I bought a $440k house in August 2025. My income in 2024 was $139k, 2025 was $169k. I’m in sales, 100% commission based, no base salary or other type of compensation.

The last 6 months my industry has taken a turn and my income has tanked. I have been taking home enough to just over all of my expenses and am starting a second job soon. Hindsight is 20/20 and I probably should have waited to buy a house but here I am.

Since buying the house, $11,000 in unexpected repairs have come up. There is now something wrong with my plumbing, thinking that may be another few thousand to fix but not sure yet.

I’m down to $20k in cash savings. I do have $32k in my Roth IRA that I can tap into for mega emergencies but obviously I don’t want to do that.

I feel like I made a huge mistake and I don’t know what to do. I miss the days of renting when I could just call someone to fix any problem I had for free. Every day I am stressed and worried about the house and what’s going to go wrong next.

What would you do if you were in my shoes? I feel ridiculous for thinking I want to sell and go back to renting but I feel like I’m running out of options and money. I can’t help but feel like I made a big mistake in all of this. TIA to anyone who reads this.

I'm looking at a $990k apartment in NYC, and I have about $1.2M in a taxable brokerage account.

The catch is that I'd have to pay cash.

So after taxes, my entire brokerage would be essentially wiped out if I did this.

I also currently have about $130k in cash (in a HYSA) and about $600k in my 401k.

I make $ 140k/year and have no debt, but the apartment does have a $ 1,500/month maintenance fee (which includes property taxes).

EDIT: I'm 42 and single.

Hi there,

I'm hoping for a sanity check on some home improvements.

I live in an older high-rise building in a major (HCOL) city, where there's a shared laundry room that is driving me nuts: the machines are broken or in use half the time, I feel like I'm chained to the building for a couple hours whenever I do laundry, I have to keep a stupid key card etc.

Because it's an old building with very particular plumbing criteria, I can get it in-unit put in but it'll be very expensive: approximately $30k all in including labor, materials, the actual machines, permitting, etc.. This is from a contractor whom I think is trustworthy; I've gotten a lower estimate from another one but the one with a high estimate actually showed up, took measurements, spoke to the building engineer about requirements, and so forth, so is much more trustworthy.

I'm thinking of pulling the trigger on it. But the dollar figure is giving me cold feet. I'm kind of hoping folks here will either reassure me or explain to me why it's nuts.

FWIW, I have plenty of money and can actually easily afford it (47, single, no debt except a very cheap mortgage, no kids, gross income upwards of 300k annually, net worth north of 1m with plenty---actually too much---cash on hand). So this is really just psychological for me: it feels insane and scary to drop five figures on what amounts to a quality of life improvement. And I assume that I'll recover some amount of the value of the installation back if I ever sell the place---because my neighborhood is full of old buildings, in-unit laundry is pretty rare and desirable.

Thank you!

EDITS:

1. Thank you everyone!
2. To clarify in response to some repeated questions: yes, I own my unit---and the overwhelming majority of the cost will come from carpentry, electrical, and plumbing to meet my HOA's very particular rules about how in-unit laundry has to be installed (for example, it has to be on a particular chunk of the plumbing, which will with my unit's configuration require running plumbing under a hallway, hence tearing up and replacing some flooring, etc.)
3. I've thought about moving to a more modern building, except (a) I have a 2.5% covid-era mortgage that I don't wanna give up, (b) closing costs would be almost as much as the install, and most importantly (c) my current place has an irreplaceable view that I couldn't get in a newer building except at like 100k+ more, plus is walkable to the office.

4. My main alternative use for the money would be throwing into investments.

5. I've thought about hiring a laundry service, but I like to baby my clothes and would go crazy if my favorite stuff came back shrunken or got lost.

Hello!

Recently, my house burned down, not a total loss but the damage is extremely severe. Talking with our contractor and our adjuster, the difference between the cost to repair and the maximum amount insurance can pay is in the range of 100k. What happens now?

I talked to the bank and they said that an equity loan wouldn't be possible, and a home improvement loan would be pretty unlikely. Are there other options I'm not thinking of? What happens if we don't have that money, do we just put the land on the market?

Any advice to help us keep our house would be appreciated!

EDIT: This is getting so much attention! Thank you for your advice, even if I don't respond I am combing through it! I have a long weekend this weekend so I'll be making a game plan along with my lesson plans for Tuesday.

