[an]

[quote=bearishgurl]Of course, it’s anecdotal, but I believe at least 40% of homebuyers put down at least 30%. We in lower-priced properties (this includes YOU, AN and ME) don’t see this because we don’t come into contact with it, like a RE professional would. In properties above $600K, I believe that the majority of current buyers put down 30% to 50%. Of course, this didn’t happen during the “millenium boom.” During that time, lenders routinely approved unqualified buyers to borrow far more $$ than they could ever pay back and also routinely made 100% LTV mortgages using 2nd TDs. This enabled purchasers who could qualify for a $150-$300K purchase on a bright sunny day (in a “normal” lending environment) to qualify for a $500-$850K purchase and drove up the prices of properties that should have been $200-$600K less under normal circumstances.[/quote]
I wasn’t talking about the $600k+ move up buyers. I know they put down a lot. I’m talking about the $400-600k buyers in 4S. I highly doubt there are that many move up buyers who would want to buy in the $400-600k range. Those tend to be the “detached condo” type. BTW, I know a few who are those buyers. They all are first time buyers and they’re professionals in their late 20s – early 30s.

[an]

[quote=captcha]
Single vs. dual matters because part of the ‘comfortable’ is psychological. I am more comfortable spending $X/month if I know that I can easily generate another $50K/year income stream.

I used 25% because that’s what it takes to get the best rate. Your tax deduction is rather conservative. Assuming $600 in principal payment and $100 insurance (and skipping the MR deductible-or-not discussion) the deduction should be ~25-30%, i.e. ~$500-600/month.

Looking around, most 4S families are either families of retired/active military officers or immigrant engineers working at major SD companies. Usually with limited medical bills (decent insurance) and no student loans (foreign educated, government paid, etc).

I am not saying what you are getting in 4S Ranch is worth the money, just that fiscally-responsible single-income $125K/year family can rather comfortable afford $500K place.[/quote]
Psychological is different for different people. Some might find it more comforting that both parents are working and it’s easier to find a job when you were recently employed vs being out of the work force for so long.

How many people actually put down 25%? I don’t know the statistics, but I would assume it’s not that many. Especially people in the $400-600k range. I compute my tax deduction based on (interest + tax – standard deduction) * 25% tax bracket. You forgot the standard deduction in your calculation.

Even with decent insurance where you don’t have to pay for any of the premium, you still have out of pocket stuff, dental stuff, vision stuff. They add a little or a lot, depend on how much you use/need. How many people don’t have student loans? Why am I hearing all the talk about student loans being a huge problem, yet you don’t think anyone in 4S have student loans? I didn’t even talk about saving for rainy day yet, just retirement. Again, lets assume you’re right and those who live in 4S spend $0 on medical and student loan, how much does a family spend a month? You have $2200 to play with. How much would be a good rainy day saving? To me, comfortable would be saving $1k-2k/month for rainy day, on top of maxing out 401k and IRA. That would leave this theoretical family $200-1200 to spend on everything else. I don’t consider that comfortable.

All of this is talking about a $500k house too, how about a $600k house? If you recall, ocrenter was saying $400-600k and I said it should be more like $300-500k. Ideally, it would be $300-500k w/out HOA&MR.

[an]

[quote=pri_dk]You mean like the 10%+ inflation in the late 1970s/early 1980s? – Whatever happened to that?[/quote]
I wonder what happen to nominal housing prices during the 70s. I could have sworn it drops less than 2-3%/year.

[an]

[quote=captcha]There is a difference between two income family making $125K combined and one-income family with college-educated stay-at-home-by-choice parent making the same amount of money and the latter is more common than the former in 4S Ranch.

PITI on $500K with 25% down in 4S is ~$2600-$2800. With tax deductions we are talking $2-$2.2K month. It would be nicer if it was $1,500, but $2,200 on one salary of $10K/month is doable without much stretching.[/quote]
It doesn’t matter if it’s dual income $125k HHI or single income $125k HHI. What matter, is if it’s before or after tax. $125k before tax, even with single income is still not enough to comfortable afford $600k (w/out HOA/MR), much less $600k in areas like 4S/SEH where HOA+MR comes out to be another ~$400.

Why did you use 25% vs 20%? Does that help your numbers? Using conventional 20%, $400k loan on a $500k house with today’s rate (assuming you have great credit), the P+I is $1900. Tax should be about $450 + ~$400 for HOA+MR + ~$100 for insurance, and you’re looking at $2850/month. Tax deduction is ~$330/month. So, we’re looking at ~$2500/month after tax deduction. $125k before tax would be about $100k after tax. That’s $8300/month. So, we’re looking about $5800/month after tax to spend on other things besides your shelter. How much do you think a typical family spend on eating, gas, student loans, car loan, etc? Now, about medical expenses? Then, how about retirement? If you’re prudent and max out your 401k AND IRA (assuming Roth for both spouses), that would come out to $3600/month. So, just after retirement, you only have $2200/month to spend on eating, gas, student loans, car loans, entertainment, after school activities, travel, medical expenses. I’m ONLY using a $500k house example too. Imagine how much tighter it’ll be if I use a $600k house example.

[an]

[quote=ocrenter]At $125k, you are averaging $10k per month. $500k house with 20% down at 4.5% mortgage rate you are looking at $2000 monthly mortgage. Add $700/month for property tax and MR/HOA, so that’ll be $2700/month. That’s less than 30% of income on housing.

And remember you do get 20% of that mortgage interest and property tax back on tax refund.

