Heh, I’m paying $850 for a one bedroom apartment but I’m in Bumblefuck, Ohio and stuff is way cheaper here.
That’s not just CA. It’s everywhere. People buying as much house as they could afford (or more) is more or less what caused the housing crisis in '08 and even lead to the creation of a new derivative (CDS).
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In brief, tax breaks and hidden loan subsidies encourage speculation in home values. They cause buyers to put more money into their homes and less into other, productivity-enhancing investments. They bid up home prices in zoning-constrained high-price markets and escalate house and lot sizes at the top end of the market in more sprawling, less-expensive markets. For example, US housing policy boosts the prices of multi-million-dollar Victorians in San Francisco and speeds McMansion sprawl around Houston. It also exacerbates inequality. Because the tax breaks are much more valuable to households in high tax brackets, they skew the housing market away from first-time and entry-level buyers, who are mostly in lower tax brackets.
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I’m giving $0 until they show a baseline level of competence. So never.
https://twitter.com/cosmopolitan/status/1360217251434094594?s=21
“Hey Gramma! I’m having unprotected sex with my wife again! Thought you’d like to know! OK, toodles!”
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I’m old enough to remember when Jim Bunning squeaked by the Dem candidate ('04 I think). For a while there I actually thought he was going to lose. Haven’t even been close to feeling like D candidate has had a chance since then.
Is there anything going on in the impeachment trial I need to care about? I can’t bring myself to open that thread and try to find an answer among the 800 new posts.
I would like to believe Charles Booker has a chance. But knowing Kentucky DNC they will run Amy McGrath again just because she raised so much money.
Cliffnotes: More obvious than ever Trump should be impeached, more obvious than ever GOP says fuck you lol
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When I bought my townhouse for $210k I was preapproved for $750k. My realtor thought I was clinically insane for buying so low. A few months later my assistant and her husband bought a place for $600k. They were in their 20’s and spent the next decade house poor.
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Your experience is exceedingly rare though. Even the well off two professional households I know often ask the bank to borrow as much as possible, then buy the biggest place they can find. Everyone thought we were nuts for buying a 1200 sq ft condo in downtown Toronto instead of a McMansion in the suburbs.
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Oh I know. That is my point. People are so bad at buying homes. Our 1,100 square foot condo has a ton of space we never use yet most of my friends live in 2,000+ square foot homes. It’s just nuts. So many people I know are house poor for nothing.
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Similar experience here - we got a £160K mortgage for an apartment (instead of maxxing it up to £400k for a large house with more room than we need that would have meant being cash poor and working for 25 years).
Instead, we paid it off early and I retired.
People love their status symbols so they can show off to each other - it’s naff.
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Not wanting to be house poor is why we’re still in the condo we bought back in 2004 for under $200k. Every time we think about buying a house somewhere, we run the numbers and it makes less and less sense.
Trying to buy into today’s market is insanity. We’d have to move out into the sticks to get a detached under $500k atm.
Is this becoming more of an option during/after the pandemic? Seems like way more people will be WFH long term.
Every time it comes up at work, we’re told WFH will be the norm for “the foreseeable future.” Nobody has any idea how long foreseeable is. I think eventually we’ll come back at least part time.
I do know several people that have done it or are seriously considering it. We batted the idea around, but we both like city living too much, and I don’t want to put myself in a position where I have to endure a soul-crushing commute a couple of days a week.
Even thought I didn’t do this, I’ve got a bit of regret that I didn’t do it. I bought soon after the housing crisis, so houses were cheap and they have mooned since then. I could have afforded at least 50% more house comfortably. And that would have appreciated a ton.
I really shouldn’t feel that bad, because I did invest the difference in stonks which have stonked. So I’m probably ahead financially. However, I would probably get more enjoyment out of a nicer house than I do from checking out my portfolio.
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