I’m going to stay in my first flat
A FIRST-time buyer has been discouraged from climbing the property ladder with a fall in the housing market looming. Restaurant manager Iryna Charis, 40, decided to remain in her two-bed flat in south London as property prices could shrink by 9 per cent in 2024. Stamp duty cuts announced in the mini-Budget will now only be frozen until March 2025. Miss Charis, who is originally from Ukraine and earns £50,000 a year, bought the property for £610,000 last year as part of a shared ownership. She owns 25 per cent of the flat, paying rent on top of a £4 0 mortgage fixed at 1.9 per cent. She said: ‘I need to remortgage my property soon and it is quite a big difference.
‘I am on a fixed rate for two years and it ends in May... I am worried but I am hoping by May, things will have settled down.’