Temeculaguy – I really like those ones, I hadn’t considered them because we would prefer to be closer to the freeway (my husband will be commuting to Fallbrook), but I think I’ll take a second look.
Rent is $1450 for the DR Horton townhomes. I stopped by today, and the asking price for the same plan is $235k (3 story, 2bd/2ba). It backs up to a park and they’ve built about 1/3 of the development so far. Taxes are 1.4%, HOA is $199. While I was talking to them today, they offered to pay 3% towards the down pmt., $8k towards closing costs, one year of HOA fees, and include the washer/dryer and fridge – about $20k in incentives according to their calculations. The payment that I calculated is about $1900 unless I put down more (which I really don’t want to do, because I’d rather pay down some other debt and increase our savings).
We’re not selling because of a short sale – our property just needs a TON of work, and my husband and I realized that neither of us are interested in maintaining a large property. My husband’s elderly father has also been living in our guest house and the utilities costs combined with the expenses of caring for his father were more than we wanted, so we decided to simplify our situation. Our plan is to rent or buy and stay there for a few years while we look for a lot in Fallbrook and build a home.
As for savings, we have about $40k saved, as well as a healthy CalSTRS pension (I’ve been triple-contributing for the past few years). We would like to build our savings and investments even more though, and that’s another reason why we are selling our home and downsizing.
My gut feeling is that we should rent for a year or so. It sounds like prices are still falling in Temec., and I would probably be irritated if we bought and then the prices went significantly lower.
