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Great story! My wife and I recently sold our home and are now renting. My stress level has decreased 10 fold in the last 4 months since selling. There is always

• EdwardDiego 6y ago
  How is your security of tenure renting where you are? Sadly in my country, our rental laws are still firmly stuck in the "quarter-acre" dream of the 1960s, where renting was only something you did at university before shortly buying your first house with a tiny deposit and a Government backed home loan. These days as house prices rocket, only now are changes being made to tenancy laws to give tenants some more security. Back in my renting days, I had to move 4 times in 5 years because the landlord wanted to move in, or they sold it, or the farm my cottage was on had been sold and the new owner wanted it for workers, etc. So here, at least, owning removed a significant amount of stress for me - I know I'll still be living here in 5 years, I haven't been able to say that until now.
• tomerbd 6y ago
  What about a nag in the head that something would happen to the bank account that has the money that you got from selling the house or by money deprecation with relation to housing prices (or stock market crash if in stocks)?
  • johanvts 6y ago
    Buy some real estate that someone else lives in, maybe through a REIT.
• jdthedisciple 6y ago
  "...but our <A/C || roof || plumbing || appliance> is going to need to be replaced in the next year or so" How does this prevent you from going on a trip? I don't understand. Mind to elaborate a bit?
  • mrweasel 6y ago
    Replacing our roof last year was 40.000USD, (250.000DKK). While we able to pay it off faster, it’s basically a 14 year bank loan. Not everyone, depending on country and salary, is able to get those loans at reasonable rate, but you’ll still need a new roof. That means saving like crazy and holidays get expensive pretty fast, and isn’t something you REALLY need, making it a place to save money. Try saving to much on home maintenance and you risk damaging your property, lowering it’s value in the future. Owning a home is expensive, it’s still a sound finacial choice, depending on country and so on, but it has a running cost.
    • kugla 6y ago
      But even when renting the roof still needs to be replaced. Owner pays for it, but it is financed from rent money.
      • mrweasel 6y ago
        I don’t know how it works around the world, but maintenance of the property is normally factored into the rent. Large maintenance work won’t affect your rent so your expences are more predictable.
        • Jon_Lowtek 6y ago
          expenses are predictable, which may lower the stress level, which is the main part of the parent comment. However owners want to make money using the property, so rent is overall higher then the cost of owning the property including roof replacements. The problem many home buyers face is that it has become normal to go deeply into debt to buy and maintain a house, so it is not like they pay rent into their own house ownership account which slowly accumulates reserves for costly maintenance. A house costs twice as much as its sale price and if one has to go into dept to buy it in the first place, one is not middle class. Back in Boomer-Days a middle class worker could buy and maintain a house, provide for a family with multiple children, pay for their education and still have money left to go on vacation. Today two working parents can't do the same, instead children go into debt to finance their education and fathers live in their cars in googles parking lot.
• deanclatworthy 6y ago
  You have similar anxieties with renting. "When will my landlord give me my 6 month notice?" Depending on your location and who you are finding an apartment for rent can't be easier. e.g. in Finland most landlords won't pick foreign names.
  • pjc50 6y ago
    Six month notice? Try one month notice.
    • deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
  • have_faith 6y ago
    > 6 month notice What alternative timeline is this?
    • deanclatworthy 6y ago
      Europe :)
      • Dansvidania 6y ago
        Where in Europe? In my experience (In Italy, Spain, Czech Republic) the notice period is 2 months.
        • Hard_Space 6y ago
          UK. Source: Frequently happened to me when I rented.
