000 for older homes, and to £180,000 for new builds.
*These figures are based upon a deposit of 15%, £1,200 conveyance fees and £800 in other costs. They are calculated on the basis of borrowing four-and-a-half times your salary and with a stamp duty of £3,375.