people who rather rent then buy

[The Cactus Leaguer]

Originally Posted by Cleveland_Collector

The problem here is that I'm using MY numbers and proving you wrong.

You proved nothing. You simply changed your original assertion and then bent the other numbers to your maximum benefit, and even then you barely broke even.

And, you have a $30,000 cushion to work with which, in this market, is largely unrealistic.

Again, this was YOUR scenario and claim that I responded to.

The market is flat.

According to whom? Even in Cleveland, where there was not much of a bubble, prices were down 2.9% YOY as of February (latest available data), and down 20.2% from the peak.

But anyway, given your last post accusing me of saying things that I absolutely did not

What exactly did I accuse you of? I'm happy to go back and remind you of everything you said (assuming you don't go back and delete your posts)

and not acknowledging the fact that anything other than a 30-year mortgage exists,

We just sold a house about six months ago that we had refinanced to a 15 yr mortgage. They're great. Took a bit of a tax hit with the reduced interest, but we built up equity much faster. (We've been homeowners for most of the past 20 years, FWIW) And oh yeah, prices are down 6% in our market since we sold. Are you also going to try and convince me we should have stayed in the house these past six months?

I can see that you're interested in no other opinion than your own.

I'm interested in facts and truth, not "damn the torpodoes, buy a house" claptrap that sounds like an ad from the NAR.

You should definitely rent, throw your money away, and not invest. Hopefully, Social Security and senior housing will be an option for you later in life.

Who said anything about not investing? I just pulled up a 5 year CD rate of 3%. Your $66k down payment would become $76,700, even at today's terrible rates. The tax and other advantages would not be enough to offset a 15% housing price drop over the same period using the same invested money (by the way, that down payment is generous since the average is still well below 20% on owner-occupied houses).

[Clevelandgal]

I think home ownership is a big scam that benifits people other than the home buyer-kind of like the one where you have to spend 2 months salary on an engagement ring. I hate that we left the area and still own a condo in Cleveland that we would lose our shirt on if we could even sell it. The money we have in there could have been invested much more wisely-heck it could sit in a saving account and we would be much better off. We will never buy again. Living in S.Cal we get a lot more for our renting $ that we ever could buying. Not that we could buy anyway b/c all the equity is tied up in Cleve real estate.

edit- I should add we are movers-longest we ever lived in a home (we have had 4, sold 3) was 5 years-so my info above applies to us. If you stay somewhere for 15 years or more maybe it is not as bad....