Money and employment

A majority of scholars have given permission to take on a mortgage to buy a home. A house is a necessity, without this you cannot live, and always renting may not be a good long term solution in terms of the needs of your family. An alternative is an Islamic mortgage which may be a suitable option.

This is not an Islamic economy so my advice would be get a mortgage based on your means, don't get a half a million pound mortgage if you need a house which costs less, and then of course there are the mortgages which are formulated in keeping with the letter of Islamic (Shari'a) law, but there is a question mark over the spirit. It is a grey area and my advice is to try to stay out of debt wherever possible, but if you have to, then keep it to a minimum.

I think that an economy based on debt is unhealthy and from this point of view, and strictly speaking, a mortgage is haram. The ideal Islamic economy would not have interest and mortgages but have equity-based finances. 

There are alternatives to mortgages, and there is more than one provider in the market who can help you to purchase land and property. Explore the possibilities. Having said that, it can sometimes be difficult to obtain a mortgage in an Islamic bank, which can have difficult procedures and requirements. If this is the case, there can be exceptions, within reason. Yes, you do need to have a roof above your head, but if you need two bedrooms you don't need to find a mortgage for a five bedroom house.

The European fatwa council issued a fatwa on this before the Islamic Bank of Britain started providing house finance: if you have no alternative, then you are allowed to get a mortgage as a condition of necessity, but it's important to discuss this with a qualified person in this area i.e. a scholar.