[Scarlett]

[quote=carlsbadworker]Assume if you are buying 4B house, the formula that I uses is the local decent-shape 3B apartment rent (maybe with one garage rental as well). There should be plenty of data from the apartment ads. I figure that’s the bottom of the housing rental price.
(…)
Then you calculate mortgage, HOA, MeloRoos, property tax and insurance. If those two prices are close, then I think it is time to buy. Sure, you will be out the downpayment, but you also get some tax benefits on the interest. I call it a wash.
(…)
In the end, however, I think it is OK to overpay a little as long as you like the house. The difference in investment return is going to be small as long as you are paying attention to the buy/rent tradeoff.
[/quote]

Thanks, Carlsbadworker! 3 BR apt rent – that’s a very good idea! Sure, the apartments rents are more reliable as a market indicator…. I am sure there are some 3 bdr in PQ area. Congrats for you, btw!

Owning a house has its benefits for your lifestyle – extra room/storage/garage, yard/patio, freedom of decorating/customizing, etc. For us it means also longer commute, but it’s not very bad.

[Scarlett]

[quote=peterb]Do your home work and find out what rents are going for so that you can decide what to do. If it’s your key component for decision-making, you need to get a good handle on it. Then decide if rents may be going down….[/quote]
Well, that was my other question – how do you find out rents, and are they relevant for SFH?

I rent in UTC a 2 bdr apt that’s quite nice but very expensive ($2500), and I want to buy a 4 bdr SFH in PQ. There are very few houses there that are posted for rent. It seems like a 4 bdr , >2000 sf home would rent there for ~$2000-2600, based on craigslist.
Not sure how much store to set on those numbers. Some people that have a lot of equity may not care much if they charge a smaller rent. Others are more desperate for money and would charge more rent. It’s not much competition, I don’t think, and it’s not really regulated and determined by the market. I could be wrong though.(Note: I am not comparing my UTC apt. rent with the PQ SFH rent, though it is a factor in my decision, too).

[Scarlett]

[quote=peterb]Do your home work and find out what rents are going for so that you can decide what to do. If it’s your key component for decision-making, you need to get a good handle on it. Then decide if rents may be going down….[/quote]
Well, that was my other question – how do you find out rents, and are they relevant for SFH?

I rent in UTC a 2 bdr apt that’s quite nice but very expensive ($2500), and I want to buy a 4 bdr SFH in PQ. There are very few houses there that are posted for rent. It seems like a 4 bdr , >2000 sf home would rent there for ~$2000-2600, based on craigslist.
Not sure how much store to set on those numbers. Some people that have a lot of equity may not care much if they charge a smaller rent. Others are more desperate for money and would charge more rent. It’s not much competition, I don’t think, and it’s not really regulated and determined by the market. I could be wrong though.(Note: I am not comparing my UTC apt. rent with the PQ SFH rent, though it is a factor in my decision, too).

[Scarlett]

[quote=peterb]Do your home work and find out what rents are going for so that you can decide what to do. If it’s your key component for decision-making, you need to get a good handle on it. Then decide if rents may be going down….[/quote]
Well, that was my other question – how do you find out rents, and are they relevant for SFH?

I rent in UTC a 2 bdr apt that’s quite nice but very expensive ($2500), and I want to buy a 4 bdr SFH in PQ. There are very few houses there that are posted for rent. It seems like a 4 bdr , >2000 sf home would rent there for ~$2000-2600, based on craigslist.
Not sure how much store to set on those numbers. Some people that have a lot of equity may not care much if they charge a smaller rent. Others are more desperate for money and would charge more rent. It’s not much competition, I don’t think, and it’s not really regulated and determined by the market. I could be wrong though.(Note: I am not comparing my UTC apt. rent with the PQ SFH rent, though it is a factor in my decision, too).

[Scarlett]

[quote=peterb]Do your home work and find out what rents are going for so that you can decide what to do. If it’s your key component for decision-making, you need to get a good handle on it. Then decide if rents may be going down….[/quote]
Well, that was my other question – how do you find out rents, and are they relevant for SFH?

I rent in UTC a 2 bdr apt that’s quite nice but very expensive ($2500), and I want to buy a 4 bdr SFH in PQ. There are very few houses there that are posted for rent. It seems like a 4 bdr , >2000 sf home would rent there for ~$2000-2600, based on craigslist.
Not sure how much store to set on those numbers. Some people that have a lot of equity may not care much if they charge a smaller rent. Others are more desperate for money and would charge more rent. It’s not much competition, I don’t think, and it’s not really regulated and determined by the market. I could be wrong though.(Note: I am not comparing my UTC apt. rent with the PQ SFH rent, though it is a factor in my decision, too).

