It seems that no matter what happens first time buyers in the UK are destined to get a raw deal when it comes to trying to get onto the property ladder.

For the decade leading up to 2007 many first time buyers found that they simply could not afford to get a property because of soaring property prices that put the prospect of getting a home way out of reach for many first time buyers. However, in the autumn of 2007 some first time buyers thought that their luck had changed.

October of 2007 saw the house price bubble burst, and having peaked house prices in the UK started to plummet, much to the delight of first time buyers. For many this marked the chance to try and get onto the property ladder after years of waiting, and many thought that a few more months of waiting could see property values fall to levels that they may possibly be able to afford. They were right, in that property prices did start to fall month on month, and with each cut in value came an increased likelihood of affordability for the average first time buyer.

However, what many first time buyers had not been expecting was the dire effects of the global credit crunch, which also gripped the UK that same year. Within months banks had tightened their lending criteria and amongst the groups that were set to suffer were first time buyers. The new stringent regulations by banks meant that getting a mortgage loan was far more difficult, and marked the end of the days of easy credit, which had been seen for the past ten years.

Many of the mortgages that had been popular with first time buyers, and had given them a helping hand onto the property ladder disappeared, such as the 125 percent and the 100 percent mortgages, which many had relied on because they had little or nothing in savings to put down as a deposit on a property. This immediately left many first time buyers out in the cold. Then came even worse news as the once traditional 95 percent mortgage started to disappear. All of a sudden lenders started to demand extortionate deposit levels such as 25 percent and even 40 percent of the property value in some cases.

It seems that first time buyers are in a no win situation. At the time when property prices were too high to afford they could easily get finance for 125 percent or 100 percent of the value of the property but could not afford to take out such a big mortgage due to the repayments. However, just as property prices plunge to affordable levels and the base interest rate falls to its lowest level in history, at just 0.5 percent, first time buyers have found that lenders are no longer prepared to offer them finance, and those that are demand a far higher deposit than the average first time buyer can afford.

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