If you could go back in time, what advice would you give yourself regarding home ownership? (plumber, documents)

[augiedogie]

1. Don't purchase a house until you are settled into a career and an stable long term employer for several years. Otherwise rent. We have lost money on houses simply because we bought and sold so fast. The extra costs with buying and selling make it a losing proposition.

2.Buy a small house and learn to live without accumulating stuff that just sits and takes up room. in reality, many people have a larger house than they need, but they buy it to impress their family and friends and use it to store their accumulation of stuff they don't even use. Smaller homes cost less to heat, insure, AC and saves on taxes also. A less expensive house will sell faster also. If the price is right, its possible to sell without a realtor saving a bundle of money.

Unless you have school age children, avoid the new growing subdivisions of large metro areas. Typically the taxes are higher and you'll pay a premium for the house since those homes are in demand from parents looking for good schools for their children.

Depending on the state and tax situation, consider a mobile home in a gated park. Cheap, and pretty easy to sell. There are always people looking to save money on housing.

When in doubt, rent.

[gunslinger256]

Originally Posted by nightcrawler

i would have bought the condo in nyc that i liked back in the 80's and sold blood to get it.....
because that 100K back then was a lot, but the same condos go for 2 million, or more today.

My sister did just this. Bought a place for $150k and now gets $3k per month in rent in her retirement.

If I could, I would tell myself to accept the inlaw's offer to chip in for that $400k house (and live with us) when I could only afford a $175k house because when I finally sold my house the other one was worth $1.5m

I would have also told my family not to sell the old house in brooklyn at $85k because it would be worth over $1m today.

[ea1420]

The only thing I wish I had paid attention to to was to not get overly focused on the finishes. When I bought my first house, it was the nicest house that I had seen and so I over looked some pretty big potential negatives. I also wish I had considered where the neighborhood might go versus where it is when you buy.

And, then my other piece of advice to myself is don't buy a house until you can put 20% down and don't use your house as a piggy bank. Because a house is not guaranteed to appreciate it.

[LifeIsGood01]

Buy a home sooner. In 2008 I moved to Florida, it would have been the perfect time to buy a home, after the crash when the prices were at their lowest, I also had the money then, but with renting it disappeared. I would have also moved to Florida many years earlier than I did.

[Katana49]

I would tell myself to take the first offer I got on my condo when I had it for sale in 2006, literally right at the time the market crashed. I didn't take it, and had to wait almost 2 years before getting another offer, and that one was for $40k less.

[rrah]

Build a smaller house even thought we've loved living in this place, it's too big.

You should have bought the lake cabin and a new smaller house instead of the bigger house. The lake cabin is now worth 4 or 5 times what it was in the 90's.

[Electrician4you]

Originally Posted by statisticsnerd

1. Stay away from condos!!!!!
Not necessarily. Plenty if condos sell for millions of dollars
2. Don't buy a home unless you are married, have a family, and fully intend to settle down in an area for at least a decade. If you have kids, you should own a home since apartments are no place to raise kids.
You can have kids in a apartment. You just can't have a lot of them
3. Don't buy a home that is over 20 years old. The repair bills aren't worth it.
All my houses are over 20 years old. Buying a house less than 20 yo doesnt mean it's built better. In fact you could be getting worse quality
4. If you are single, keep renting cheap apartments, cook your own food, drive an old car, and stick what's left over in your 401k and IRA. Renting provides you with a lot of flexibility career-wise since you can easily move.
Agree with this, but you would have to be a saver to tea head. Sadly that doesn't happen al the time
Ahome is a ball and chain.
Not always. Depends on the decisions you make
That kind of goes with #2, wait until you are married and settled down before considering homeownership.
5. Never EVER listen to realtors who tell you that renting is "throwing money away" and that owning a home is an "investment." Stocks are investments. A home is just something you live in. You throw money away on realtor's commissions, HOA fees, maintenance costs, property taxes, insurance, etc. on a home and should you need to sell when the housing market stinks, you'll throw a ton of money away.

To me long term renting is throwing money away. (UNLESS you invest and make money in a different way) We've done pretty well with the real estate market. I can't complain.


.

What I would do. Dreamland

Leverage like a mother f'er to buy rentals before the bubble and get my RE/broker license. Everything would be double deal in house. I wouldn't have one agent representing two clients. Both agents would each get a client. Sell everything in 05/06. Buy back in 2009. Resell again in 2016.
Keep a few paid for rentals in high demand areas for constant low risk cash flow.

Real life
I wouldn't of tried long distance rentals.
I would remove my bad tenants way sooner than I did
I would be more strict on my rentals rules sooner
I would of bid that extra 10k on THE house we found two years ago
Other than that I wouldn't change much. I think we did great over the years.

[steve807]

Dividend paying stocks ? Averaging 2% return to risk 50% loss of principal.

[WouldLoveTo]

Originally Posted by wmweeza

The market tanked 6 months later so our move is finally going to happen next year...10 years late. (we live in a very rural, not in demand area).
.

So where is your rural area? My next and probably final move will be rural

If I could go back in time:

Wait 6 months as the market will tank! Better yet, wait 2 -5 years.
OTOH I lost my job 3 months after buying the house, so ownership probably would have been out of the question at that point.

Fire the idiotic realtor that was a friend of my parents and refused to show me properties she didn't think my parents would like. Who was buying the house anyway?!

Do not believe in the starter house BS (though maybe it will work when selling mine!)

Do not take the mortgage where the interest increases yearly for 3 years "because you will get regular raises and be able to afford it" (see laid off in 3 months comment above)

My plan had been to live here 5-10 years and move "up". My "up" was more land, not more house. Unfortunately I am in a high COL area and land is usually sold for more developments and who can complete with those prices?

I've been here 26 years now. Between 2 divorces, that first serious job loss and a number of refinances (I started at over 10% interest), I certainly won't be paid off in 4 years.

That said, I could never rent what I have now for my monthly payment, so I can't complain about that.

[1insider]

This applies to my town: Buy everything you can get your hands on from 1996 through 2003 and sell it all in 2005. Repeat the buying again in 2010 through 2013 and begin selling again in 2017.