The housing ladder

The price of property in London is increasing very quickly, which is good news for people who already own a home, but bad news for everyone else! We meet Chris Hanley, who can't afford to buy his first home, and we learn some useful words relating to house buying.

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	The housing ladder

Vocabulary from the programme

a flat
British English term for an apartment, a home arranged across part of a house

price bracket
a range of prices on an item
e.g. 'That car is out of our price bracket, I'm afraid'
'Nowadays even very good computers fall within my price bracket.'

mortgage
an agreement allowing a large amount of money to be loaned by a bank or building society to pay for a home
e.g. 'It's easier than ever to get a mortgage.'

deposit
here, the money paid towards a home by the buyer at the time of purchase, i.e. not paid for by a mortgage
e.g. 'I can't afford a large deposit, so I'll have to get a really big mortgage.'

to repay
to pay someone back what you owe (less common than 'pay back')
e.g. 'It's taken me years to repay this debt.'

repayment
noun form of 'to repay' - with mortgages it usually means a regular payment to a bank or building society towards the mortgage
e.g. 'They offered me a mortgage for £300,000, but I worked out that I would never be able to afford the monthly repayments.'

the housing ladder
the system whereby owning a cheap home allows you to buy a more expensive one after a time
e.g. 'I just can't get on the housing ladder.'

Listen to these words

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Extras

Programme script (pdf - 21 k)
Download this programme (mp3 - 1.8 mb)

BBC mortgages and housing site