The Saving Journey

I’ve always been ambitious, keen to get the most out of life and willing to take on challenges that others may not want to. So next up I have an adventure in partnership with my husband – we’ve bought some land to build our own house on! We have been looking for about 8 months and nearly put an offer in on a plot of land earlier in the year but it had already been sold. Then while relaxing on holiday just after getting married, my new husband was browsing Right Move and spotted a small piece of land less than a mile from where we currently live. After landing back in the UK on a Sunday, we immediately went to view it the following day and by Thursday had submitted an offer. Then followed some bartering as another interested party offered more but we were eventually triumphant! Then followed two months of discussion with the local planning department, the estate agent and solicitors culminating in a final exchange of contracts on Friday – we are now officially land owners!

Now this is not necessarily a good move from a financial independence perspective. The most financially profitable option would be to stay where we are and pay this mortgage off which we could probably achieve in less than 5 years and which would then give us all sorts of options as our monthly costs would fall significantly. But this is not a financially driven decision (or at least not purely). We’ve both dreamt of building our own home and although we don’t have direct experience of house building, we do have experience of extensive renovations and a good level of skill which we hope will enable us to save money on labour. Time is also on our side, there is no rush to get the new house completed and plan A is to live in our existing house until the new house is ready. If plan A comes to fruition then in 5 years we will have our new house built to our requirements and tastes and will still be mortgage free. But in true FI style, I also have plans B, C, D and E!

The next step is to find an architect, preferably with experience of Passivhaus building. We accept that this is likely to cost us more money, however, in keeping with FI principles it will cost less in maintenance over the long term and we will be doing our bit for the environment. Any recommendations for architects serving north west England gratefully received!