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Hey government! (An edited for clarity rant)

A

AreaCode7O7

Senior member
Please note: I CAN afford a house but the points below are what make it a seriously bad investment right now, therefore I DON'T and SHOULDN'T own a house.

  • - If you hadn't taxed me at nearly 40% of my income, taking social security I'll never see, handing out tax refunds of my money to my housemates, paying unemployment to my lazy friend who won't let me help him with his resume, paying lawyers to go to court to keep the Seattle Sonics playing in an expensive empty stadium and creating me more traffic
    - If you hadn't deregulated the financial industry and allowed them to invent trillions of dollars out of thin air, eventually causing my contributed-to-the-max 401k to be worth 30% less than it is
    - If you hadn't incentivized the mortgage industry to loan to unreliable borrowers and therefore inflate housing prices in my area such that families who can't afford their expensive brand new homes are going through foreclosure
    - If you hadn't pumped billions into artificially inflating the economy and "saving" the housing industry, PREVENTING HOUSE PRICES FROM DROPPING TO NORMAL LEVELS, meaning that those foreclosed homes are still for sale at "market rates" that even solvent families cannot afford
    - If your damn environmental programs and requirements (King County, WA, green capital of the world) didn't mean that it'll take me an extra 150k to prepare my little 1/4 acre space on the 6 acres I bought cheap but am not otherwise allowed to touch, develop, cut trees or even WEED (clarification: I bought six acres but 5.75 acres of that is now "protected" and I'm not allowed to do anything whatsoever to it, and I'd better cross my fingers and toes that I can get a well, septic and house on the remaining little spit of land they told me I can walk on.)
I would own a home right now.

Jeez, how is it that my husband and I can both make just touching the 6 figures, make all the right investment decisions, not travel, not buy new cars, bus to work, live with a packed house full of roommates to save on rent, work 60+ hours a week for years, not have kids, not play the stock market, not make a single bad decision, and we still cannot afford (edited for clarity: to make a good investment in) a house? Who the hell CAN afford (edited for clarity: to make a good investment in) a house?

I'm whining a bit more than I really deserve to be; we could go out and get a mortgage and buy a house right now (for nearly $600,000 in our area!) but it'd mean a probably 10-25% loss on our money in the next couple of years and just wouldn't be a good decision.

I'd feel a lot better about not being able to buy a house if I considered it MY fault. I just can't imagine being a one-working-parent, one-stay-at-home-parent family with two kids and trying to do this.
 
Originally posted by: Kntx
Why would you buy land you can't build on if that was what you wanted to do?
Click to expand...

Not all new regulations are grandfather in the land they apply to.

Oh, and just for fun, the government has never had a thing to say about the squatters on the not-theirs land next door that put in a yurt, septic and well completely unpermitted and on an unbuildable section of the lot and lived there for four years before the property changed hands and the owner kicked them off.

King County government FTL.
 
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
I'm whining a bit more than I really deserve to be; we could go out and get a mortgage and buy a house right now (for nearly $600,000 in our area!) but it'd mean a probably 10-25% loss on our money in the next couple of years and just wouldn't be a good decision.
Click to expand...

Oh, so what you are really saying that that you CHOOSE to not buy a home. I see.
 
You can afford a 600k mortgage and you're bitching and moaning that you can't afford a house?

I live in King County and I'm buying a house this year on a single income. Sounds like you just don't know how to manage your money.
 
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
  • - If you hadn't taxed me at nearly 40% of my income, taking social security I'll never see, handing out tax refunds of my money to my housemates, paying unemployment to my lazy friend who won't let me help him with his resume, paying lawyers to go to court to keep the Seattle Sonics playing in an expensive empty stadium and creating me more traffic
    - If you hadn't deregulated the financial industry and allowed them to invent trillions of dollars out of thin air, eventually causing my contributed-to-the-max 401k to be worth 30% less than it is
    - If you hadn't incentivized the mortgage industry to loan to unreliable borrowers and therefore inflate housing prices in my area such that families who can't afford their expensive brand new homes are going through foreclosure
    - If you hadn't pumped billions into artificially inflating the economy and "saving" the housing industry, PREVENTING HOUSE PRICES FROM DROPPING TO NORMAL LEVELS, meaning that those foreclosed homes are still for sale at "market rates" that even solvent families cannot afford
    - If your damn environmental programs and requirements (King County, WA, green capital of the world) didn't mean that it'll take me an extra 150k to prepare my little 1/4 acre space on the 6 acres I bought cheap but am not otherwise allowed to touch, develop, cut trees or even WEED (clarification: I bought six acres but 5.75 acres of that is now "protected" and I'm not allowed to do anything whatsoever to it, and I'd better cross my fingers and toes that I can get a well, septic and house on the remaining little spit of land they told me I can walk on.)
I would own a home right now.