          • jlokier 6y ago
            UK. Currently I can be given 2 months notice at any time. This is actually preferable to on the earlier time with this tenancy, where I could be given 2 months notice and also the landlord makes an active decision whether to renew or decline every 12 months. In fact they always send a no-reason formal eviction notice 3 months before the end of each 12 months renewal as a matter of policy, just to rub it in. (I would be surprised if that's legal. It seems against the spirit of eviction law where timescales are supposed to begin when a tenant refuses to leave, not months before they are supposed to leave) On one occasion they did decline to renew, giving no reason. They changed their mind at the last moment after I had a chat with the landlord's property manager. That was a source of great stress for me, not even knowing why. Eventually I found out. The agency (not landlord) told me, to my face, that they didn't know the why, couldn't get a reason, but the landlord had decided not to renew. But later the landlord's property manager told me that the agency had lied to my face and the landlord did not initiate the decline. It was the agency who had made the recommendation. I saw it advertised briefly at ~35% raise, so I suspect that was their motivation. These are not rent-controlled, I already pay a substantially above inflation annual raise, so it's not stuck on an ancient rate. If they had got a tenant in to replace me, not only would they have increased their agency fees as a percentage, they would have charged the landlord additional fees for processing a new tenant as well.
• WildGreenLeave 6y ago
  I am buying a place in the capital city of my country for this exact same reason. I want to travel and be free to do what I want, yet I also need a place to live in for the months that I'm not away traveling. I could rent something but that would be the same price as my mortgage and it will be lost money anyway. Instead I picked buying so only a small part (interest) is lost, but everything else goes back into my own pocket. So even if I'm only spending 50% in my own place it is still cheaper then renting. However, you are talking about things that I don't really have to worry about since it is an apartment. So maybe there is a slight difference here.
  • ant6n 6y ago
    What about using it as a vacation rebtal while away. There are probably companies that take care of the details. Personal stuff could be locked away somewhere.
  • deleted 6y ago
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  • heipei 6y ago
    It's important to realise that you can't compare your rent with your mortgage payments without factoring in a lot of things. The rent you pay includes things like taxes, insurances, upkeep, depreciation, risk and opportunity costs that your landlord has to pay while still coming out ahead. And he has to deal with all the administrative things too. So if you're a homeowner yourself, ask whether you're still coming out ahead carrying those costs yourself, plus the risk that something around your house breaks, plus the risk that your home might lose value for another reason, plus the opportunity cost of your down-payment not being invested otherwise (e.g. stocks). At the end of the day, it depends on the location and how far apart the purchase prices have diverged from rents. With the current economic situation and low interest rates, house prices where I live have mostly broken away from rents so significantly that it doesn't make any sense to buy from a financial standpoint.
    • WildGreenLeave 6y ago
      I've checked your profile and saw you are living in Germany, I am living in The Netherlands and buying in Amsterdam. I do not know if it is different in Germany so I cannot say too much about that. However, regardless of what the situation is, in the end the landlord will have to come out ahead when you are paying rent. Only by that definition it should save you money in the long run when buying your own place. The only argument that can be made is that the money you do not spend on your own house is money that could be put into a different investment like the stock market. But in NL renting a place is roughly as expensive as my monthly mortgage payments. So both situations it is money I cannot put in the stock market. Insurance and heating is being added on top of those monthly payments regardless of the option you pick.
• gambiting 6y ago
  >>There is always that little nag in the back of your mind regarding a house Do you not have any nagging thoughts about renting though? Because I went the exact opposite way. I was always super stressed when renting, because I knew that at the end of our contract the landlord could tell us to leave. Especially when we were on a monthly rolling contract, my stress about this was probably 10/10. Now that we bought a house I sleep well - if anything goes wrong I can probably repair it myself, in case of appliances I can buy second hand ones cheap or again, try the repair myself ...and for things I can't repair myself(ie - boiler) I have insurance for. It's about 10x less stressful than renting to me.
  • mattr47 6y ago
    You have insurance for major appliances ? Or do you mean a warranty?
    • gambiting 6y ago
      Boiler insurance. £100 a year, includes a service, if the boiler breaks down it will be repaired or replaced. Similar thing is available for things like dishwashers and washing machines, but I have never seen the need.
