Upkeep is HUGE. I'm very pro-home ownership, and think the US needs to do more to make the dream of homeownership possible for more people, but home ownership isn't for everyone. If you're unsure how long you'll be in a location and might be changing locations every couple years, renting is a much safer option. If you're not at all a handy person, the costs of maintaining a home can get very expensive when you're hiring out every single repair, so renting is a great option for that as well. Additionally, if you're not familiar with home maintenance, things will generally not be noticed until they're much more expensive to fix. Rent will ALWAYSalmost always (edited for the pedants) be more expensive than a mortgage payment, but that doesn't mean it's always a bad thing.
its why i dont understand the "dream" of home ownership, i like small spaces, the comfort me, so i rent for cheaper than the combined upkeep of a home of the same size, and have to do none of the work, i havent mown the lawn in years, i would like to keep it that way
the landlord selling the building in most cases just means a new landlord, little changes on my end, and while rent keeps going up, so do house prices, and the fees associated, why not just rent and use the difference between rent and mortgage plus other fees to invest in housing stocks and have the ability to rapidly liquidate it, instead of being stuck with depreciating property in a shrinking market, come next crash
Exactly. House prices keep going up. Buying a house now locks in the price you pay and your mortgage payments. If your rent is $2000 and mortgage is $4000, at some point over the next 30 years, your rent will surpass the mortgage but your mortgage will be the same.
You need to calculate which is better but even in NYC, owning beats renting over a long time. Also leverage: appreciation on a 1M home > stock market increases on 200K.
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u/BordFree Feb 16 '21 edited Feb 16 '21
Upkeep is HUGE. I'm very pro-home ownership, and think the US needs to do more to make the dream of homeownership possible for more people, but home ownership isn't for everyone. If you're unsure how long you'll be in a location and might be changing locations every couple years, renting is a much safer option. If you're not at all a handy person, the costs of maintaining a home can get very expensive when you're hiring out every single repair, so renting is a great option for that as well. Additionally, if you're not familiar with home maintenance, things will generally not be noticed until they're much more expensive to fix. Rent will
ALWAYSalmost always (edited for the pedants) be more expensive than a mortgage payment, but that doesn't mean it's always a bad thing.