London first-time buyers: ‘Help to Buy meant we beat our five-year plan to buy a new home’

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Ruth Bloomfield15 October 2021

When they moved in together in 2017, Teshnee Beeharry and Durvesh Gajadur made a pact that within five years they would own a home of their own.

In November, and with a year to spare, the couple will achieve their goal when they move into a two-bedroom flat in north London.

And their mortgage payments each month will be the same as the rent they are currently paying on a cramped studio flat.

“We wanted to be independent, not living in some else’s home and paying their mortgage,” explained Beeharry, 26, a finance specialist at a healthcare company.

The couple, who got married in 2018, started saving as soon as they moved into their £800pcm rental flat in Edmonton Green.

“We set a target to put some money aside, even if it was only £200, every month,” said Beeharry. “We knew that, over five years, it would really mount up.”

At the start of this year, Beeharry and Gajadur, 30, a bio-medical engineer at an NHS hospital, realised that by using the Help to Buy scheme they would only need to put down a five per cent deposit if they bought a new home, raising the rest of the money using a loan of 40 per cent from the Government, and a mortgage.

They opted for the New River View development, in Winchmore Hill, which was taking shape close to where they lived and — with the added enticement of a £8,000 cashback offer from the developer which will help them furnish the flat and pay moving costs — decided to go for it.

The fact that there is plenty of green space nearby and it is close to a train station was another plus point, since both of them need to commute to work in central London — Gajadur full-time and Beeharry two days per week.

They reserved a £535,000, two-bedroom, two-bathroom flat in April, putting down a deposit of £26,250.

“If it had not been for Help to Buy we would probably have had to save for another two years,” said Beeharry. “We can’t wait to move in and have a place of our own.”

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