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I was approved for $275k (single income here) with a small down payment; I'd rather make my money work for me than sink it into a house that, at the time, I wasn't sure would be a better investment than the markets. I bought a house for $190k, which is significantly less than $275k! On paper I would now qualify for a $400k mortgage on my own but I'm staying put. Dallas is a seller's market right now which would make it very difficult to transition smoothly between selling/buying.
We live in a two bedroom trailerhouse. On paper we qualify for a very nice house. Instead we upgraded our little home. Luckily we don't have a mortgage because now that I have humongous medical expenses we would be struggling.
Our house and all personal possessions plus cars are only 10% of our net worth. It will remain that way. When you diversify, houses and such become less and less of your overall net worth. They are not liquid and not much help in a crisis. It is hard to pull money out.
Keep perspective about housing and keep it only a part of an overall plan.
We had a little bit different type of situation when we bought our house. We managed to get our credit rating up, but then when we tried for a loan we discovered that because my husband is still in school (working on his Master's), the bank counted all of the student loans (and its a bit!) against us, as debt we owed even though they won't be due for quite a while. And they figured it at 3%, when in fact its only 1%- of course, it blew us right out of the water as far as getting a loan was concerned- but I consider it a blessing, I hated the thought of a bank loan, always scared me. We had to think creatively, and we ended up buying a house on a land contract (those scare me too, but unless I have 50,000 lying around, which I don't, we didn't have much choice...)--our house cost 53,000, and it's on a five year balloon. Now of course, that five year balloon freaks me out as well, lol- however, we figured out a way to have it paid off by the time that the balloon payment comes due (42,000 and some change...doesn't seem like much would get paid off in the five years, does it? Oh, I forgot...interest-LOL)---we have an SUV that we still owe on, but when we got our income tax, we paid a huge chunk on it, and it will be paid off early summer. The car payment is almost 400 a month, and we are going to apply that every month to our house payment. We also decided that every income tax, the entire amount will go towards the house payment. I figured that by the time we get to the balloon, we will be paid off. It won't be fun, it won't be easy, and things are always tight, lol- but I know its going to be a major relief to have it paid off at that time, and we'll be glad that we did it this way. Our house is nothing special- had a bit of things inside that needed work-example, in the kitchen there were no doors on any of the cabinets to speak of- well, except one- just the shell of the cupboards, but they were in very good shape- I measured and bought bead board and wood for the edges, and made all of the doors- looks so nice! And its amazing what paint will do- when we moved in, the kitchen was painted (you're going to love this..) Fire Engine Red, School Bus Yellow, Cocoa Brown, and.....White- LOL- each wall a different color- first order of the day, I painted, lol-
I actually really like that house- especially for the price!
I would consider putting in a second bathroom though (possibly in the basement) for added convenience when you have guests, plus it will probably help resale.
Overall though, without knowing your market and the area- I'd say that was a nice house for $95k! Good luck and keep us posted as to what you choose to do!
Wow! If I lived where you lived we would be having a bidding war!
I thought there was some cheap houses in Ohio, but that is awesome. Unless it is in the ghetto, that's a deal at least compared to what I'm used to.
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