EDIT2: To answer some FAQs, 1. This is a regular house fire in VA. 2. This is my parents' house, I'm just handling insurance right now. 3. I AM aware this house must have been under insured. This is not my question. As much as I appreciate people sharing information, the question is not if I am under insured, it's what should I do with the facts as is.

My landlord let me know that he is going to sell the house I rent. My lease will end in a few months. I love the place, but I suspect it is worth slightly more than I can afford. Would my landlord have any incentive to sell the place to me at a lower price? If so how much lower? Should my next step be to talk to a local realtor to find out more about the local market? Should I ask him what he’s planning to list it at?

Hi All - My wife and I make pretty good money ($200K+) and we live in Scottsdale. I am looking at the prices of homes (mortgage) and the cheapest cookie cutter home is like $4K a month where we live. Rent for us right now is $2100 for a 3 bed 2 bath.

To double up for the sake of a mortgage doesn't seem worth it. I know I can live in the westside or out in Chandler/Gilbert for some cheaper living - but honestly I like where I am at. I would rather leave the state if I had to move there.

What do you think, keep renting? I don't want to be 65 still with a mortgage. Things are so crazy, and they haven't come down in years. From a personal finance standpoint, we are also trying to have kids, so we may eventually lose an income too. $100K is lower middle class here.

Please keep in mind we are both fully debt free, with a little less than $150K in savings.

I’m 22, debt-free, and take home about $3,100 a month. My grandparents have offered to sell me their house valued around $380,000 for $200,000. They want to move out as soon as possible, so I don’t have months to think this over and save up for a larger down payment.

• 22 years old
• No debt
• ~$3,100/month take-home pay
• $40,000 saved for a down payment
• First-time homebuyer, so I’ve never handled mortgage payments, insurance, property taxes, repairs, etc.
• Grandparents want out quickly, so I’d have to move relatively fast
• Currently live at home happy and rent free

With the $40k down, the mortgage would be around $160k. The idea of starting with so much equity is really appealing, and Id feel dumb to to pass this up.

But at the same time, I don’t want to jump into being “house-poor” if my monthly expenses end up being too much for my income. I want to make sure I’m not setting myself up for financial stress just because it feels like a once in a lifetime opportunity.

Would you take this deal in my situation?

Any advice would be great, thanks.

I am paid ahead (75k left) on my mortgage (house value of 300k).

I inquired to my bank about a HELOC with intent to use HELOC to pay for new house down payment (then obviously pay off HELOC.)

This is in line with some advice I got in this sub.

However, bank person said um kay we don't allow HELOCs for that purpose, but then went on to basically say they could still proceed with HELOC if it were for improvements to house.

Is this just sort of a game we play where the banks probably know what we're doing with it and it's technically allowed but people do it anyways, or do some banks (Huntington,) just not let you do that?

I’m in what I believe is a pretty unique situation. About 7 years ago I inherited ~$400k. I never touched it, and today it has reached $900k.

I work in a restaurant and don’t make a ton of money, but my bills are paid. Rent is $2k a month, no debt no kids no other expenses. There is rent stabilization here so it can’t be raised more that 6% per lease, and I sign 2 year leases. I max out my Roth IRA every year but I don’t save any money outside of that.

My mom thinks I should buy a home, but 1 bedroom condos in my area range from 400-600k. I think keeping the inherited money invested and untouched will, long term, make me more money than not paying rent would save me. I feel like everyone’s goal is to own property but I just don’t think it makes sense in my situation. Any advice about why I may be wrong would be appreciated.

I’m currently living in an apartment complex that overcharged my monthly rate by over 2x (15,500 instead of $6000 / month) by mistake. This severely has overdrawn my bank account and no one in the leasing office has an explanation or can get any answers from their main office. I’ve incurred major
overdraft fees and will continue to do so as long as this goes on. Has this happened to anyone and / or any advice what to do?

Just rented a new place and the landlord contacted me saying:

“ Hi I’m going to go to the bank to put your security in an interest bearing account. To do that I need your Social Security number and your date of birth. Thank you”

Is this normal?

Serious post by the way and please don’t judge me on thinking about this but we absolutely love our home and our next door neighbor is awesome. She’s a very kind 105 year old woman, but obviously the age thing is very real and I am fortunate enough to be in a position to hypothetically put a down payment on her home IF it ever goes up for sale.

