“I was looking on craigslist and 3/4 br 2 bath houses @1500 sf in Poway look like they rent for ~$2000+”
Well, a $350,000 house with 20% down and 6% interest would have a mortgage+tax payment of about $1900 dollars. Not enough to cover your all your costs completely but it could help in an emergency.
I would say that if you only plan on staying in the house for 5 years then you should rent. Houses have a lot of transaction costs associated with buying and selling and that’d be hard to make up in 5-years during a normal market much less the one we’re in.
