Homeowners

[negadave]

All you dudebro's that own houses. When did you buy your first house and what made you pull the trigger and go for it??

I just turned 30 and i've been paying rent for like 12 years. I'm thinking i should look into buying. Any advice?

[NussieT]

My husband and I bought our first house 4 years ago this June. I was 20 and he was 23.
We bought it for a number of reason including we no longer wanted to live in a mouse infested apartment, didn't want to pay rent, and my husband wanted a garage to work on his shit.
As for advice, get what you want and don't settle and don't go out and buy a large house if its just you... It'll be more to clean.

[negadave]

Two incomes would help. I'd rather get a tiny house on some acreage than some $450,000 house in a subdivision with no privacy. That's what we build. I don't know why people buy them.

[Derick]

Two incomes would help. I'd rather get a tiny house on some acreage than some $450,000 house in a subdivision with no privacy. That's what we build. I don't know why people buy them.

300,000 buys you a very average house here. Anything less than 300 and you get a shithole. I too have been renting forever, I would like to buy within the next couple of years, but having a second income would help

[the keifer]

I bought my place 5 yrs ago at the age of 24 when I left my parents house. Got it for 119k in 05. Has 3 bedrooms 2 full baths 1/3 acre and a one car garage.

First off before you start looking, you want to go to your bank/mortgage rep with a month of paystubs. Also figure what you have for a down payment too. If you have a 20% down payment or more, you won't have to pay for PMI insurance. For me that knocked $50mo off of my payment. Figure on property taxes getting worked into your payments too. That's the escrow account. Also there is a closing cost in there too. That pays for the attorney that's involved during settlement. Once they determine what you can afford, than you can start seriously looking.

Getting the house is another story. Took me a month between looking at the house and the settlement. Doesn't hurt to try and get the owner to drop the price a little. Be ready for a lot of paperwork and signing your sig about 100 times during settlement.

It might cost more than renting now, but it will be better in the long run.
And good luck!

[the keifer]

Two incomes would help. I'd rather get a tiny house on some acreage than some $450,000 house in a subdivision with no privacy. That's what we build. I don't know why people buy them.

300,000 buys you a very average house here. Anything less than 300 and you get a shithole. I too have been renting forever, I would like to buy within the next couple of years, but having a second income would help

150,000 is average for here.

[Pete Nice]

I bought my house in 2007, I was just tired of throwing money away in rent. I wish I would have bought a house, any house, right out of college, even if it was some 40k frat house right off campus, anything to have built up equity and sold when ready to move up in quality. One of my best friends bought a house in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida shortly out of college for a good price. He lived there for about 4 or 5 years and sold it for a healthy profit when his work moved him to DC. He used the money to pay a HEALTHY down payment on the house in DC. Then the housing market EXPLODED. His work moved him back to Pittsburgh and sold his home in DC at such a healthy profit that he was able to flat out buy his current home in an affluent area of Pittsburgh and currently has no mortgage. I wish I had done something like that.

I used to be a mortgage broker, so I can help with those kind of questions if you have any. I know Derick was looking into it a few years ago and we discussed it. I suggest, like Keefer said, saving at least a 10% down payment, 20% is better, the more the better, gets you a lower rate and not PMI (private mortgage insurance).

My house has 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, a one car garage and a yard that I forget how big it is. I need to remodel the bathrooms and kitchen, but am taking things one thing at a time. I currently have all new stainless steel appliances and am going to remodel the main bathroom and first floor bathroom next spring. The kitchen hopefully the year after that. Then put a deck out back after that. I knew there were things that I wanted to do in my house when I bought it to get it where I wanted it, but it also was good to go when I bought it as is, livable and nice. I would never buy a house that needs work just to make it livable or presentable.

I could go on and on and on, but I have to go to COmcast and get some new converters. Post some specific questions and I can answer them.

[Hondo]

Bought my first house in 1992 when I was 25. $64K bought a 1500 square foot, 3BR house with a 2 car garage. Ah...those were the days. My advice...rent blows. If you live in anything close to a decent housing market buy and start building equity. By the time you reach my age with a few more houses you'll be set.

[Brampton]

All you dudebro's that own houses. When did you buy your first house and what made you pull the trigger and go for it??

I just turned 30 and i've been paying rent for like 12 years. I'm thinking i should look into buying. Any advice?

If you've been paying rent for 12 years, your ready to buy a house.

We bought our house last year, moved in last summer. We bought cause rent where we were living was about 75% of a morgage payment, so it only made sense.

We got our house rather cheap :roll: for about 275k........If I were to have bought a house in my hometown, equivalent to the house I got, it would have cost at least 400k.

[michaelangelo]

a few years ago, i was renting a place with a couple of friends, then they moved out, so I moved in with a couple of other friends. Then they decided to move out too, so I ended up back at my mom's house. Then my mom asked if i was going to stay here in Grande Prairie and I said yes so she helped me by putting a large down payment on my house. I had 3 roommates when I first moved in, my wife, her sister and a guy who replied to an ad in the paper. Our third renter changed a few times and eventually it was just my wife and I. Thanks to my mom though, our mortgage was very affordable. We paid $172000 for the house in 2003 and now it's worth at least $250000. We've since moved into a bigger house but we still have the other one as a rental and backup incase we have to leave our current home.

[bdinva]

Something else to consider:

Only buy a property if you plan to stay in one place for several years. If you move around every 5 years, renting is going to be cheaper because you won't incur the costs for closing, maintenance, taxes, insurance, and interest on the loan. The "payback" of owning doesn't really occur until you start paying off your principle balance OR the house appreciates significantly (which is not likely to happen in today's market).

That being said, owning property and not having to worry about a landlord messing with you, doing whatever you want with the place, etc, is probably worth more or less to some people.

You'll also want to consider the market you live in. I bought earlier this year - $150k got me 1900 sq ft, built in 2001, 3 br 2.5 bath, 2 car garage in a great neighborhood just outside of Charlotte, NC. I have friends living in the larger markets (Chicago, NY, DC, etc) where $300k will barely get you a shack built in the 70s that smells like your grandma's basement. Their incomes aren't proportionately higher than mine either to make up for the difference in cost of living. They'll be renting well into their 30s if they don't move or triple their income.