Quantcast

House buying - money pit or good idea

Buy a house (details in OP)?

  • Total voters
    8
mandown

mandown

Poopdeck Repost
Jun 1, 2004
21,306
8,757
Transylvania 90210
Looking at houses in LA. I can probably pull a $500k place and get a mortgage at about $2,000 a month vs my current rent of $1,300.

I don't really need the extra space. In fact the extra cleaning, furnishing, and maintenance might be a negative for my time and money. I would like a place with AC. I don't have it now, and moving would mean a bump up in rent, which makes it seem like I may as well go whole-hog into a mortgage. Though my landlord and I just started talking about getting an AC unit installed in my place (it's an old place with odd wall and window space for using window or portable units).

I'm a SINK. I'd like to think I'll be a DINK at some point. Assuming that happens in the foreseeable future, I'd have a big buying power upgrade.


I've done the math on the hard numbers (I'm an accountant and in the real estate industry by day). I have some friends telling me I should jump in to the market. I've had others tell me to save the funds in liquid form and avoid the responsibilities of ownership. What's the hive-monkey-mind think?
 
W

wiscodh

Monkey
Jun 21, 2007
833
121
303
mandown said:
Looking at houses in LA. I can probably pull a $500k place and get a mortgage at about $2,000 a month vs my current rent of $1,300.

I don't really need the extra space. In fact the extra cleaning, furnishing, and maintenance might be a negative for my time and money. I would like a place with AC. I don't have it now, and moving would mean a bump up in rent, which makes it seem like I may as well go whole-hog into a mortgage. Though my landlord and I just started talking about getting an AC unit installed in my place (it's an old place with odd wall and window space for using window or portable units).

I'm a SINK. I'd like to think I'll be a DINK at some point. Assuming that happens in the foreseeable future, I'd have a big buying power upgrade.


I've done the math on the hard numbers (I'm an accountant and in the real estate industry by day). I have some friends telling me I should jump in to the market. I've had others tell me to save the funds in liquid form and avoid the responsibilities of ownership. What's the hive-monkey-mind think?
Click to expand...
3 years ago you shoulda jumped in. Now ..... fuck that. Wait till this shit crashes again. Same stuff that happened in 2008 is going on now.

Houses are selling in Portland the same day as listing for well over asking. My house has gone up in value ( according to zillow) 115k in 2.5 years. Thats not right. We want to sell but we are going to be priced out of anywhere good to live.
 
mandown

mandown

Poopdeck Repost
Jun 1, 2004
21,306
8,757
Transylvania 90210
Thought about slum lord route. Not interested in that game. Certainly not on my property where I'll live. I like low key, low overhead.

Almost got a hook-height loft a few years ago. Stupid paralysis got in the way.

Wondering what the drought will do to home prices.
 
mandown

mandown

Poopdeck Repost
Jun 1, 2004
21,306
8,757
Transylvania 90210
Big problem with ownership is it locks me into this job or one paying similar. If I ever want to go into early retirement, or get fired, I've got a bunch of months of rent saved up vs dropping it on a down payment.
 
mandown

mandown

Poopdeck Repost
Jun 1, 2004
21,306
8,757
Transylvania 90210
Depends. Highland park is the best thing going near me. 1,200sq ft. 2bed 1ba was what I saw Sunday. Lots of 1,100 3bed flips on the area. It's a little gangy if you hit a bad pocket.
 
canadmos

canadmos

Cake Tease
May 29, 2011
21,762
21,241
Canaderp
:popcorn:Hi, I'm Chris and I approve of this thread. I look forward to anyone justifying that buying a house is perhaps not the greatest of ideas for a single guy with no intent on renting a room to someone.
 
jonKranked

jonKranked

Detective Dookie
Nov 10, 2005
88,150
26,495
media blackout
mandown said:
Depends. Highland park is the best thing going near me. 1,200sq ft. 2bed 1ba was what I saw Sunday. Lots of 1,100 3bed flips on the area. It's a little gangy if you hit a bad pocket.
Click to expand...
damn. i got almost twice as much space for substantially less. you should move to a cheaper part of the country.
 
kickstand

kickstand

Turbo Monkey
Sep 18, 2009
3,441
393
Fenton, MI
wiscodh said:
3 years ago you shoulda jumped in. Now ..... fuck that. Wait till this shit crashes again. Same stuff that happened in 2008 is going on now.

Houses are selling in Portland the same day as listing for well over asking. My house has gone up in value ( according to zillow) 115k in 2.5 years. Thats not right. We want to sell but we are going to be priced out of anywhere good to live.
Click to expand...
I bought in 2009, zillow and trulia have given my house a 100k bump. I want to move, but I can't find anything on the market within my budget/intended range anywhere.

I keep telling my wife we are way better off to just stay here until the kids are done with school.

If I was a single dude, there would be no way I'd go buy a house, I'd just keep saving and renting and having the freedom to move wherever i want the minute I want.
 
canadmos

canadmos

Cake Tease
May 29, 2011
21,762
21,241
Canaderp
kickstand said:
If I was a single dude, there would be no way I'd go buy a house, I'd just keep saving and renting and having the freedom to move wherever i want the minute I want.
Click to expand...
My friends do not understand this concept at all. I bring up renting and they act as if I'm literally burning a pile of hundreds on top of their feet.

Then five minutes later they'll complain how their furnace is on the way out and how much it'll cost to replace it. Yeah, sign me up!
 
4130biker

4130biker

PM me about Tantrum Cycles!
May 24, 2007
3,884
450
wiscodh said:
this x10000000000000000000
Click to expand...
Agree w keeping your options open.

