Mortgage affordability: the Reddit threads worth reading
'Can I afford this?' threads are useful precisely because posters list their real numbers — salary, take-home, car payment, council tax. These five are the ones where the maths is all there to check.
5 threads, each checked live on 2026-08-27. Reddit posts are other people's experiences, not advice; the commentary underneath is ours.
The threads worth reading
1 · r/UKPersonalFinance · 2026-04-14
First time buyer, can I afford the mortgage based off my income?Solo buyer with a £250,000 mortgage in principle and a £25,000 deposit, £2,900–£3,400 a month after tax depending on weekend work, a £350 car payment and about £180 of other bills.
2 · r/UKPersonalFinance · 2026-02-07
Can we afford £260k mortgage on 39k + £27k salaries?A couple with £72k left on a 2014 mortgage, £4,300 combined take-home (£4,475 with child benefit), eyeing a house at offers over £450k and asking whether £260k of borrowing is realistic.
3 · r/UKPersonalFinance · 2025-12-17
Can I afford to take on a £308k mortgage alone on a £65k salary?Separating and taking the jointly owned home into sole name by transfer of equity: £380k value, £308k outstanding at 4.5% (about £1,500 a month), with a full itemised monthly budget.
4 · r/HousingUK · 2026-07-07
Advice on mortgage affordabilityA first-time buyer with an AIP for £170k on a £163k house, whose fee-free family broker can only find lenders at 6.4–6.8%, pushing payments towards £1,000 a month — why so high?
5 · r/UKPersonalFinance · 2024-11-13
Mortgage affordability / disposable income calculation, do savings count?Asking whether a lender's disposable-income calculation gives any credit for savings, or looks only at income and committed outgoings.
What a broker adds
Two different questions get mixed together in these threads. 'Will a lender approve £260k on £66k?' is answered by the lender's model — roughly 4.5x income as a ceiling, then a stress-tested budget where child benefit may count, the car payment is deducted and savings are ignored. 'Should we?' is answered by your own budget at the real rate. A broker runs the first across many lenders; only you can answer the second.
The £163k first-time buyer at 6.4–6.8% is the thread to learn from: when every available lender is expensive, the cause is usually something in the case (credit history, deposit source, property type) narrowing the panel to specialists — and that is worth diagnosing before accepting the rate.
Related reading: How do banks calculate mortgage affordability? · Affordability with existing debt · Monthly budget calculator
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