Housing market recovering?

[jaedaliu]

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/business/buy-rent-calculator.html?_r=0

Living your WHOLE life in an apartment might make more economic sense. This notion that you MUST buy is foolish.

At my current place, if I bought the empty place accross the street, with a 5% mortgage and a 6% return on investments, I am better buying than renting in 2 years.

Any way I can change the mortgage length? It's a priority for me to be clear on my primary residence quickly. nevermind, found it. Still 2 years switching the mortgage from 30 years to 10 years.

 

[randomrogue]

Lets be realistic. If you live in the midwest and can buy a home for $60,000 then obviously it makes sense to buy. Rent of $400 and a home you can pay off very easily is a no-brainer. However when you start looking at $400K+ homes and $1500 rents then it's not so easy. Your investments should be doing better than 4% too. So far this year I'm up 10%. Get a good investment manager. Even when things were super shitty I was making 6% and I'm invested conservatively.

I'll buy something eventually but I'm not going to pay a premium of hundreds of thousands of dollars to own. There are plenty of great places to rent.

 

[randomrogue]

At my current place, if I bought the empty place accross the street, with a 5% mortgage and a 6% return on investments, I am better buying than renting in 2 years.

Any way I can change the mortgage length? It's a priority for me to be clear on my primary residence quickly. nevermind, found it. Still 2 years switching the mortgage from 30 years to 10 years.

Yes that works when things cost very little or the rent prices are screwed up. If you have a $1000 rent and a $100,000 mortgage then it's pretty easy. Like I said, the midwest is pretty good for buying. Unfortunately most people live on the coasts and the prices aren't so cushy. Overseas prices in the cities where everyone goes for jobs the prices aren't cushy. So most people have to make harder decisions.