[Scarlett]

[quote=peterb]Do your home work and find out what rents are going for so that you can decide what to do. If it’s your key component for decision-making, you need to get a good handle on it. Then decide if rents may be going down….[/quote]
Well, that was my other question – how do you find out rents, and are they relevant for SFH?

I rent in UTC a 2 bdr apt that’s quite nice but very expensive ($2500), and I want to buy a 4 bdr SFH in PQ. There are very few houses there that are posted for rent. It seems like a 4 bdr , >2000 sf home would rent there for ~$2000-2600, based on craigslist.
Not sure how much store to set on those numbers. Some people that have a lot of equity may not care much if they charge a smaller rent. Others are more desperate for money and would charge more rent. It’s not much competition, I don’t think, and it’s not really regulated and determined by the market. I could be wrong though.(Note: I am not comparing my UTC apt. rent with the PQ SFH rent, though it is a factor in my decision, too).

[Scarlett]

[quote=HLS]
with a high credit score and a 90% loan, on a $540,000 loan my guess would be $250-$300 a month.

SDE, At this time, I still have one solid lender that offers FNMA 95% financing (5% down) for high credit scores. I think the minimum score needs to be 720.

HLS[/quote]

Thanks HLS, I wish there would be more lenders willing to do FNMA 95% financing! With good credit score, carefully documented income etc. of course.
See my post above… I have the same concerns as SDEngineer…

-Scarlett

[Scarlett]

[quote=HLS]
with a high credit score and a 90% loan, on a $540,000 loan my guess would be $250-$300 a month.

SDE, At this time, I still have one solid lender that offers FNMA 95% financing (5% down) for high credit scores. I think the minimum score needs to be 720.

HLS[/quote]

Thanks HLS, I wish there would be more lenders willing to do FNMA 95% financing! With good credit score, carefully documented income etc. of course.
See my post above… I have the same concerns as SDEngineer…

-Scarlett

[Scarlett]

[quote=HLS]
with a high credit score and a 90% loan, on a $540,000 loan my guess would be $250-$300 a month.

SDE, At this time, I still have one solid lender that offers FNMA 95% financing (5% down) for high credit scores. I think the minimum score needs to be 720.

HLS[/quote]

Thanks HLS, I wish there would be more lenders willing to do FNMA 95% financing! With good credit score, carefully documented income etc. of course.
See my post above… I have the same concerns as SDEngineer…

-Scarlett

[Scarlett]

[quote=HLS]
with a high credit score and a 90% loan, on a $540,000 loan my guess would be $250-$300 a month.

SDE, At this time, I still have one solid lender that offers FNMA 95% financing (5% down) for high credit scores. I think the minimum score needs to be 720.

HLS[/quote]

Thanks HLS, I wish there would be more lenders willing to do FNMA 95% financing! With good credit score, carefully documented income etc. of course.
See my post above… I have the same concerns as SDEngineer…

-Scarlett

[Scarlett]

[quote=HLS]
with a high credit score and a 90% loan, on a $540,000 loan my guess would be $250-$300 a month.

SDE, At this time, I still have one solid lender that offers FNMA 95% financing (5% down) for high credit scores. I think the minimum score needs to be 720.

HLS[/quote]

Thanks HLS, I wish there would be more lenders willing to do FNMA 95% financing! With good credit score, carefully documented income etc. of course.
See my post above… I have the same concerns as SDEngineer…

-Scarlett

[Scarlett]

[quote=SDEngineer]

Given the state of the economy, I can easily understand why a lot of people are willing to pay the extra fees to keep more of their own cash available (in fact, I will probably be buying in the next year, and am leaning towards going the FHA route for just that reason – I can afford 10% down, but it would seriously deplete my cash reserves, and in this economy, I’d rather keep those reserves just in case).[/quote]

Thanks, SDE, I think we are in the same boat…about looking at buying next year with 5% down, 10 if that’s impossible… Being a knife-catcher, but being serious, I struggled hard to make all my payments on my previous home and as a result I didn’t save anything… Hey, I didn’t know I could be bailed out! 🙂
Now, I am slowly buliding up, I have a better job and I am renting, but I’d hate to dump all this hard-earned cash in a down payment.

