For those that moved out of state

When buying your home, did you buy the best house that you could afford

or

did you take advantage of the fact that some houses are way affordable, so your mortgage payments are completely doable and under what you bugeted for..

we are torn...hit our bugeted amount, or go smaller and save more each month.

TIA!

Re: For those that moved out of state

We ended up buying a place that was $400 less than what we were paying in rent. We wanted to be comfortable and not stretch ourselves thin. Plus we know we would want to move to the suburbs in a few years. We were lucky and found a 3br starter that was completely rehabbed.

Re: For those that moved out of state

thanks. DH is leaning towards going less expensive, learning how to be homeowners/parents..then wait for promotions are move into something bigger, rent out the old house.

Sounds great, I am just getting so sucked into the bigger homes. but I have to start looking at it for what it is, a starter home.

Re: For those that moved out of state

We are starting to think about buying something when our lease is up in April. I think I would go smaller (as long as it has what we need: 3+ bedrooms, 2+ baths, small yard, parking - this is if we stay in the city) and try to continue to save some $ for the bigger house in the suburbs. My thinking is that we'd be ready for that in approx. 5 years when the baby is ready for school (and we hopefully have another little one.)

Re: For those that moved out of state

We just moved to N.C. and bought a smaller starter home. We were lucky enough that my fil's friend owned the place so we could move right in. But we also wanted to wait for our dream home until we figured out whether we definitely like it here and where we are going to end up settling for life. I don't want to move a million times. I LOVE the area we are in (Winston Salem) but my dh eventually wants to move down to Charlotte. We will see. I can understand wanting to get into the bigger homes, though. Not too far from here are gorgeous huge brick homes that I would love to be in, and i know we will some day. But for now our house is perfect for us.

Re: For those that moved out of state

I wanted the smaller, totally affordable house. It just seems so much more practical...and even the smaller house is huge when compared to the NE. Plus they tend to be brand new since starter homes are built all the time down here. I didn't want to pay much more than what my rent was.

DH on the other hand wanted the "luxury" home. He wanted to go to the top of our price range. His thing was "if I'm leaving NY and my family the house HAS to be worth it for me" and that meant every single thing on our "must list". It was a long battle with him.

I managed to stay lower than the top of our price range, but DH won. We got the bigger "fancier" house.

I don't regret it because thankfully we're not stretched and I do love my house...but this is it for a while...we won't be moving anytime soon...next stop is custom built.

I say go for the more affordable smaller house. You'll love having the extra cash each month, your baby will grow up in a house anyway and like your DH says you can learn to be homeowners and parents all at once. That's what my brother and sister did. That's what I wanted to do. I think that's more "normal" than what my DH fought for.

Re: For those that moved out of state

thanks guys..I guess that is what most of us do.

I guess when moving down here, I saw another image in my head of the house...but if we can be homeowners and save each month, then that's okay too.

Re: For those that moved out of state

sasha-I am glad you replied. Like your DH, I want this move to be compensated. I want the "I just moved down south and love my home" feeling.

But, DH wants the "i just moved down south and have an incredibly low mortgage" feeling..

so it looks like I will surprise him and go with the more affordable.

Re: For those that moved out of state

Re: For those that moved out of state

When we moved down south we rented an apartment for a year until we decided where we wanted to live. When searching for a home we went with the bottom of our budget. Honestly we really weren't too sure what we could afford and by today we truly kick ourselves at times. We went with a 2500sqft. home, which is mid-to small down here . can you believe that

In any case when it was time for us to move on and up we did. no regrets. we were ablt to live very comfortably and still have a beautiful home. I personally think that is the most important when buying a home. buy what you can be comfortable in, not so much what you can afford. we could afford a lot more than what we have, but chose not to so that we can fly up to NY or anywhere on a whim, save for whatever and also save for our children and still have money left over.

I think no matter what you buy as a home will be beautiful and yours. enjoy your search.

Re: For those that moved out of state

We are custom building a house but it is not that big (2000 Square feet) and still very affordable (Under 200k). We decided that since we are planning to have a family soon we should get the most for our money.

Re: For those that moved out of state

thanks!

Just weird to adjust to the thought. We saved forever, I have my 20% to put down and budgeted for a bigger mortgage, now to go smaller is fine. He feels more comfortable with it, so I guess it will be out starter style home. I like the thought of renting it out once we want to move on.

Re: For those that moved out of state

we knew what we could afford according to the mortgage broker, so we stayed in that range and it's a cross between what we wanted and what was affordable.

DH loves this house more than I do...I just love having my own home

Re: For those that moved out of state

Thats a hard answer for me.

We had our house custom built so a lot of it was what we could afford and who would give us more bang for our buck.

What I really wanted was a home that had the 2 living rooms, a dining room, eat in kitchen, island in the kitchen, and a media room. Since we had a quarter acre of land, whatever builder we went with we would only be able to fit a 3 bed 2 bath house on our lot but a media room is not considered a bedroom because it does not have a closet. So the house would have 3/2 and a media room

We both fell in absolute love with Mironda homes. They had everything we wanted in a home, but they offered little inside (certain appliances were included, no window treatments, etc...) and there were some things I wanted as upgrades and we wouldnt be able to afford the house if we got them (i.e., tile floors)

Mironda offered everything we wanted in a house but didnt offer the things we would need (washer and dryer, microwave, or blinds for the windows) Also the counter top was only standard neutral colors. If we wanted anything with color it would be extra.

