Author Topic: Renting vs Buying  (Read 786 times)

madsan11

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Renting vs Buying
« on: July 10, 2019, 08:43:56 AM »
Hi everyone, I am getting married in April and my fiance and I have an ongoing debate about whether we should buy a house or continue to rent. We live and want to stay in a fairly expensive area for both renting and buying and would have a small down payment. My fear if we continue renting we will never be able to save for a down payment, I also just want my own place and to not have to answer to a landlord anymore. My fiance is pretty staunchly opposed to buying, he thinks it is not a good investment and he doesn't want to worry about upkeep.  Any advice?

monarda

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Re: Renting vs Buying
« Reply #1 on: July 10, 2019, 08:59:29 AM »
Sounds like you're not ready to buy even if you both agreed.
Try this calculator and discuss with your fiancé

ericrugiero

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Re: Renting vs Buying
« Reply #2 on: July 10, 2019, 09:17:31 AM »
There are some nice calculators out there comparing renting vs buying.  I own a house and am happy that I do.  But, I live in a low COL area and a decent amount of the reason we own is just because we want to.  In your situation it sounds like you should wait.  Here are a few reasons:

It costs a lot to buy and sell a home.  If you are getting married you may not know for sure what you want and where you want it.  In nearly every case you must stay in a house for several (or more) years to make sense to buy.  If you buy, you are locked into an area or you will lose money. 

It costs a lot to maintain a home.  I've heard numbers like 1-3% of the purchase price per year just to maintain the home.  That's an average over time.  Some years nothing major will break.  Other years you will have to replace the roof or the heat/AC. 

The money you "invest" in a home could be making money in the stock market instead.  In a HCOL area that amount is significant and much of the time it just makes more sense financially to rent. 

Here is a link to a blog that is very anti-home ownership.  I think they are pretty extreme but they do have some good points.  https://www.millennial-revolution.com/rent/bought-house-back-2012/

If you really want to own, look into house hacking.  Maybe you can buy something and rent out a portion of it to cover most of the mortgage. 

Edit:  I'm not saying you can't or shouldn't own at some point.  Just that you should really look into the hidden costs and the opportunity cost of what you could do with that money instead of buying.  We own our house and would do the same thing again but our situation is vastly different than yours. 
« Last Edit: July 10, 2019, 11:02:42 AM by ericrugiero »

 

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