I’m not out because I’m attempting to time the market, I’m out because when I sold, I got disgusted with the competition and thought the prices were insane. Then they went up some more.
When I look around Irvine, Huntington Beach and see pretty standard tract homes with $1.1 Million price tags on them, and it’s all regular middle class families, it’s “just not right”.
I was looking for a modest 3/2 (just like everybody else), they were $799,000 and gone in a day. Once you break the “I want” stranglehold on your emotions with housing, the compromise becomes much easier.
My alternative, while not a 3/2 with a quaint yard, was to split a dual master bedroom townhome with a friend, a mile off the beach, in a complex with three pools, sauna, 2 tennis courts, 2 car garage, etc. Yep that’s a big difference. A roommate, townhome, I wanted an SFR and no roommates. You may wonder what could possibly make giving up what I wanted tolerable. The answer is simple.
My half the rent is 1/6th of the mortgage and tax payment of trying to buy something I wanted. Plus I have someone to pick up half the utilities!
Granted, my income tax bill sucketh. However, since I don’t have a fat mortgage payment, I can pretty much fly off any weekend I feel like getting out of town.
When buying that 3/2 or a larger 4/3 becomes closer to comparable rent, I’ll get going and not worry about the bottom.
