Whenever I hear someone is paying a small fortune in rent – an everyday occurrence in this town – it strikes me how many people don’t realize how easy and affordable it can be to buy a home. The discussion of renting vs. buying is all too often shut down before exploring all available options (some of which may surprise you!).
Consider this: In today’s mortgage market, for every $500 you pay in rent, you are pretty much paying $100,000 of mortgage. If you’re paying $2500 per month, that’s $500k in mortgage.
Even in our expensive town, you can buy a home for $500k or less. Here are a couple of recent success stories that prove it is possible!
First-time Home Buyers
Sonya and Jacob are doing things just a little backwards! They are getting married soon and just bought their first home. They were realistic about what they can afford now, so we discussed options and looked at a variety of properties. Granted, it isn’t the home of their dreams, however it is a great foot in the door where they have tax write offs and are building equity, rather than wasting money on rent.
Building and Using Equity
Alan and Elizabeth bought their first condo shortly after they were married. Fast forward 4 years (and 2 children), we have their condo in escrow and them in escrow on a house! The house needs some work, and they know they can manage it as their payment for the house will end up being almost exactly the same as the mortgage for the condo was. The equity in the condo provided a great down payment for the house!
It IS Possible!!
What? You don’t have any money to buy a home? Did you know you can buy a home for less than 3.5-5% down? On a $500,000 condo, that is $17,500. Perhaps your parents can help you out? Perhaps you can have one less dinner out per week or wait to buy a new car? Do you really need those new shoes? It really isn’t as difficult as people think. If you are a veteran, you can buy for 0% down, nothing, zilch, zero – yup, that’s what I said! You may have a few closing costs or inspections, but that’s easy!
Credit isn’t great? Talk to a Lender – click here for the contact info for several great lenders we work with! They can run your credit report and help you figure out the easiest way to improve your score so you get the best mortgage interest rate possible!
The latest and greatest tool in our tool belt is Down Payment Assistance, which has various programs and options to help overcome that challenge!
The bottom line: home ownership is attainable for more people than you would expect. At least it is worth having a conversation about, right?
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