If you are already behind in your bills, it is going to be very difficult to budget to pay $342 more a fortnight. That's an awful lot of money on a casual wage,/Centrelink especially with four kids.
And banks aren't scared to force you to sell up. If you don't have the equity in the property, then they can chase you for any money that you owe. So if you make a loss on the house and then owe say $25,000 (not unrealistic) then you have to pay rent, plus the repayments on that $25,000, plus your credit rating is wrecked.
In your situation, I'd save save save, but also look at renting somewhere else for a year or so, to get out of the whole issue with MIL. The idea of putting aside the extra $342 minimum each fortnight is great, plus $20 per week in rates and $100/month in building/contents insurance. It all adds up, unfortunately.
The only other thing I could think of is, do you HAVE to live in the area where the houses are $300K? Can you move to the country where some houses are as little as $55K (country western Victoria?) This looks much more achievable from your budget perspective, you'd pay off that $55K very quickly with a small deposit and paying the amount you are paying now in rent.
hun we've just sold a house because the financial strain of only one person working was killing us. we were in deep doo doo and the options were either for us to sell or for someone to sell out from under us. with both of us on c'link for a while, and paying only 270 a week on the mortgage, it was damn hard. yup, you'll get more FTB than I get cos you have more kids BUT, you have to factor in, long term, the expense of those kids. while they're little it's fairly simple. they don't have extra curriculars (your eldest will probably have them soon), they don't have expectations of what they will wear in terms of clothes and things. adding 342 a fortnight to your budget without even factoring in the rates and things like that isn't easy. keep in mind you will lose c'link rent assistance (which is probably about 135 a fn a moment), your c'link payments will change with you returning to work and DH being the SAHP - at least until the end of the current financial year because he has earnings. unless you're working full time and bringing in a taxable income of less than 1480 a fn, he won't qualify for parenting payment which means you'll only have ftba and ftbb, no ppp and no rent assistance. you're looking at not only having to add 342 to your outgoings on top of the "rent" you pay now, but also losing 135 ish in rent assistance - can you really afford to take 470 extra out of your living budget totally? you're not going to even get that much extra in ftb once the twins arrive (no more than 320 ish if you're on max ftba) so can you, now, take an extra 150 out of what you have immediately and pretend it doesn't exist? that's without the extra costs taken into account (land and water rates)
DH and I had to make the call to give up on the dream of home ownership for the time being. we're being realistic. having a rental isn't ideal, but it isn't the end of the world. you need to either get tough with MIL and get a proper lease/tenancy agreement or you need to find a rental with a different "landlord". the reality is that, even if you can put the full baby bonus for the twins into savings, taht's only for six months. any mortgage is going to need more savings history than that. can you continue with it after the babies are six months? are you guaranteed work at the six month point?
like the others, i don't want ot be a downer on your dream. i have just been on the other end where it went belly up due to illness/loss of employment. we HAD the dream and we lost it. we're barely breaking even leaving that house and to be honest, i feel physically, mentally and emotionaly exhausted from the effort. and i HAVE secure work, i'm on a good wage - it just wasn't working out.
also, just as a word of advice - i would be VERY wary of any "institution" that allows you a large mortgage when one of you is on income support payment (ppp) - unfortunately many will let you borrow far more than they should and you are left in the crapper. i have looked at the calculators. they calculate it at a ridiculously high percentage of your income. run your estimates as if you're both out of work, or at least you only being part time and DH being at home. don't factor in "maybe" income for him on one of these contracts. factor in that money you are guaranteed. and put the mortgage percentage up at least two percent and see if it's still viable (all advice i was given when looking at buying fresh into workforce
thanks everyone for your suggestions and i dont think a lot of people really got what i was saying i wasnt saying we were running out and buying a house straight away our goal is 3-5 years time when i have a full time job, plus my business on the side and DH does also work but its seasonal and he has another job when the off periods.
Moving costs dont cost us a thing the great thing about DH being a furniture removalist we have never had to pay to move.
I'm not being defensive here im just getting my point across that it is actually realistic with our time frame etc.
As for MIL we are already on a rental contract we have a lease with a real estate, rent gets paid to the real estate etc but MIL still refuses to fix things if we go to VCAT we are out on our asses and i dont want my kids to have no roof over there heads, as for renting somewhere else that would be too difficult in the area we are in there are only 7 rentals within the district one being here with it being rural it doesnt leave much and we dont want to leave the are DD1 is settled in school, DHs job is only 5 mins down the road etc.
Right now whilst I am on centrelink payments and DHs contract for this season is near the end (hes not doing his other job until after the twins are born he wants to be home to help me out) yes it is impossible which is why we arent running out and buying but asking for tips and advice on ways to save so when that time comes in a few years we can say ok we have well over the 10% recommended deposit we are hoping to have around 25-30% which yes is a lot but can be done and thats all i was asking for was help on how to achieve this over a period of a few years
Anyway sorry for rambling sooky kid and heat dont mix today
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