Yikes - higher rates suck - My $365Kish mortgage was refi’d in Jan of this year at 2.875%
$2,150 payment
$650 Principal
$870 Interest
$630 escrow
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Yep… not as fun watching the balance drop monthly when it doesn’t drop by much 
One of my rentals right now is $3200.
House is worth roughly $625k.
With $0 down at a 6% mortgage the payment is $3700. Add $400 for tax and insurance. So $4100.
But from that $4100 on day one, $625 is principal payback. So it’s almost even with renting before taking into account the MID. And then every month the $625 grows by a few dollars.
I totally agree that you should rent for at least a year when moving somewhere new. Get to know the areas of town you want to commit to before jumping in as a buyer.
As for repairs it really depends on the age of a house. A newish house won’t need much. A 125 year old house, holy fuq will it need a lot. Source: I live in a 125 year old house😁
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This is me. Housing costs are just unattainable in any decent city if you’re not married or not making $120k+ a year. This is the case for basically anyone who graduated college in the last few years. Demand is insane but feasibility is low. I’m honestly not sure if I’ll own a house in the next 5 years, which is brutal to think about.
Well there’s your problem. Your definition of “decent” means what? LA or SF or NYC? I hear this all the time and my answer is, then go somewhere else. There is an entire country out there in between LA and NYC where someone making $60 or $70k a year can comfortably buy a nice home.
It’s like people saying they can’t afford a car because S-class cars are so expensive. Well, OK. How about a Camry?
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Sorry man but you’re wrong. I live in Texas, Dallas specifically. There is virtually zero inventory below $300k in the entire city.
Saying “just move” somewhere cheaper isn’t a solution either…should I forfeit my job I enjoy, live somewhere worse, move away, just to say I’m a homeowner? That’s so ridiculous.
I’m not asking for much either, just a decent starter home with a couple beds and baths. New builds in the “city” start in the 400k range…
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My BIL’s house just had its AC die. He has a home warranty that he bought, but these warranty companies are known for throwing the cheapest fixes at the HVAC and loathe to spend any more money than they absolutely have to. That and their timeliness sucks.
It’s supposed to be 95+ in his area today. 
I hear you. I used to live outside of Boston for a number of years, before moving out to the Western part of the state 3 years ago. There was no affordable housing close to the city with good schools in our price range (less than $400k).
I feel for first time home buyers looking for a starter home in this market.
This is fair, but if we say 2k sqft under 300k on that same map (Dallas Proper, no boundary shows 38) see the picture. Many of those places were 1200 sqft or smaller. There are less than 100 listings (home,condo,townhome,multifamily) with 1500 sqft or more under 300k
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I know you’re trolling but let’s do this the way a real homebuyer would. South of downtown is out of the question and why you see so many houses for sale unbought.
We’ll include some northern suburbs and filter to homes not lots, condos, etc. Since this is Leasehackr we will include a garage as well. Under 300k no bed/bath filters. There’s 6 options.
Remove the garage and there’s 26 options.
I used to live in DFW and the northern suburbs went bananas the past several years. When I moved there in 2013 we paid $320K for our house, sold in 2016 for $470K and last I checked it was up to ~$850K.
Ya it’s really unfortunate. The surrounding areas obviously exploded the last few years. I mean quite literally looks like home prices doubled anywhere within 15 miles of Dallas…
I’ve lived in all the major cities in TX and have been in Dallas a little under a year. I really love it and it feels like home!! Just wish I could actually call it home and stop worry about renting/moving all the time.
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I bought my first house for $300K and I was making $62K at the time. I could have easily bought $400K, I think I was qualified for up to $450K or something. So when I said someone making $60-70K can afford a decent place I was thinking more in the $375-425K range. And looking at Zillow for Dallas there are never ending pages of listing in that range.
Can you break down the math on that? I literally applied for a mortgage around the beginning of the year and was told I could do 350-400k making 72k a year. If I pulled the trigger on that, I would be so broke. Pretty sure the mortgage was pushing $3k a month. Now with interest rates tripled I’m not even sure $200k would be in the budget lol
Yeah, shit happens. I remember when I was in middle school and my family moved into a new house. It was early July and the A/C died. Like literally the day after we moved in, it started sputtering. Thinking back on it, wouldn’t that have been caught on an inspection? Did they have inspections back then?
But the house in question was 15-ish years old. And that’s when A/C, and furnaces and water heaters and such need replacing. It goes with the territory. And you have to account for it.
IIRC correctly, house I bought was $300K, I think I put down $15K (thanks to the bank of mom and dad which gave me an interest free loan) and the mortgage I got was 4%. I don’t remember what tax and insurance was, but it wasn’t much, maybe $2K taxes and $500 insurance for the year. And I had no problem affording it.
In TX however I guess property tax is a killer.
I think its typically between 2-4% of value. insurance was also pretty high (ours was $1500)
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So on a $400K house tax is $8-16K? Jeeeeezuz. That can’t be right. I know TX is high property tax since there’s no income tax but that sounds insane.
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Yep, actually an old site I had looks like most are ~2.5% with highest being almost 3%. I thought there was some 4%, but that’s probably a few very small areas. No state or city income tax, but still sucks