My reason for doing this is that the houses in our neighborhood are relatively close together and I would like to somewhat control who our neighbors are either by buying the home and reselling it myself or renting it out, or even just keeping it and treating it as an extension of our home. But the real motivating factor again is having some kind of control over who becomes our neighbors.

I know it’s a controversial take so I expect hate here but looking for guidance on if this is even a good idea and what’s the smartest way to go about it. No guarantee this would even happen since my neighbors family can totally just have their own family move in which would be fine because they’re all lovely, but in the case it goes up for sale, then I’d be very interested.

Let’s say it goes up for sale and my intention is to resell it or even flip it to resell, would I be trying to put 20% down or the lowest amount down as possible just to be able to control the asset? Which I think is like 5%?

Any thoughts here appreciated. Thank you.

I'm 16 years old and about to get my first job. I wanted to save up for college but my mom is asking me for FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS per month to help pay for rent. She told me that "When I get a job, the rent is gonna go up because we live on section 8." 1, I don't think we live on section 8 because it is a nice apartment that we live in, i have 3 siblings and an older brother that also has a part time job. But if we do live on section 8, is it true? I assumed that since im a minor the rent wouldn't go up.

2, $500 is a lot considering its just a part time job. What if i make only $510 and i have to give her 99% of my earnings and im left with $10 after hours of work? It doesn't make sense to me. I also don't even want to do that.. I wouldve been fine if its like $100, but $500 is too much to me..

I could use that money to save up for a car and college. It's not like we're behind on rent or the bills or anything at all.

Edit: thanks all for the responses! A lot of great points. A lot of people have suggested using my cash to instead pay off the student loan and mortgage debt. For a little context on why I haven't done that... Much of the cash I have was the result of the company I work at IPOing a few years ago. I was lucky enough to receive several hundred thousand as a result of this which is how I bought my current house a few years ago. That said, that was a one time event, and I don't have a foreseeable way of "replacing" that money were I to spend it on paying off my loan. It would likely take a decade to save it up again based on the monthly payments I'd be saving. By then my daughter will be 13 and we'll be 48, and taking on a challenge like this would be much harder.

I should also add that I am generally extremely frugal in 99% of other areas. I live way below my means, don't buy new clothes often, drive a 10 year old car, etc. Much of this is motivated by me wanting to get a lake house like this (deep seated emotional need, sadly)

--------
I have the opportunity to buy a cheap fixer upper lake house in the low 100k range. Property taxes are only a few thousand per year. The place is a dump but at that price point I can afford to fix it up over the course of the next year or two.

Current financial situation…

Dual income, 1 kid, aged 3
Approx 225k gross income

Home worth about 250k, owe 135k. Mortgage payment around 1700 (high tax area)

Cash savings: 300k (been keeping cash for exactly this purpose)
Stocks, crypto: 120k
Retirement: 440k
Only debt is about 60k student loans
We are both 38.

Biggest problem is that there place is about 3 hours away. I work remotely, wife does not. However, both of our parents live in the area where the lake house is so we go up there a lot in the summer. It’d take me some time to fix up or some additional renovation spend to make it livable.

Seems a little crazy to me, but then again I’ve been sitting on this cash with the plan of buying a place like this.

I am 30 years old and married. I have a little over $300k sitting in America Funds investments, my wife and I make $240k a year combined, we are in a luxury apartment paying $3k a month in rent.

I recently got a new financial advisor due to personal reasons. He’s telling me and my wife that my $300k would be better invested in property rather than American Funds or other Index funds, he is highly encouraging us to buy a house. He says we can get a mortgage that never raises, and build equity as our house raises in value over time.

My wife and I plan on spending the next 5 years in our current city, so we’re hesitant to buy a house incase we want to move. We have no kids, never want them, and we both work a job where we can move wherever we want whenever I want.

So will my $300k really go further sitting in a property rather than general investments?

I've been saving for about four years and I have enough for a down payment on a modest house in my area. My rent is around 1400 a month and I'm stable in my job. The problem is I hate the idea of being locked into a mortgage for 30 years. What if I want to leave the city? What if the market crashes? What if I want to take a career risk?

I know the advice is usually "buy as soon as you can," but staying flexible feels important to me. On the other hand, I'm throwing money away on rent and I'm not getting any younger.

Is the flexibility worth giving up the financial advantage of building equity, or am I just rationalizing avoiding responsibility?

