Well, I’m pretty sick to my stomach!

[NotCranky]

Ouch Perry!
That’s some “tough love.” Better that Relo have real figures to show her husband.

575k vs 350k= 225k up front and roughly an additional 200k in interest for the life of the loans plus the opportunity lost to compound both ammounts over time in investments.

It’s only money.

Aren’t we both hypocrits though? Staying put in our primary residences? Even if they aren’t leveraged there are serious opportunity cost if we are right about forthcoming depreciation. You have pretty pricey tastes in houses. Are there not eventually opportunity costs in that?

[Farls]

Seattle-relo,
I’m sympathetic to your situation…but you seem to be blaming everyone but yourself. For such a large purchase maybe you should have done more homework before making the purchase. You have blamed:
1) The real estate agents.
2) The locals for being in denial of market conditions.
3) The seller for non-disclosure of problems.
4) The inspector for not finding problems.

It’s sounding like excuse after excuse with no personal accountability for your actions.

Sorry you’re in a bad situation…but no one held a gun to your head to buy the house.

[Farls]

Seattle-relo,
I’m sympathetic to your situation…but you seem to be blaming everyone but yourself. For such a large purchase maybe you should have done more homework before making the purchase. You have blamed:
1) The real estate agents.
2) The locals for being in denial of market conditions.
3) The seller for non-disclosure of problems.
4) The inspector for not finding problems.

It’s sounding like excuse after excuse with no personal accountability for your actions.

Sorry you’re in a bad situation…but no one held a gun to your head to buy the house.

[seattle-relo]

Yikes, that really painful! If we sold now and are lucky to get what we paid for 575K, we’d have to pay up to 10% in sellers fees – 57,000. Since we put only 5% down we’d have to show up with about another 27K – which we have in the bank, but that’s almost ALL our liquid savings, the rest is in 401K’s and mutual funds.(You might ask why we didn’t put down more- I don’t know either – it seemed to make sense at the time) So even if we wanted to buy in 2 years, we wouldn’t have 10-20% to put down to buy low. I don’t know that we could save that much – maybe. I just don’t think I could talk him into giving away 27K in cash because he really believes the market isn’t going to tank. I will try to get him to see reason, the tax data might work. Someone asked why we moved here, it was because of a great job opportunity for my husband – both salary and work. responsibilites.

[seattle-relo]

Yikes, that really painful! If we sold now and are lucky to get what we paid for 575K, we’d have to pay up to 10% in sellers fees – 57,000. Since we put only 5% down we’d have to show up with about another 27K – which we have in the bank, but that’s almost ALL our liquid savings, the rest is in 401K’s and mutual funds.(You might ask why we didn’t put down more- I don’t know either – it seemed to make sense at the time) So even if we wanted to buy in 2 years, we wouldn’t have 10-20% to put down to buy low. I don’t know that we could save that much – maybe. I just don’t think I could talk him into giving away 27K in cash because he really believes the market isn’t going to tank. I will try to get him to see reason, the tax data might work. Someone asked why we moved here, it was because of a great job opportunity for my husband – both salary and work. responsibilites.

[seattle-relo]

You are right, I only have myself to blame, my original point was that a lot of buyers out there really are blind to what’s going on. We honestly didn’t know how serious it was and I would imagine other recent buyers don’t either. My other question when posting on this site was to get a better understanding of the longterm consequence and how people dealt with it in the past. Yes I am angry that I made a bad decision and yes I am angry that the inspector missed thousands of dollars of repairs, but I don’t blame him, he didn’t make me buy the house. It’s too late now, so I am just trying to figure out what to do next, that’s all.

[seattle-relo]

You are right, I only have myself to blame, my original point was that a lot of buyers out there really are blind to what’s going on. We honestly didn’t know how serious it was and I would imagine other recent buyers don’t either. My other question when posting on this site was to get a better understanding of the longterm consequence and how people dealt with it in the past. Yes I am angry that I made a bad decision and yes I am angry that the inspector missed thousands of dollars of repairs, but I don’t blame him, he didn’t make me buy the house. It’s too late now, so I am just trying to figure out what to do next, that’s all.