I have friends who got married a few years ago. She had a place when she was single that turned out to suck for both of them because of job locations, space, etc. they needed to get rid of it to move on, but with the recession wound up losing $$$.
 
mandown

mandown

Poopdeck Repost
Jun 1, 2004
21,306
8,757
Transylvania 90210
Lots of folks miss the big picture.
If you buy a house for $100 and sell it for $200, you didn't make a real $200. You still need a place to live and will likely buy another $200 house that used to cost $100. Your money just floated along at the same relative boyant value.

Also hear lots of "but you can deduct..." Nonsense. Yeah. I deduct the interest and taxes, but I still gotta pay them. They aren't free. Also, if something breaks, I gotta fix it outta my ducat bukket. No landlord to bail me out.

I can't find a great reason to do it right now.
 
Pesqueeb

Pesqueeb

bicycle in airplane hangar
Feb 2, 2007
41,444
18,705
Riding the baggage carousel.
mandown said:
I have some friends telling me I should jump in to the market.
Click to expand...
Where you live? Jesus, fuck no. My buddy down there is playing that shit too. They bought a place 3-4 years ago and it's damn near doubled in "paper" value. They have enough extra $$$ that they were/are looking for rentals to purchase, and what he tells me about the bidding wars and cash purchases on homes down there is insane. I'm no economist, but if that's not a "bubble" then I have no idea what makes one. It's LA, I say save your pennies and wait for the next bust. It's only a matter of time.
 
Pesqueeb

Pesqueeb

bicycle in airplane hangar
Feb 2, 2007
41,444
18,705
Riding the baggage carousel.
kickstand said:
I keep telling my wife we are way better off to just stay here until the kids are done with school.
Click to expand...
It's why we stay were we are. 8 more years......

mandown said:
Lots of folks miss the big picture.
If you buy a house for $100 and sell it for $200, you didn't make a real $200. You still need a place to live and will likely buy another $200 house that used to cost $100. Your money just floated along at the same relative boyant value.

Also hear lots of "but you can deduct..." Nonsense. Yeah. I deduct the interest and taxes, but I still gotta pay them. They aren't free. Also, if something breaks, I gotta fix it outta my ducat bukket. No landlord to bail me out.

I can't find a great reason to do it right now.
Click to expand...
Sounds like you answered your own question.
 
kazlx

kazlx

Patches O'Houlihan
Aug 7, 2006
6,985
1,958
Tustin, CA
It's a toss up. I purchased my first house about 7 years ago now and we have been in our second for a little over a year. Purchased my first place for $430k and sold last year for $510k. Just like you said, it's basically funny money at that point, but allowed us to have more cash to put down on the first place. I would have liked to keep the payment of the first house, but there were some deal breakers with staying there and raising the kid(s).

I definitely feel like I have benefited financially, as it would cost a boatload to rent a similar house, but YMMV.

FWIW, our payment on 430K with 3% down via FHA was $2400ish. Would be even less with 20% down, no PMI. But it does anchor you and you lose quite a bit of GFY latitude...

I plan on being where I am now until I retire or the neighborhood goes to complete hell.

There are trade offs. House is nice and just like everything else, the better you take care of it, the less stuff breaks, but you still have paint, roof, appliances and crap like that. My bathroom sink started to leak last week, went to fix it and then the shutoffs started leaking because they probably hadn't been used in 10 years. So, I had to replace those before attacking the sink again. I do most stuff myself, so the maintenance is quite a bit cheaper than paying someone to fix things.
 
Last edited:
StiHacka

StiHacka

Compensating for something
Jan 4, 2013
21,560
12,508
In hell. Welcome!
mandown said:
ots of folks miss the big picture.
If you buy a house for $100 and sell it for $200, you didn't make a real $200. You still need a place to live and will likely buy another $200 house that used to cost $100. Your money just floated along at the same relative boyant value.

Also hear lots of "but you can deduct..." Nonsense. Yeah. I deduct the interest and taxes, but I still gotta pay them. They aren't free. Also, if something breaks, I gotta fix it outta my ducat bukket. No landlord to bail me out.

I can't find a great reason to do it right now.
Click to expand...
Not if you go with my bulletproof strategy "start big and downsize/move somewhere sane later". :D

It is interesting how different home ownership is in the US and in my old country. Property taxes here make you a lifelong lender, unlike where I come from. People in my old country build and live in the same house for generations because there are little differences between towns' schools, public infrastructure etc. Once you own a house, cost of living in it is pretty much limited to maintenance and insurance.

I rented for many years here in the US, I bought a house four years ago at the (then local) bottom of the market, mostly because my wife wanted to. My taxes have doubled since because estimated bogus hyperinflated property value went up about 40% (according to Zillow), and I hope I won't have to do any major renovations/repairs according to new code for at least another decade. The impression of the paper money is kinda nice but you don't have them until you have them.

I wish I was a rich dude who could just live in hotels 24/7/365.
 
dan-o

dan-o

Turbo Monkey
Jun 30, 2004
6,499
2,805
StiHacka said:
I hope I won't have to do any major renovations/repairs according to new code for at least another decade.
Click to expand...
You only need to meet current code when performing new work.
There's no need to bring an existing structure up to current code, assuming it was to code when initially built.
 
StiHacka

StiHacka

Compensating for something
Jan 4, 2013
21,560
12,508
In hell. Welcome!
dan-o said:
You only need to meet current code when performing new work.
There's no need to bring an existing structure up to current code, assuming it was to code when initially built.
Click to expand...
In my town the line between repair and renovation seems to be pretty thin. IIRC my buddy had to bring a lot of stuff in his bathroom to current code when he had to break tiles to replace shower plumbing in wall, and new tiles triggered the renovation / current code clause. I may be wrong though. Still, my friends' repair and renovation stories make me a part time alcoholic.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom