268
Imaging sinking yourself completely just to follow the dream.
this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2024
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Every home I can afford is a home I can barely afford, for both rent and mortgage.
I have been house hunting for over a year. I don't have crazy requirements....I want a 3 bedroom house with a sub basement (tornadoes) and a fenceable yard within an hour of work.
The average price for that around here is 425k. A house that needs major work might only go down to 300k.
Down payment on a 300k house is 60k. A 240k mortgage plus taxes and insurance is $2100/month. $2100 is 30% of $7000. That's a $140k salary. The median income in my county is 78k.
I make above that, have 200k for a down payment, and am still struggling to find a place.
[Edit] fixed math
~~$2100 a month for insurance? That might be more than my whole house payment. Paid pretty much nothing down on 175k in very late 2018 - house is apparently worth 350k now, but we're trapped because I can't/won't afford to move. I'm 85 miles from the office, but I WFH and it looks like I might have to go in about once a year.~~
Well that's what I get for not wearing my glasses...
Lol no prob. I've always paid my taxes/insurance through my loan account so I do not think of them as separate expenses
I do not make 240k/year and it's looking like I'll have to pay $2400/month for all 3.
I should've known just based on the insanity of that rate, but I think there are places in Florida that are that much or even more, so I guess that's where my head was.
I read it as 2100 all in, tax and insurance.
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Alternative headline: "Homes buyers can comfortably afford increasingly rare."
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And most of those willing to take on the additional risk will look back at their decision positively. Shit’s not getting any cheaper.
It's a gamble, as long as your income remains steady and you don't have any major expenses crop up, the gamble pays off.
There's no guarantee that it will all turn out positive, though. That's why they call it "risk".
Those first few years will be the most vulnerable, as you are not paying down principal very fast. All it takes is a job loss combined with a modest short-term real estate downturn to end up underwater on their house but still needing to sell.
But if someone is able to buy in now, maintain stable employment, and keep paying that mortgage for 5 years or so, then they will likely be better off than if they had rented all that time. How many people here can say they are confident in their job security over the next 5 years, though?
most
You might be a bit optimistic there
When the options are rent you can barely afford or a mortgage you can barely afford ,the choice is obvious .
Rent, where someone else is held responsible for maintenance and plumbing/electrical work and landscaping? Maintenance ain't cheap.
Condos are a happy in-between, where the COA handles anything outside of your studs, including the roof and landscaping. My condo even has free water and the pipes and tank are maintained by the COA. Free heat too. All I need to worry about is the electrical.
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My landlord doesn’t fix shit
It can be, especially if you have steady tenants.
I know ex landlords of mine that barely had to pay out anything over the course of years, while they made 5 figures/year.
Even as a home owner, you can have a string of luck. I have relatives with 20 year old water heaters going strong.
My HVAC is 25 years old and going strong. Only quirks it has is the airflow sensor needs to be blown (haha) once in the winter. Only maintenance outside of the usual I've done is replace the fan capacitor.
My water heater is about 10 years old but one of the perks of my gas utility is a water heater warranty so when it comes time to replace or repair part of the cost will be covered.
More importantly, can you lock in a mortgage payment that won't change much, vs. a rent that may skyrocket in the next 6 months? And sometimes a mortgage can be less than rent (although there are other costs to be considered). In our situation we were very lucky to be able to leverage money and jump on a house before things got stupid, and if we hadn't taken that jump I'm not sure where we'd be right now since rent prices got crazy while we're now still paying a decent monthly price.
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When buying our first house in 2008 the mortgage company was pushing us to buy more by saying, “why are you purchasing this house at $197,000 when you can afford twice that?” My response was, “we’ve done the math, we can’t afford twice as much.” Never listen to a mortgage broker. They all want you to spend more so they make more.
I had the exact same experience a few years ago. A lender did some quick math within like 20 minutes of talking and was like "I think we could go ahead and lock you in at loan in the mid 600's"
Lmao we could never in a million years dream of affording that. Idk wtf that dude was thinking but I can't even begin to try and figure out how I'd be able to afford that mortgage unless it was like a 3,000 year 1.08% loan or something.
I bought in 2022 and can't imagine having that much interaction with a mortgage broker. My interaction consisted of giving them my information. Getting pre approved for a stupidly large mortgage (about twice what I could afford). Then, when I found a place to buy, they punched in the address for the "virtual appraisal" and approved the loan.
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Well, yeah. We can't afford rent either.
Should we suffer from rent we can't afford or a house that might one day have some value?
I get it. My wife and I just bought a home in Canada this summer and the pressure is very real. The prices just keep climbing and there is so much competition for everything that comes up on the market. Throw in periodic drops in interest rates and you feel like you have to pounce now or you'll never get one.
We were very fortunate that the sellers chose us specifically because of our family dynamic and the vacancy their own family was leaving in our little neighborhood of playing/communal children. We got the house at asking price and are well within our budget, but things were looking a bit grim there until fate worked itself out. People put shit-holes up for 400k and half the time people buy it anyway. If they don't, the price drops by 15k and it's sold the next day.