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Crap house in a great town - someone will always want to live in a great town, the demand will be there. Don't know many people who would love to own a spanking brand new house in Wyandach, do you?
Why would anyone want to live in a beautiful house where they have to worry about potential breakins or even worse. If you live in a bad house in a good neighborhood,the people will probably appreciate when they see you trying to take care of it unlike the previous person.
I don't think anything's worse than "crap town"... crap as in too dangerous to even walk around at night. If it's safe but just nothing exciting going on, I would still live there... great house there makes it very attractive.
About the crap house in a great town, that works easily as you can fix the house but not the town.
I know from experience. I brought a cute little house in a blue collar area and I just sold my house and practically lost all my money because this area depreciated more then the nicer areas so I should have went for a crappy house in a nice area since you can change the house a lot more then the neighborhood and even if you dont have that much money to fix it, at least you will get your money back, unlike me, who spent more and lost more...
No question, hands down, crap house in a great area. You can change a house - you can do it over a few months, a few years - whatever. You can LEARN to be handy (pretty much have to if you own a home!).
But - LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION - you cannot change it. You cannot will it to get better. You cannot HOPE FOR THE BEST with your biggest lifetime investment.
I think every potential homeowner is faced with this decision at some point - and I think we know who ultimately ends up happier!
I think a lot of the reason that people who move away from here end up unhappy is becasue of a complete lack of research on where they are going. That makes for ugly long term consequences.
sometimes a great location changes too
Hempstaed comes to mind, was once a very great place..now wouldnt want to go near it
Location, location, location. I wouldn't buy anywhere on LI as it's over taxed, over crowded and crime is rising all over with more and more home invasions, etc, but that's off topic. As long as they can get the house at a real bargain and either put the money saved toward renovations or knock the house down and rebuild, I think that's the way to go.
Let's keep this comparison fair and put in perspective the condition of the crappy house and the available funds of the buyer. The "Crap Town" reference has been associated with places that are dangerous. To be fair, the "Crap House" has to be similarly dangerous or otherwise unliveable. Also to be fair, let's assume you would be cash strapped after such a large purchase and will not be blessed with a ton of disposable income after the purchase. Otherwise the choice would be easy, buy the shack and dump a ton of money into it until it's liveable.
So, if the house you were to buy in a great town were 1100 SF, leaky roof, asbestos, lead paint, oil tank and septic needing replacement, wiring and panel unsafe, infestation, foundational issues, etc. Also assuming you would have to live in it for several years with only minor improvements, would the choice be so easy?
What if the nice 2400 SF colonial in the "Crap Town" was on a particularly well groomed and safe block with excellent private schools near by, would that change the equation?
Personally I did not vote, I'm with the previous poster, neither.
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