    • ggcdn 6y ago
      Not op but our mortgage lender offers a “total home warranty” for like $8/month which covers appliances and systems (hvac, boiler, etc). It’s basically appliance insurance. And at that price it’s a pretty good deal when buying a used house.
  • Daho0n 6y ago
    >because I knew that at the end of our contract the landlord could tell us to leave. Luckily this can't happen in most of the EU. Even if the contract say X years you can't throw people out after the contract runs out unless you are moving in yourself.
    • scandox 6y ago
• loloquwowndueo 6y ago
  The landlord has to make the same repairs you would, and still turn a profit, at a margin likely higher than a mortgage’s interest rate. So that nice saved-up vacation money would still go away eventually. For me the nag was about all the thing we wanted to do to the house but couldn’t because it was a rental. To each their own I guess - there are fair points for both approaches. Do what makes sense financially and keeps you happy / less worried :)
  • Supermancho 6y ago
    > The landlord has to make the same repairs you would, and still turn a profit, at a margin likely higher than a mortgage’s interest rate That's unlikely, if the rented space is part of a complex. The complex repairs are amortized across all the units. The issue is about cost per square footage. Given you don't have to pay for the same square footage (not the full lot, only the space your unit and parking occupies) it's almost always lower.
  • pacman2 6y ago
    Yes, but the landlord does this repairs pre-tax and all the repairs are deductible.
    • seanmcdirmid 6y ago
      Only against rental income right? Otherwise one could get a tax break simply by renting their own house to themselves. If just against rental income, then there still isn’t a difference (they get a tax break because tenants pay rent and for the repairs indirectly post tax). Also, they can’t both be pretax and deductible. The former, the money never shows up on taxes at all, the latter they show up as a subtraction on taxable income.
      • pacman2 6y ago
        I am not a tax specialist, nor do we know which country we are discussion (EU, US, Australia, like in the post). But it may make more sense to buy real estate to rent out to others and live somewhere else for rent. If a company holds a few apartments (and getting rid of non-paying renters can be tricky in some jurisdictions) then you can deduct interest payments, repairs etc. If you live in your own house I don't know how much you can deduct mortgage payments. And if you need a new roof then you have to pay for this by your after tax income salary. Big difference. I am eyeing a loft in an EU country. I wish I had the money to buy it, renovate it and making loft apartments out of it. One I would rent for myself (from my company).
• tkiolp4 6y ago
  Out of curiosity: would you be still renting when you are over 70? In my mind the kind of people who never mind owning a house is the kind of people who know they will inherit their parents’ house.
  • astrostl 6y ago
    I currently own and 100% expect to rent something like a low-maintenance condo in a community when older.
• tarsinge 6y ago
  I have quite the opposite experience: my stress level decreased since I own. I guess it depends on your financial comfort. Doing the vanlife is great but what happens if you lose your job and your van needs maintenance? Maybe add a downturn on the stock market. Suddenly you have nothing. It’s a very personal choice, for me traveling freely while being assured I have a place back home (albeit very minimalist) was needed.
• cko 6y ago
  I've been a landlord for ten years and I've always been a renter. For people like me with no desire to have kids and minimal ownership of furniture and toys, renting is nice. I've always wanted to be a renter for life, but recently I also have been thinking about buying some land in upstate New York or in the outskirts of some European city and building a livable structure like an A frame or a geodesic dome. I do think urban housing prices are insane. My rental units were in the suburbs, and now I have vacation rentals in Southern Utah instead. So the rent price ratios made sense. In denser cities, the landlord would have to out like 50% down just to break even on the mortgage. Yes, they may be cash flowing, but just barely, and the nuance is they put a massive down payment. It just depends on location. For those who need a general rule of thumb comparing rent vs mortgage, there's the 5% rule: https://www.pwlcapital.com/rent-or-own-your-home-5-rule/ https://www.pwlcapital.com/rent-or-own-your-home-5-rule/