It’s a good idea to work out how much you can realistically afford before you get serious with your search, that way you can be sure of what your budget is and you won’t get disappointed falling in love with a property that you can’t afford. Also it enables you to provide specific instructions to your agent which will help enormously with your search. Starting with your net monthly income work out what all your realistic outgoings are and what you have left over is your ‘disposable income’. Ideally you will need to have a 10% deposit but some developers offer deals as low as 5% with additional benefits like paid legal expenses, stamp duty or cash back. With this information, your mortgage advisor will be able to quickly work out what you can afford with examples of what the monthly repayments would be on different types of mortgage deals. Be realistic about what you can afford so you don’t run into trouble early on with your repayments.