Jeez, how is it that my husband and I can both make just touching the 6 figures, make all the right investment decisions, not travel, not buy new cars, bus to work, live with a packed house full of roommates to save on rent, work 60+ hours a week for years, not have kids, not play the stock market, not make a single bad decision, and we still cannot afford a house? Who the hell CAN afford a house?

I'm whining a bit more than I really deserve to be; we could go out and get a mortgage and buy a house right now (for nearly $600,000 in our area!) but it'd mean a probably 10-25% loss on our money in the next couple of years and just wouldn't be a good decision.

I'd feel a lot better about not being able to buy a house if I considered it MY fault. I just can't imagine being a one-working-parent, one-stay-at-home-parent family with two kids and trying to do this.
Click to expand...

And if you had a clue about the real problems, and the government had not been so corruptly in bed with the private sector, wasting trillions on the corporatocracy, you would be a lot better off. The only valid bullet you listed was the deregulation of the financial industry. For example, the government's push for more marginal homeowners to get loans worked quite well from what I've seen, and screw you if you have no compassion for other people who are not quite as able as you to afford a home for a *sensible* program.

That's what makes your rant whiny - that it's so damned selfish, only concerned with the specific policies affecting your particular situation. Screw the poor, screw lots of people.

In general, I'd go after you for your attacks on environmental protections, but your summary suggests you *might* have an argument and I'd listen to that one.

I don't know the circumstances about where your land is, why it's so highly protected, and so on, but I do know that usually, profit beats out the environment in politics.

All the horror stories we usually here IMO are usually, not always, just an indication of the profit makers' ability to dominate the debate and try to pass bad law on propaganda.

But overall, if you want to see where all the money you're worried about has gone, look at the statistic I often cite: that in the last 25 years, the bottom 80% have gotten nothing after inflation, and the next 10 to 15% not much at all, while the top 0.1% and up have gotten huge increases as the concentration of wealth has skyrocketed. Fix that.
 
she doesn't want to lose her disposable income. She would rather not pay into the government that protects her and society and buy a home and still have money for consumer goods. Only problem is without that government protection some how I don't think she could keep her home. 1 person with a machete and a shotgun and its gone.
 
You should be able to pay $600k cash for a house by the way you describe it. I don't see the problem here.
 
Originally posted by: Deeko
You can afford a 600k mortgage and you're bitching and moaning that you can't afford a house?

I live in King County and I'm buying a house this year on a single income. Sounds like you just don't know how to manage your money.
Click to expand...

I don't get it either.. my Mom just bought a house in Wallingford, really nice and not on a thoroughfare or anything, for $400k. If you're living with roommates and both making over $100k for years then you must have one hell of a coke habit to not be able to afford a house. Hell my Dad makes $90k/year and put 4 kids through college and lives in a $750k house with most of it paid.
 
Originally posted by: JSt0rm01
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
I'm whining a bit more than I really deserve to be; we could go out and get a mortgage and buy a house right now (for nearly $600,000 in our area!) but it'd mean a probably 10-25% loss on our money in the next couple of years and just wouldn't be a good decision.
Click to expand...

Oh, so what you are really saying that that you CHOOSE to not buy a home. I see.
Click to expand...

Yep. Hence my own statement that I'm whining more than I deserve. I'm choosing to make a good financial decision to not lost 25% of my money by buying a home. If the government decisions were different, I'd be able to buy a home as a safe investment AND place to live. As it is, I'm basically stuck renting.
 
Originally posted by: Deeko
You can afford a 600k mortgage and you're bitching and moaning that you can't afford a house?

I live in King County and I'm buying a house this year on a single income. Sounds like you just don't know how to manage your money.
Click to expand...

Could buy a home, but shouldn't. I said I WOULD own a home right now, if it wasn't for the gov. It's the poor decisions leading into the current bad economy that have made home purchase a seriously bad financial decision. Hopefully you pick up an under-market place so you don't wind up losing much on it.
 
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
Yep. Hence my own statement that I'm whining more than I deserve. I'm choosing to make a good financial decision to not lost 25% of my money by buying a home. If the government decisions were different, I'd be able to buy a home as a safe investment AND place to live. As it is, I'm basically stuck renting.
Click to expand...

You must be very skilled investor to know you will just lose 25% on a home. I would think that if you purchased your home and lived there for 15 years you would not of lost 25%. But what do I know.
 
Originally posted by: DukeN
You should be able to pay $600k cash for a house by the way you describe it. I don't see the problem here.
Click to expand...

Can. Shouldn't. I wouldn't be able to drop cash like that if I made poor financial decisions along those lines.
 
