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Apple, Google and Amazon all have something in common: they were started in garages.While it’s unlikely you’ll start a trillion-dollar company from one, you might be able to kick-start your property investment portfolio from this unusual source.A typical house now costs nearly 7.2 times the average salary. This makes saving for a deposit a daunting task – but experts say that there is an often-overlooked solution to raising funds. Garages and parking spaces can be bought much cheaper and let out without many of the regulations and costs levied on regular...

Increasing numbers of Britons now own their home without a mortgage, government figures have revealed.In 2023/2024, 37 per cent of households owned their homes outright, according to the Department for Work and Pensions' latest Family Resources Survey.It is less than the 28 per cent of homes owned with a mortgage, revealing a widening gap between those who own their home outright and those who don't. Over the past ten years, the number of people owning outright has risen from 33 per cent to 37 per cent of households.The percentage of households...

House sales are taking more than three months to complete once an offer has been accepted, according to analysis by property buying website OneDome.The research looked at almost 200,000 property listings over the course of 2024 and found that property transactions took an average of 108 days to complete.However, in some parts of the country, buyers are finding they are having to wait for an agonising five months.Buyers in the capital typically face the slowest completion times.The north London borough of Islington was found to be the slowest market in the...