Oh snap! I just bought a house!

madmax

Just double the payment amount and be done with it in 7 or 8 years...

madmax

AsSiMiLaTeD

all I know is when my finance guy figured everything up for us, he figured we'd save $35 a month by going that route...maybe I need a new finance guy...

or maybe it's the way our loan is set up...maybe it's because we're doing a 15 yr instead of a 30 yr and we're financing closer to 200K instead of 100K

whatever, works for me...

Skynut

Dude,

Owning a house blows.
1. You are not giving someone else money to pay their mortgage.
2. You have all these new Tax write offs and have to deal with spending refund checks.
3. Nobody to get permission from before you paint or landscape.
4. When you finally get rid of the house you usually have to deal with thousands of dollars of extra money.

What a hassle.

shack

Making 2 payments a month does little to shorten a mortgage maturity (less than one month over a 30 year mortgage and even less for a 15 yr mtg.). What most people are referring to is to take your payment and divide it in half and then make payments EVERY TWO WEEKS. Basically making 13 payments per year. This will decrease a 30 year mortgage to approximately 24.75 years.

Most mortgage companies will charge you a fee to SET THE LOAN UP to pay bi-monthly. You can of course just make a payment twice a month on you own...but this usually messes up the loan holder and your account never gets straight. The bi-monthly payment is overrated and a hassle.

Skynut

I round my monthly payment up a couple of hundred dollars each month and it comes out to a little less than 2 extra payments per year.
This will probably cut 10 years off my loan by the time it is done saving thousands of dollars. (literally)

bknauss

On the flip side, if you string out your payments longer, and if you can invest that extra money well (get a better rate of return than the interest rate on the mortgage payments), then that's a good financial option also. In the case of my college loans, I strung them out for 20 or 25 years, but my savings account has better interest, so I'm definitely saving money (not much, but its something).


And I'm still amazed at the housing prices out there! If you have a couple minutes free on the internet, check out the housing prices around me, F1, and doro (and the other DC area Polk forum guys)...

dorokusai

No kidding....you'd think this was freaking NYC sometimes! Hey BK, did you see the new "luxury condo's" going in near Bethesda/Rockville?

Shizelbs

House prices are redunkulous right now. Where I got my house is 40 minutes outside of Seattle, and you could well call it semirural. I honestly do not know how a family making average pay can afford a house anywhere near Seattle. I mean, no where near Seattle. Something is just not right about that.

landry_p2000

Daaaaamn! That is a huge a$$ crib. Congrats.

bknauss

Originally posted by dorokusai
No kidding....you'd think this was freaking NYC sometimes! Hey BK, did you see the new "luxury condo's" going in near Bethesda/Rockville?

Simply amazing. Why not just go north a bit and get a bigger place with less taxes?

jdhdiggs

Originally posted by bknauss
Simply amazing. Why not just go north a bit and get a bigger place with less taxes?

Eh, the merrylanders are invading up here as well and commuting to B-more. I think MD is full..

Fortunately houses are still less than Dallas so we did allright...

bknauss

Houses are dirt cheap in York (if you don't account for taxes which are twice as much). $250k in the DC suburbs mean a townhouse, but the same amount in York might mean a single family home, 2 car garage, and a decent sized yard.

And there still is room in MD... but no one wants to live in the boonies I guess

jdhdiggs

I agree their cheap, but the housing market is going nuts. Houses are only on the market for 3-4 days right now so that may change some. Still won't compare to the big cities though. A guy from Knoxville was complaining about the real estate prices here, then I showed him some DC, NY, LA, SF numbers...

Wouldn't Shrewssberry be considered the boonies?

Early B.

I have a 30-year loan. I make payments every two weeks. The payments are a little more than half the monthly mortgage note. My house will be paid off in 7.5 years. Been living here 7.5 years, so I'm half way there. Once I pay off my house, it'll be time for me to retire -- at about 20 years ahead of most other people. My goal is to live debt-free, no credit whatsoever. Just cash. Yeah, yeah -- I've heard all the other "other people's money" arguments, and there's pros and cons either way. This strategy works for me 'cause you can't put a price on the peace of mind of knowing that you don't owe anyone a damn thing.

