this post was submitted on 02 Nov 2023
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Repeat after me: it's okay to rent. Equity is not everything.
The downvotes are really depressing. My point is that we've been conditioned in America to focus solely on homeownership. The banks, title companies, realtors, and home contractors tout it as the American dream. No matter the personal cost--the down payment, the interest, the insurance, the maintenance--and no matter what negative externalities--sprawl, inefficient heating and cooling, increased infrastructure, car pollution, divorce and obesity from commuting--you must buy a house.
I get it. If your overriding concern in life is to maximize investment, then by all means pour your cash into a house.
Renting and ownership can be fairly similar in larger cities (but costs more than owning a house in my state), but when you're in the rural America, there tends to be a fairly sharp decrease in quality of life despite the fact that rental prices adjust up with housing prices anyway.
I mean, I can still get a half-acre of land and private house for a mortgage payment that's about the same as the rent on a 2 bedroom apartment. Without having to worry about a landlord, an upstairs neighbor with toddlers. I can do what I want with my yard, even have any pet without an additional "pet fee".
And rental houses (the happy medium?) in my area are going for exactly what the mortgage would be to buy one today. We're talking $3000, even $4000/mo. Yeah, current rates are shitty, but that still gets you a $550,000 mortgage (used to get you closer to $700,000). And rent isn't going down any time soon, but one can likely refinance to a lower rate in 5-10 years
What it means to me is that I'm not selling my house, with my 3% APR mortgage any time soon despite the $200,000 in equity I have from the price skyrocket.
Well I wouldn’t sell at that rate either, getting 3% in this market just isn’t happening.
I just bought a house and we had to pay $10k just to buy points to get our rate down to 6.9 😭