Hi all,
About me: I'm new to MMM and the FIRE community. In my early 30's with a family and working in tech in the PNW.
My question: I just bought an expensive home that closed earlier this year in a high cost of living area. While the home is expensive, I specifically bought it because it has a basement that is ideal for a rental unit. My thinking was my renting that out I could substantially reduce my housing costs. However, I've recently learned that I can work remotely moving forward. Thus, my incentive to remain in a high cost of living area is substantially reduced, and my thinking is that if I can reduce my housing costs then I might be able to reach FIRE faster. So, here are my specific questions:
1) How should I think about - at least from a financial perspective - whether I should sell my new house? On the one hand, I think I could reach FIRE faster if I could reduce my housing costs and invest the difference. As mentioned above, I think I'll eventually be able to rent out the basement of my house to reduce my current housing costs, but even if this is possible, I still have the liability of carrying a large mortgage. On the other hand, I have quite a bit saved for retirement in index funds, so maybe I should keep the house and just rent it as a form of diversification?
2) If I do decide to sell it, what is the best methods for recovering the transaction costs that go into buying and selling real estate? I've read online that if one lives in a house long enough that it's generally better than renting. So does that mean I just need to sit on the house for a couple of years to let it appreciate? Or should I try to sink some money into it to make repairs and make it more valuable in hopes of recovering more of my transaction costs? I'm really not sure whether it's time, added value through repairs/upgrades, or something else that will help me recover the transaction costs.
ANY help whatsoever will be greatly appreciated! And yes, I do know now that buying an expensive house isn't consistent with the MMM philosophy :)
Cheers!