Skynut

Originally posted by Early B.
I have a 30-year loan. I make payments every two weeks. The payments are a little more than half the monthly mortgage note. My house will be paid off in 7.5 years. Been living here 7.5 years, so I'm half way there. Once I pay off my house, it'll be time for me to retire -- at about 20 years ahead of most other people. My goal is to live debt-free, no credit whatsoever. Just cash. Yeah, yeah -- I've heard all the other "other people's money" arguments, and there's pros and cons either way. This strategy works for me 'cause you can't put a price on the peace of mind of knowing that you don't owe anyone a damn thing.

AMEN to that, someday I will be debt free also.

Sami

Originally posted by bknauss
On the flip side, if you string out your payments longer, and if you can invest that extra money well (get a better rate of return than the interest rate on the mortgage payments), then that's a good financial option also.

Exactly. Mortgage money is cheap. That 5-6% interest you pay is tax deductable so a wise investment will yield much better results than paying the mortgage off early.

Some people are so eager to pay off the mortgage that they pay it as fast as possible and make minimum payments on other loans that are either a) higher % and/or b) not tax deductable. Not smart. Mortgage is the last on the list to be paid off.

Early B.

On the flip side, if you string out your payments longer, and if you can invest that extra money well (get a better rate of return than the interest rate on the mortgage payments), then that's a good financial option also.

Lots of "if's" in there. That's the problem -- most people are not disciplined enough (or savvy enough) to invest "that extra money" over a long period of time and realize a better return on their investment. There's likely to be more risk associated with those investments, as well. However, most people consistently make their monthly mortgage payments, so it's best for them to have their home serve a dual investment purpose.

Shizelbs

Is all the interest accrued on a home mortgage tax deductable, or just some of it?

Sami

Originally posted by Shizelbs
Is all the interest accrued on a home mortgage tax deductable, or just some of it?

Mortgage company will send you a tax form where all of the interest you paid is marked. I don't know what rate of tax deduction applies to it as I always let the tax software take care of it.

Real estate taxes are also tax deductible.

jdhdiggs

IIRC 100% of your interest payments is just taken off of your gross income (as if you never earned that money) Now I'm guessing that in your tax bracket, that would mean 27-30% of your interest payments would go back into your pocket as a tax break.

Shizelbs

Update: My realtor just called me. Since we signed for the house, the asking price on the same plan has already increased by $45k. Not too bad of a return on our, up until now, earnest money.

Pics to follow.

Shizelbs

Big expensive hole

ND13

Originally posted by Skynut
AMEN to that, someday I will be debt free also.

I will too, when they put six-feet of dirt over my corpse.:D

madmax

Originally posted by Shizelbs
Update: My realtor just called me. Since we signed for the house, the asking price on the same plan has already increased by $45k.

If it were me I would go ahead and give the builder the extra $45K. It's only right...

madmax

dragon1952

Originally posted by Shizelbs
Big expensive hole

Nice hole!! Hopefully that isn't the neighbors house in the picture though

BTW, I've never heard the expression 'Oh Snap!" and I've pretty much been on the west coast my whole life (in fact I was born in Wash St. ) What does it mean?
Oh no! Oh Goodie! Oh ****! ??? I'm assuming it's a good thing?

Shizelbs

For me, its mostly an expression of shock or suprise.

marcpam

http://www.newhavencustomhomes.com/


since we are discussing first time homebuyers, this is mine

click on electronic brochure and then click on smithfield.

this is my first home, it has been two years and as soon as my wife gets out of nursing school, we will move into a bigger place. No kids as of yet.

Shizelbs

Well, after two days filled with stress, last minute signings, and TOTAL SCREW UPS by pretty much everyone involved, I own a house. I'll be back in a couple days. Until then I am going to be busy unpacking things I forgot I owned and rediscovering the joys of surround sound.

dorokusai

I've been staring at you for two days wondering when something good was going to happen....mmmmmm thanks man.

bknauss

Shizelbs wrote:

Well, after two days filled with stress, last minute signings, and TOTAL SCREW UPS by pretty much everyone involved, I own a house.

I had some last minute problems too... all because of the schmuck handling my mortgage. We authorized a bunch of stuff to happen weeks before the signing, and for whatever reason all of the stuff didn't seem to happen until a couple days before signing (probably cause he was very lazy).

Anyhoo... have fun! Hopefully you don't have to paint or do crown molding or something like that. I started doing a lot of work over the summer, got burnt out from working all day then working on the house till midnight for about a month, and everything has sat for a while.