We used Holiday Builders. The model we went with didnt have a media room, or an island in the kitchen. The house was a little smaller square footage wise and had almost everything we wanted.

Turns out we needed very little upgrading (we upgraded the cabinets, carpet, marble vanity in master bath, lanai, jacuzzi tub and glass top stove) tile floors came standard, all appliances were included (including washer and dryer) and blinds on all windows were included.

Holiday turned out to be a dream come true. They dont have the island or the media room but what they gave us was a true home. It's a home where I can see us raising a family in, a home that we can change things around in. Actually DH got me feeling all warm and fuzzy when he told me when the kids come around the room that is our office now we'll make the nursery and then the front living room since we really dont use it we'll build a wall and make it the office. Leaving us with the guest room, a nursery and now the office/media room.

So bottom line for us was who would give us more home for our money

Re: For those that moved out of state

Message edited 8/14/2006 11:01:05 PM.

Re: For those that moved out of state

We bought something less than what we could afford... part of that was because I was in my last year of law school so I wasn't making an income at the time, but part of it was that we just wanted to get into the market with a starter house with something that we were comfortable with. Our mortgage payments actually ended up being less than what we were paying to rent... in the two years that we had that house we had enough money each month so we could make extensive renovations, which gave us a nice little profit when we sold it... and on top of that we were able to save quite a bit of money in those two years... so, now, when we purchased a house that was almost double the square footage and acreage, we could do it comfortably, without straining ourselves... I just kept reminding DH that the number one source of strife in marriage is money. I didn't want to put ourselves in a difficult monetary situation in the first few years of our marriage.

Re: For those that moved out of state

We are going to NC to look Labor day week. We are going to check out Raleigh and Charlotte.
We are torn too (first we have to find jobs) . Do you build our dream house or get something more afforable and then upgrade?

Any suggestions of neighborhoods would be appreciated.

Re: For those that moved out of state

I didn't move out of state but we bought out of state we also had a brand new home built in South Carolina in Hilton Head. My inlaws live down there so I know that Island like I know Long Island. We knew we coulnd't afford a home here right now so we put the money into this for an investment and we will see in a year or two what we want to do with it. For now it is rented out. So that pays for the mortage.

Denise

Re: For those that moved out of state

we bought a house that we could afford...but we looked at all different price points...the house we so happened to afford was brand new...5 bedrooms 2.5 baths and we have the biggest property in our community, which was brand new too....still building here btw...we got the house for under 200k...crazyness!!!!

Re: For those that moved out of state

Hey Janice -
So we're looking lower than what we can actually afford - but that's because we're planning on going to one salary when we have kids. So we want to make sure that we feel comfortable to do that when the time comes.

With that said, I feel it is really important to love your home! I wouldn't compromise to the point that you drive up to your house and are not happy with it. My friend went ahead and bought a very affordable house, and then didn't want to do anything with it. She was constantly thinking "What's next?" and even kept house hunting after she had bought her current home.

So maybe the answer is a price range in the middle?

It is exciting to be close to owning a home no matter which way you look at it

Good luck!

Re: For those that moved out of state

We built our house and I went with a smaller house (2,200 sq ft) but did a lot of upgrades I wouldn't have done if we had bought something bigger.

The only thing I regret is that I don't think we could afford our house on one salary because the taxes are so high! If it weren't for the taxes we would be fine. If I had to do it over again I would have bought something a couple of years old with lower taxes.

It's mainly due to that taxes that DH is looking to put our house on the market soon.

ETA: Congratulations and good luck with your home search! It's such an exciting process!!!

Message edited 8/15/2006 10:07:35 AM.

Re: For those that moved out of state

thanks guys for all your input! well, I think we are going to go mid-range. Subdivison that I want, smaller house.

As someone who is staying at home and will be staying at home, I have learned in the last 2 days, I really better love my home The neighborhood I really want is active. I can put the baby in a stroller and walk the streets. I really want neighbors.

So the house that I call mine is at the top of our budget, but has dropped 5K since we first looked at it 6 weeks ago. Great sign, it is also the house with carpets throughout with cats that will have to be ripped up before moving in.

down the block from that one though, is a slightly smaller house, with a garage(other one doesn't have it). I am going to look at that this week. 10K less then "my house"

thanks again!

Re: For those that moved out of state

we bought a small ranch with 3 bedrooms (one of those is more like an office though)

we love the area and are thinking when we need more room, we will renovate and add a second story onto the house

Re: For those that moved out of state

Posted by Janice

thanks guys for all your input! well, I think we are going to go mid-range. Subdivison that I want, smaller house.

As someone who is staying at home and will be staying at home, I have learned in the last 2 days, I really better love my home The neighborhood I really want is active. I can put the baby in a stroller and walk the streets. I really want neighbors.

So the house that I call mine is at the top of our budget, but has dropped 5K since we first looked at it 6 weeks ago. Great sign, it is also the house with carpets throughout with cats that will have to be ripped up before moving in.

down the block from that one though, is a slightly smaller house, with a garage(other one doesn't have it). I am going to look at that this week. 10K less then "my house"

thanks again!

Re: For those that moved out of state

We moved out of state about 9 months ago, for my hubby's job anyway. But we couldn't have stayed on LI. WAY TOO expensive. We got more for our money$$ We had a house built in a nice area, 3227 sq feet LOL! We rented first to get the feel of areas. We DID pick out a home that is too big for us, but this home would cost probably about 700,000 on LI

So hope this helps and good luck!