4 ms·
Maybe in the market this very moment it's tougher to buy, but I bought in 2020 and my mortgage + other expenses pretty much match what I was paying in an expens
by whateveracct 3y ago
Maybe in the market this very moment it's tougher to buy, but I bought in 2020 and my mortgage + other expenses pretty much match what I was paying in an expensive city (Seattle). I didn't buy in Seattle but it's an easy drive away.
And my house is 3k sqft vs the 800 I had in the city. And that space is put to work: Proper office, guestroom, gym room, much larger and nicer kitchen (which in turn saves me even more money because I cook more), charcoal grill outside, room for more guitars and drums, proper dining room for hosting family gatherings, a porch I can sit and smoke on. The list goes on.
Grocery store is walkable and the neighborhood is nice to walk in for exercise. City experiences are 20-40 min away depending on which city I wanna hang out in. I guess I have to have a car but I had one in the city anyways since I liked to drive to destinations around Seattle. It's an old Civic still kicking so it's pretty cheap all told.
For the same money per month, locked in for years. If I renewed my lease in 2020 during the pandemic instead of owning, I'd be materially less well off.
- blackguardx 3y agoWhat city do you live in now? When I lived in Seattle, most of the suburbs with 3k sqft houses weren't that walkable.
- whateveracct 3y agoI moved to a Tacoma suburb instead. Tacoma is a very cool city in its own right! It's my main city I do stuff in.
- daveguy 3y agoIt must be nice to get a mortgage at ~3.1% or less. Do you realize that you would be paying over 50% more per month for that same mortgage today? Would you still consider that a super good deal that you can't imagine anyone not taking? Rate lock-in isn't that great with a high interest rate, because you are going to need to pay thousands to refinance. I get where you're coming from, but it's a different analysis today than it was 3 years ago.
- whateveracct 3y agoOh yeah right now - it's time to rent. If this was the economy in summer of 2020, I would've probably kept rolling with my apartment (which I did like a lot) while continuing to stash away liquid savings for when buying a house became a good deal again. But this article is about "Forever" Renters. I highly doubt buying a house will never be worth it if you follow the above path.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]