[SD Realtor]

Seattle Relo –

I do agree with the points Perry made about interest and HOA cost. For the overpayment of property tax, the post was incorrect. If your home depreciates you can always go to the assessor and get it reassessed so you will not pay more in property taxes then the neighbor who lives next to you and bought at a lower price.

Additionally, I would suggest that if you are going to resell your home, that you really sit down and crunch the numbers. Don’t confine that number crunching to the cost of just selling your home either. Let me explain. Many people who post here do so before buying a home. They ask, should I buy the home. As you expect the standard answer from most everyone here is, no you should wait. Many posts have been made comparing renting to buying and lots of viewpoints are made with somewhat varying conclusions. Among the biggest point of conversation is, the cost of renting verses buying. The big topics there are of course the write off you get when you own AS WELL AS, the opportunity of investing the downpayment you would have made on the home you are considering buying.

So your case is unique. Not only have you put a downpayment into the home already, but you now have additional money you will be needing to spend to get OUT of the house.

There is no doubt that the market will continue to depreciate and it very much could hit the numbers that Perry used. It also may appreciate faster or slower after it bottoms out. Also yes if you look at the money you will pay in interest, and HOAs it adds up to potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Yet here is my point. You guys made one move without REALLY thinking it out. Don’t make another one without REALLY thinking it out. I am going to type this out slowly… Go…talk…to…your…accountant…Run out a few different scenarios of what the future may hold. Compare holding onto the house verses bailing out and selling. You have numbers that you can use for estimating the cost of the sale so you know that value. Also use a few different scenarios for the depreciation cycle as well as the appreciation values in the other direction. Get information on the cost of renting so you can know what your rent will be. Your accountant can help you figure out what your tax savings or non savings will be.

I think you will find that yes, if you sell now and time your purchase correctly, that the best thing would be to indeed suck it up and bail out now. Many people cannot get over the admission of a mistake and if you did sit tight for many years and could afford the payments then you would be okay. You would be overpaying, of that there can be no doubt. Yet don’t do anything without really really knowing what the implications are.

SD Realtor

[SD Realtor]

Seattle Relo –

I do agree with the points Perry made about interest and HOA cost. For the overpayment of property tax, the post was incorrect. If your home depreciates you can always go to the assessor and get it reassessed so you will not pay more in property taxes then the neighbor who lives next to you and bought at a lower price.

Additionally, I would suggest that if you are going to resell your home, that you really sit down and crunch the numbers. Don’t confine that number crunching to the cost of just selling your home either. Let me explain. Many people who post here do so before buying a home. They ask, should I buy the home. As you expect the standard answer from most everyone here is, no you should wait. Many posts have been made comparing renting to buying and lots of viewpoints are made with somewhat varying conclusions. Among the biggest point of conversation is, the cost of renting verses buying. The big topics there are of course the write off you get when you own AS WELL AS, the opportunity of investing the downpayment you would have made on the home you are considering buying.

So your case is unique. Not only have you put a downpayment into the home already, but you now have additional money you will be needing to spend to get OUT of the house.

There is no doubt that the market will continue to depreciate and it very much could hit the numbers that Perry used. It also may appreciate faster or slower after it bottoms out. Also yes if you look at the money you will pay in interest, and HOAs it adds up to potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Yet here is my point. You guys made one move without REALLY thinking it out. Don’t make another one without REALLY thinking it out. I am going to type this out slowly… Go…talk…to…your…accountant…Run out a few different scenarios of what the future may hold. Compare holding onto the house verses bailing out and selling. You have numbers that you can use for estimating the cost of the sale so you know that value. Also use a few different scenarios for the depreciation cycle as well as the appreciation values in the other direction. Get information on the cost of renting so you can know what your rent will be. Your accountant can help you figure out what your tax savings or non savings will be.

I think you will find that yes, if you sell now and time your purchase correctly, that the best thing would be to indeed suck it up and bail out now. Many people cannot get over the admission of a mistake and if you did sit tight for many years and could afford the payments then you would be okay. You would be overpaying, of that there can be no doubt. Yet don’t do anything without really really knowing what the implications are.

