For Kelly Calver and and Adam Mayhew a new-build home was the dream. Kelly had bought her previous home with her dad, a builder, and lived through months of renovation work complete with noise, dust and cold draughts.
So once she and Adam had decided to buy a home together, she was keen for it not to need any work or repairs.
Kelly.35, explained: “Having lived through the chaos of building work, I really wanted a home that was perfect straight away. The idea that no-one had ever used things in the house really appealed to us. The bathroom, particularly, in my previous home wasn’t great, and the thought of a brand new, untouched property was really tempting.”
Kelly and Adam had been living together in Adam’s rented home in Saxmundham and had begun to discuss buying a property.
Meanwhile, Kelly’s dad and his partner had decided to live in the newly refurbished home in Ipswich that Kelly part-owned; and they offered to buy her share.
Having grown up in the area around Saxmundham, Kelly was keen to return to a more rural way of life.
When they saw that Hopkins Homes was building the Priors Grange development, the couple was decided to have a look.
It didn’t take long to make the decision.
Kelly explains: “I popped into the office for a brochure, and we liked what we saw. I then spent some time with Katie, the sales consultant, and gathered lots of information to discuss with Adam.
“The next step was to look at our mortgage options. We had around £30k for a deposit, but most lenders want you to have a deposit of around 25% of the property value. We had around 10% of the value, which meant we couldn’t find competitive mortgage interest rates.
“I hadn’t really heard much about Help to Buy, but our mortgage advisor was great at explaining how it worked. Essentially, Help to Buy gives you a loan to boost your deposit and there are no repayments for five years. You need to already have a minimum deposit of 5% and the Help to Buy loan tops it up to 25%. It meant that we got much better rates, and now our mortgage is just £100 more per month than we were paying on the rental property. For Adam, that’s what made the final decision – it was a no-brainer.”
Kelly first enquired about Priors Grange in late March, and just two weeks later they reserved their dream home, a three-bedroom house with a large kitchen-diner that opens into the garden.
Kelly said: “We’d previously had a small kitchen, and it’s just brilliant to have so much space. We moved into the house in November and now I love cooking for our family and friends. I can’t wait until summer when we can open up the doors and enjoy the garden in the evening and at weekends.”
“We are getting to know are neighbours, it is beginning to become a community.
“It is a really nice place to live.”
Katie Vinyard sales consultant for Hopkins Homes said: “It was great to be able to help Kelly and Adam buy their first home together. Because they reserved the property more than six months before it was due for completion, they could choose how it would be decorated. They were so organised. They made all their selections in just a couple of hours – and they were really thorough! It was lovely to see how quickly they could agree on the future look of their home.”
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