I know that this low to no downpayment played a major role in this housing market mess, but I would like to see more lenders giving 95% financing with good rates if the applicants have excellent credit scores and well-documented enough income (debt-to-gross income ratio of 28-33%)…I know quite a few people that were in my situation and got out just in time , with “affordable” losses. So now they have little if any savings for a future downpayment. They make good income, have as stable jobs as one can hope for so they would so they are able to afford the monthly payment, but not the down payment. They seem they will be left out of the housing market – even if you save $1000/mo for downpayment only, it takes at least 7-8 years to save 100K -which is 20% of a relatively modest (depending on the area) home of 500K.

[Scarlett]

[quote=SDEngineer]

Given the state of the economy, I can easily understand why a lot of people are willing to pay the extra fees to keep more of their own cash available (in fact, I will probably be buying in the next year, and am leaning towards going the FHA route for just that reason – I can afford 10% down, but it would seriously deplete my cash reserves, and in this economy, I’d rather keep those reserves just in case).[/quote]

Thanks, SDE, I think we are in the same boat…about looking at buying next year with 5% down, 10 if that’s impossible… Being a knife-catcher, but being serious, I struggled hard to make all my payments on my previous home and as a result I didn’t save anything… Hey, I didn’t know I could be bailed out! 🙂
Now, I am slowly buliding up, I have a better job and I am renting, but I’d hate to dump all this hard-earned cash in a down payment.

I know that this low to no downpayment played a major role in this housing market mess, but I would like to see more lenders giving 95% financing with good rates if the applicants have excellent credit scores and well-documented enough income (debt-to-gross income ratio of 28-33%)…I know quite a few people that were in my situation and got out just in time , with “affordable” losses. So now they have little if any savings for a future downpayment. They make good income, have as stable jobs as one can hope for so they would so they are able to afford the monthly payment, but not the down payment. They seem they will be left out of the housing market – even if you save $1000/mo for downpayment only, it takes at least 7-8 years to save 100K -which is 20% of a relatively modest (depending on the area) home of 500K.

[Scarlett]

[quote=SDEngineer]

Given the state of the economy, I can easily understand why a lot of people are willing to pay the extra fees to keep more of their own cash available (in fact, I will probably be buying in the next year, and am leaning towards going the FHA route for just that reason – I can afford 10% down, but it would seriously deplete my cash reserves, and in this economy, I’d rather keep those reserves just in case).[/quote]

Thanks, SDE, I think we are in the same boat…about looking at buying next year with 5% down, 10 if that’s impossible… Being a knife-catcher, but being serious, I struggled hard to make all my payments on my previous home and as a result I didn’t save anything… Hey, I didn’t know I could be bailed out! 🙂
Now, I am slowly buliding up, I have a better job and I am renting, but I’d hate to dump all this hard-earned cash in a down payment.

I know that this low to no downpayment played a major role in this housing market mess, but I would like to see more lenders giving 95% financing with good rates if the applicants have excellent credit scores and well-documented enough income (debt-to-gross income ratio of 28-33%)…I know quite a few people that were in my situation and got out just in time , with “affordable” losses. So now they have little if any savings for a future downpayment. They make good income, have as stable jobs as one can hope for so they would so they are able to afford the monthly payment, but not the down payment. They seem they will be left out of the housing market – even if you save $1000/mo for downpayment only, it takes at least 7-8 years to save 100K -which is 20% of a relatively modest (depending on the area) home of 500K.

[Scarlett]

[quote=SDEngineer]

Given the state of the economy, I can easily understand why a lot of people are willing to pay the extra fees to keep more of their own cash available (in fact, I will probably be buying in the next year, and am leaning towards going the FHA route for just that reason – I can afford 10% down, but it would seriously deplete my cash reserves, and in this economy, I’d rather keep those reserves just in case).[/quote]

Thanks, SDE, I think we are in the same boat…about looking at buying next year with 5% down, 10 if that’s impossible… Being a knife-catcher, but being serious, I struggled hard to make all my payments on my previous home and as a result I didn’t save anything… Hey, I didn’t know I could be bailed out! 🙂
Now, I am slowly buliding up, I have a better job and I am renting, but I’d hate to dump all this hard-earned cash in a down payment.

I know that this low to no downpayment played a major role in this housing market mess, but I would like to see more lenders giving 95% financing with good rates if the applicants have excellent credit scores and well-documented enough income (debt-to-gross income ratio of 28-33%)…I know quite a few people that were in my situation and got out just in time , with “affordable” losses. So now they have little if any savings for a future downpayment. They make good income, have as stable jobs as one can hope for so they would so they are able to afford the monthly payment, but not the down payment. They seem they will be left out of the housing market – even if you save $1000/mo for downpayment only, it takes at least 7-8 years to save 100K -which is 20% of a relatively modest (depending on the area) home of 500K.

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