I would not lump del sur in with 4S/SEH, Del Sur MR and HOA is at least $300 more per month compared to 4S/SEH.[/quote]
Oh, you’re talking $125k after tax HHI. Then I totally agree with you. I thought you’re talking about before tax $125k HHI.

Yes, Del Sur MR+HOA is ~$300/month more. $300/month equate to about $60k in price when broken down to monthly payment. So, my $300-500k for Del Sur would be ~$360-560k.

[an]

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[an]

[quote=ocrenter]4S and SEH is perfect for middle class families that put good schools on top of their list. $400-$600K range is what 4S/SEH homes should be at. Essentially, we are looking at folks that make around combined $125k range.

If you are in brackets over that, it isn’t your cup of tea.

The problem of course is the bubble pushed the prices beyond the $600k barrier even though the houses remained in that $400-$600k quality. Especially the north side where the houses are even more tightly packed in as the builders hurried to jam in homes as the bubble was ready to pop.[/quote]
There’s no way a HHI of $125k could comfortable afford $400-600k with the HOA & MR that those areas have. Now, if you remove the HOA & MR, then I would agree with you. With HOA and MR at 4S, Del Sur, & SEH level, I would say the price should be more around $300-500k for a HH with HHI of $125k to comfortably afford.

[an]

[quote=flu][quote=Hobie]And the sun keep coming up in the morning and my garden keeps growing. Let’s talk about this issue next November.[/quote]

I’d like to know more important things… Do you think think Justin Bieber is really the father of a baby with Mariah Yeater? I’d say no…[/quote]
You know the baby’s mamma’s name? That’s frightening 🙂

[an]

[quote=flu]I prefer to spend my time watching two groups of grown men trying to bounce a ball around and putting the ball in a small hoop that is above the ground…It’s just too bad they are all on strike because they feel underpaid for doing so :([/quote]
Damn those greedy 1%.

[an]

Adding a fantastic electrician to this list. His name is Mike Ginnett. He values referal, so he will do what he can to keep you happy. He also does not nickel and dime you on all the small requests. He also install reccess lights for $40/light (part AND labor), which also include one switch. This is the best price I’ve ever seen. All of his business are from referal. His contact is:

Mike Ginnett
Cell: 1-714-363-1948
E-mail: [email protected]

He serve as far north as Bakersfield/Santa Barbara and as far south as the border.

[an]

Mira Mesa, University City, some part of La Jolla, OW, RB, Solana Beach and Cardiff.

[an]

[quote=Rich Toscano]Great post afx… you pretty much summed up my experience as well. Like you, I use Backblaze as the secondary backup, with Time Machine as the first line of defense.[/quote]
Thanks guys for vouching for Backblaze. I will definitely consider it when my Mozy contract end.

[an]

[quote=captcha]
Mac touchpad is major productivity booster and with Lion you can grab any edge to resize a window (and with some tricks if you hold option or ctrl simultaneously, but no win+left/right arrow for snap-to-edge like on Win7). What I don’t like are the tools. Having to use Xcode 3.xx after VS2008 was frustrating experience.

+1 for dropbox and for turning down 100M+ offer from Steve Jobs.[/quote]
I HATE touchpad. Always did and always will. I like my mouse. I turn up my mouse sensitivity to max, which allow me to get around the screen with very little movement. With touchpad, I have to move too much, and I don’t like that. It’s fun seeing people taking over my mouse without asking me (so I can turn down the sensitivity) and freak out because they don’t know where the mouse went.

I don’t have Lion, so I didn’t know they finally implement that feature. But I’m glad they did. Windows and Linux have that feature for well over a decade now. There is a 3rd party app that let you snap to edge like Win7, but you have to pay ~$20 for it.

I totally agree about XCode. XCode 4 is much better than XCode 3, but still light years behind Visual Studio AND Eclipse. Also, the fact that XCode 4 for Lion doesn’t work on Snow Leopard is retarded.

[an]

[quote=svelte]i haven’t had a single crash with win 7 after running it 10 months. i have had 2 or 3 freezes, but i have attributed that to hw issues (maybe incorrectly, i don’t know).

i do know that for the mountain of money i save buying hw and sw that is much much cheaper than apple or linux counterparts, i can put up with a few more problems and i’m not sure i even have more problems at this point. that’s just me.

i don’t use external usbs due to sw crashes but due to hard drive failures, which are much more devastating.[/quote]
HDD failures is the biggest reason why I don’t take care of my own back up. Although, I do have plan to put a RAID 5 on my main box, on top of the online back up. HDD failure is so much more devastating than SW crashes, like you said. SW crash and you just restart. HDD failure and your data is gone (unless you pay big bucks to try and recover the data from the platters, that’s not a guarantee either). I find external drives are even more prone to failures.

I agree on the price difference between PC and Mac as well. For the price difference, I can toss on a few more drives and run RAID 5, which gives you even more data protection.

[an]

[quote=flu]Neither. But I have two cartoons for you. 🙂

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Id_kGL3M5Cg%5B/quote%5D
I’m a big Linux fan myself. I’ve been trying to replace my Windows with Linux every year for the last 10 years. Can’t seem to fully jump over though. There’s always an app or two that I need that Linux just doesn’t have. It’ getting better every year, but it’s not quite there yet. Mac is not as stable like Linux and doesn’t have all the UI nicety like Windows (expanding windows from any edge, double click of the top bar to maximize, maximize = maximize, drag windows to the left edge of the monitor span the window to 1/2 of the screen, etc., I can go on but the list is way too long), so, I feel like it’s the worse out of the 3.

[Author]

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