SD Realtor

[waiting hawk]

I laugh when people talk about everyone “on the fence”, going to buy any minute. That is total BS. Look at ALL the bubble blogs. You are talking about maybe 1000 people in the whole US. Everyone else on those blogs are Realtors. As for buying to soon, I would stop reading any of these sites and just go on in life. We are still in the early stages. I even recognize everyone on all the other sites. I saw Cow Tipping post on housing panic today.

[waiting hawk]

I laugh when people talk about everyone “on the fence”, going to buy any minute. That is total BS. Look at ALL the bubble blogs. You are talking about maybe 1000 people in the whole US. Everyone else on those blogs are Realtors. As for buying to soon, I would stop reading any of these sites and just go on in life. We are still in the early stages. I even recognize everyone on all the other sites. I saw Cow Tipping post on housing panic today.

[Chris Scoreboard Johnston]

Chris Johnston

There is absolutely nothing wrong with your situation. To just sell your house now to avoid this world ending financial debacle that many are calling for would be more foolish. People in here treat housing like the outcome they predict is 100% guaranteed. They are so sure that they will be able to buy the exact house they want in the exact location they desire, for 50% off. I will say this, I am just as sure they will not be able to do that. Who is to say who is right at this point.

Focus on your job opportunity and enjoy the area. You have already bought it least some off the peak, and it is possible the world will not end in RE. If we only drop another 10% you would be foolish to sell. There are only a few real experts on RE in here, everyone else is just an internet RE expert from reading about what MIGHT happen. So you cannot brag at the next cocktail party about your housing gains, big deal. I just bought a home for quite a bit more than your price, and could care less what happens to its value, I bought it to live in it and enjoy life. You should never buy a home just to make a quick gain on it.

Although it is highly unlikely that we will get into any kind of RE boom in the next few years, it is possible that prices will just drift slowly down like they are now. In that instance, you will be fine. You cannot day trade houses anyway. People in many parts of the country live for long periods being upside down or flat on their house values, and never have a thought about it because it is not an investment.

[Chris Scoreboard Johnston]

Chris Johnston

There is absolutely nothing wrong with your situation. To just sell your house now to avoid this world ending financial debacle that many are calling for would be more foolish. People in here treat housing like the outcome they predict is 100% guaranteed. They are so sure that they will be able to buy the exact house they want in the exact location they desire, for 50% off. I will say this, I am just as sure they will not be able to do that. Who is to say who is right at this point.

Focus on your job opportunity and enjoy the area. You have already bought it least some off the peak, and it is possible the world will not end in RE. If we only drop another 10% you would be foolish to sell. There are only a few real experts on RE in here, everyone else is just an internet RE expert from reading about what MIGHT happen. So you cannot brag at the next cocktail party about your housing gains, big deal. I just bought a home for quite a bit more than your price, and could care less what happens to its value, I bought it to live in it and enjoy life. You should never buy a home just to make a quick gain on it.

Although it is highly unlikely that we will get into any kind of RE boom in the next few years, it is possible that prices will just drift slowly down like they are now. In that instance, you will be fine. You cannot day trade houses anyway. People in many parts of the country live for long periods being upside down or flat on their house values, and never have a thought about it because it is not an investment.

[waiting hawk]

“They are so sure that they will be able to buy the exact house they want in the exact location they desire, for 50% off. I will say this, I am just as sure they will not be able to do that. Who is to say who is right at this point. ”

I would listen more to the people that have been right than wrong in last few years though right? That is how I look at it. Most in here where right as housing still looked like the best thing in the entire world.

[waiting hawk]

“They are so sure that they will be able to buy the exact house they want in the exact location they desire, for 50% off. I will say this, I am just as sure they will not be able to do that. Who is to say who is right at this point. ”

I would listen more to the people that have been right than wrong in last few years though right? That is how I look at it. Most in here where right as housing still looked like the best thing in the entire world.

[Author]

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