Originally posted by: JSt0rm01
she doesn't want to lose her disposable income. She would rather not pay into the government that protects her and society and buy a home and still have money for consumer goods. Only problem is without that government protection some how I don't think she could keep her home. 1 person with a machete and a shotgun and its gone.
Click to expand...

I will personally fund law enforcement, road improvements, other relevant government programs. The Sonics are NOT valid government investments.
 
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
I will personally fund law enforcement, road improvements, other relevant government programs. The Sonics are NOT valid government investments.
Click to expand...

i take it you are the one who decides what is relevant?
 
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
Originally posted by: JSt0rm01
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
I'm whining a bit more than I really deserve to be; we could go out and get a mortgage and buy a house right now (for nearly $600,000 in our area!) but it'd mean a probably 10-25% loss on our money in the next couple of years and just wouldn't be a good decision.
Click to expand...

Oh, so what you are really saying that that you CHOOSE to not buy a home. I see.
Click to expand...

Yep. Hence my own statement that I'm whining more than I deserve. I'm choosing to make a good financial decision to not lost 25% of my money by buying a home. If the government decisions were different, I'd be able to buy a home as a safe investment AND place to live. As it is, I'm basically stuck renting.
Click to expand...

Of course, the housing prices are largely determined by whether people choose to buy or not, so the people not buying now to let the market fall, are helping cause it to fall.

When you think about it, you wouldn't lose that 25% at all if you keep the house longer than the time for the prices to come back up; you just wouildn't make as much as buying at the bottom, but you would be helping the market to not hit as far of a bottom as when more people don't buy. That's a quality of life and financial decision for you to make whether the 100% loss you have on rent is worth not owning the home for the next couple years.
 
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
Originally posted by: JSt0rm01
she doesn't want to lose her disposable income. She would rather not pay into the government that protects her and society and buy a home and still have money for consumer goods. Only problem is without that government protection some how I don't think she could keep her home. 1 person with a machete and a shotgun and its gone.
Click to expand...

I will personally fund law enforcement, road improvements, other relevant government programs. The Sonics are NOT valid government investments.
Click to expand...

You know there is a pretty good argument for the Sonics making money for the city, it isn't as simple as we're paying for a basketball team solely for our entertainment.
 
Originally posted by: Farang
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
Originally posted by: JSt0rm01
she doesn't want to lose her disposable income. She would rather not pay into the government that protects her and society and buy a home and still have money for consumer goods. Only problem is without that government protection some how I don't think she could keep her home. 1 person with a machete and a shotgun and its gone.
Click to expand...

I will personally fund law enforcement, road improvements, other relevant government programs. The Sonics are NOT valid government investments.
Click to expand...

You know there is a pretty good argument for the Sonics making money for the city, it isn't as simple as we're paying for a basketball team solely for our entertainment.
Click to expand...

Valid argument if they'd been making money for the city when they left. I'm not anti-sports franchises, just anti-costly sports franchises with little return.
 
Originally posted by: AreaCode707
Originally posted by: Deeko
You can afford a 600k mortgage and you're bitching and moaning that you can't afford a house?

I live in King County and I'm buying a house this year on a single income. Sounds like you just don't know how to manage your money.
Click to expand...

Could buy a home, but shouldn't. I said I WOULD own a home right now, if it wasn't for the gov. It's the poor decisions leading into the current bad economy that have made home purchase a seriously bad financial decision. Hopefully you pick up an under-market place so you don't wind up losing much on it.
Click to expand...

So you're planning on buying a house, and then immediately selling it after the value drops, assuming that it does? You really are a financial genius!

I'm buying something that I can rent out should I have to leave the area. By the time I sell, it is very doubtful the value will have dropped - and considering the money I will not have thrown away while renting, it will clearly be a net gain.
 
Originally posted by: Craig234

Of course, the housing prices are largely determined by whether people choose to buy or not, so the people not buying now to let the market fall, are helping cause it to fall.[/b]

Absolutely true. The market needs to fall and should have fallen much further already if the government hadn't intervened. As it is they've put it into a weird holding pattern where you can't sell and you shouldn't buy.

When you think about it, you wouldn't lose that 25% at all if you keep the house longer than the time for the prices to come back up; you just wouildn't make as much as buying at the bottom, but you would be helping the market to not hit as far of a bottom as when more people don't buy. That's a quality of life and financial decision for you to make whether the 100% loss you have on rent is worth not owning the home for the next couple years.
Click to expand...

Point indeed. In my particular situation I likely won't live here for more than 4-5 years, so the overall risk is too high. Whereas if the government hadn't propped up the economy, prices would have dived, hit their true value, and buying and selling could commence and the economic recovery could truly begin.
Click to expand...
 
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