I think you should rent a place on your own for a year and see how you like living alone and decide whether or not you like the city/your job enough to buy a more permanent place in that location. $1000-1500/month for a nice rental reasonable. You will still have your cash stash so if you find a good fixer before your lease runs out you will have the money to put down on it and fix it up before you move in.
I was kind of running numbers for how much is "reasonable" to spend on housing month to month. Even looking around at little hole in the wall spots they fluctuate a ton on location and ammenities.
I used to rent a room out of my house month to month to students and it worked out pretty well. I guess that's where I see the descrepency.
Let's say I have a aparment 900/month (1200 after utilities and such plus down payment)
Vs a Mortgage 600/month (115k+utilities/prop tax/insurance $1200 month rolling the 85k of proceeds into a down payment on a 200k house)
1200*12= 14,400
maintnance on house 1%=2000
14,400
16,400
The house i rent half the year the spare until out (800). 800*6=4800.
Apt. 14,400
House 11,600
You can also write off interest on the house.
Cons-flexibility
-This is a big one. What if this what if that? I suppose buying a place with rentability considered (duplex etc) would mitigate this as the goal would be to keep it as a rental property regardless of where I chose to live.
Cons
Other fees associated with home ownership (selling etc-I helped FSBO a house last year but would consider getting my real estate license this year to mitigate those 6% fees yikes).
Time spent maintaining/unknown maintnance costs. The 1% doesn't cover the big driveway replacement or whatever they need.
I'm split as I plan on having my family in to visit on occasion and most of the apartments are 1 BR with a garage around 900 or so in the area I want.