When saving for your first home, creating a budget is an important step in managing your finances effectively. It helps you track your income and expenses, prioritize your spending, and work towards your financial goals.Here's a step-by-step guide to help you create a monthly budget:

As we previously stated, in certain circumstances purchaser/s must provide a satisfactory explanation of the grounds relied upon by the purchaser, together with supporting evidence, immediately on request by the vendor when trying to avoid a contract due to non-satisfaction of a certain condition.

Once a relationship has been in place for 3 years, the Property (Relationships) Act 1976 (“Act”) requires property to be equally divided, despite each party’s contribution.

Launched in 2017, KiwiBuild set out with an ambitious goal of delivering 100,000 affordable homes for first home buyers. Since its inception, the program has encountered challenges and its critics along the way. However, there have been noteworthy positive changes made to the KiwiBuild initiative, which this article aims to cover comprehensively. This article will provide you with all the essential information you need to know about KiwiBuild and its current status.

Buying your first home can be an exciting, yet daunting, prospect. One of the biggest hurdles to overcome is the deposit required to secure a mortgage. For many Kiwis, being able to make a one-off withdrawal from their KiwiSaver for a home deposit enables them to reach their home-buying dreams. 

Whether you’re a first home buyer or already a property owner, we’ve all been nervously watching interest rates continue to rise through 2023. And now with last week’s OCR rise of another 50 basis points … if only we had a crystal ball to know the impact this is going to have on home loan interest rates going forward, and whether it’s a good time for first-home buyers to dive into the property market.

Buying a home is a major milestone in anyone's life and the process of finding the right one can be overwhelming. Once you've arranged your pre-approval, know your budget, and have your home deposit ready, now the really exciting part begins ... it’s time to start house hunting!

We understand that saving for a deposit can be one of the biggest hurdles for first home buyers, and that's why The First Home Buyers Club is here to lend a helping hand.

First things first though, you need to have an idea of how much money you spend weekly as well as how much you need to save for your first home deposit. Having a specific target to work towards will help keep you motivated and focused. Pick a number, set a timeframe, and then get busy saving!  

We’d like to share with you some ways you can make saving easier and hopefully reach your savings target quicker than you expected!

No doubt 2023 is set to be another interesting year for first home buyers seeking to get into their first home.  Generally experts are predicting that the subdued housing market conditions are likely to continue.  Our suggestion for first home buyers is to work on areas that help them get closer to being ready for a home loan pre-approval.

You‘ve done the hard yards, you’ve scrimped and saved, and you cautiously think you’re ready to move to the next stage of buying your first home! High Fives by the way, you have just achieved the most difficult milestone of the journey, and you’ve stayed the distance. We know how hard you’ve worked and now the fun part begins! But where to from here?  

It is very important to have a Will in place and often this is not considered until people buy their first home or have children. It is also very important to update your Will on a regular basis as people’s circumstances can quickly change.

Auctions have been the most popular property selling method for vendors in NZ for some time now and most of you will be familiar with the process – a property is offered for sale to the public (usually, the bidders have to register their interest in advance with the selling agent) and once the seller’s reserve price is reached, the property is sold to the buyer with the highest bid.

There are various ways that monetary assistance from your parents towards the purchase of a property can be recorded/protected depending on whether your parents will be loaning or gifting this monetary assistance.

One of our Tips For Getting A Yes To Pre-Approval is to show consistently good bank account conduct.  Keeping your bank account in good order is often not considered by first home buyers when preparing to get a pre-approval.

Under the current ADLS Agreement of Sale and Purchase of Real Estate (Eleventh Edition) 2022, there have been many changes. Buyers need to be aware of the conditions and the process that applies to the standard conditions on the front page of the agreement (further detail on these conditions is set out in clause 9.0 of the agreement).

In New Zealand, particularly Auckland, the growing population and rising house prices have resulted in apartment living becoming an appealing and more realistic option for many first home buyers.  Any property purchase is a big decision but buying an apartment off the plans doesn’t need to be a stressful process.

Borrowing at the moment isn’t easy and a lot of this comes down to bank credit policy in this market and their appetite to lend. Credit policy varies across banks, however, in most respects, they remain very similar.  This article helps to explain the importance of debt servicing when applying for your first home loan.

Here at The First Home Buyer's Club, we get excited about helping first home buyers through the process of purchasing their first home.  But often, this excitement is hit with a dose of reality when we discover the amount of debt they have on board.