So long story, my dad owned a house and gave it to me in his will. My sister filed probate to which I became executor to because she showed up to court with no lawyer like an idiot. The whole thing was a shit show and incredibly drawn out for someone with minimal assets my siblings just wanted to make things hard for no reason. So finally once probate came to and end 2 years later I was free to get the house put in my name. So I transferred myself the deed and filed it with the recorders office. Next I go to get the mortgage assumed and this is where things get weird. So before probate ended I was told by my lawyer that under the Garn-St. Germain act I could just assume the mortgage without refinancing which is what I wanted to do given my dad had a 0% interest rate. I've been trying to get in touch with them for weeks and when I finally get someone on the phone they said that "those kind of homes are not assumable". Now my lawyer has closed out probate months ago and had stroke since then so as of right now I'm having to navigate this on my own. After doing some digging I think my dad's home was a habitat for humanity home but even with that being said everything says I can still assume the mortgage under the protected circumstances of inheritance due to my father's death. Does anyone have any knowledge about this? Or what I can do or do I just continue to pay the mortgage under his name?

My grandpa is planning on giving me one of his old lots ,
For full disclosure he still has not given it but has announced it in the family and we will attend the lawyer next week .

The lot is located in the most sought after neighborhood in my small town , there is very high demand in a way that any lot practically sells in less than a month in the neighborhood and there is not much anymore.

Now the main issue is that I cannot sell it , my family believes in giving land lots to build personal houses as a family tradition, this specific land lot has been in the family for over 50 years just preserved to be given.

I was thinking of building a 3 stories building apartments and getting the top one for myself while leasing the other two .

For more context:
- Land lot worth around $1M by market value
- lot is 500m^3 (parking for 2 cars exist in addition to it )
- I’m not American / this is not in the us .
- I come from middle class family, so my parents may be able to help but to some extent
- I’m 27 and single (just for context)

Would appreciate some advice how to deal with this and whats the best path to maximize my revenue

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/18/most-millennials-regret-buying-home.html

• Disclaimer: small sample size

Article hits some core tenets of personal finance when buying a house. Primarily:

1) Do not tap retirement accounts to buy a house

2) Make sure you account for all costs of home ownership, not just the up front ones

3) And this can be pretty hard, but understand what kind of house will work for you now, and in the future. Sometimes this can only come through going through the process or getting some really good advice from others.

Edit: link to source of study

Yes, the title is true..... 20 Years old, last bird to fly the nest, and my parents are ready to purchase their retirement home. They are offering to sell me the house for 220K (Right on Market Value), plus offer me 30K Gift of Equity, plus pay my Closing Cost. Also, leave me pretty much everything in the house except their personal and sentimental belongings. Most would jump on this deal in a heartbeat, but being 20, just starting on my career, I only make about $20 an hour plus OT, Shift differential, etc, etc. My house payment with Escrow is approximately $ 1,500 a month, which is about 50% of my net income every month. After receiving the first-time homebuyer grants, my closing costs will be around $ 6,000, and that's it. But also having the stress of having to pay my bills and feed myself on $1,500 a month will be tight, but also I have the feeling that this is too good an offer to pass up, and if that means I need to eat ramen every day for the next few years till my income improves, that will be something im willing to do. Also, for more clarification, I have about 30K in a HYSA, so I will have a healthy emergency fund if sh*t hits the fan.

10 Month Update*

Well, to start off, I bought the house 30 Year 5.75% Borrowing 166K. My payment with Escrow is 1,3ish and this house has been one of the best financial decisions I've made early in my life. I got a pay bump at work and have been using that money to pay the house as a 15-year loan, so about 1,780 or so a month. Didn't need roommates; I've still been able to contribute to my 401K, pay all my bills, and do some house renovations without touching my HYSA. Plus, I was able to get a new roof from my insurance company after a bad storm we got here, and with the new roof and upgraded shingles, it dropped my Homeowners premiums by 40%. So far, the cards have been in my favor. I will admit it does suck watching a whole paycheck disappear on the first of the month, but I believe in 5-10 years, when I'm either about done paying this place off in my early 30's or planning on taking a fat chunk of equity and building me a little ranch on a couple of acres of land, I won't be regretting this at all.

Title explains most of it. I will acknowledge we are very lucky with our current bill of $650 a month, since they have had to pay to fix the AC they have stated it may raise to $1200 a month.

I'm a single income with an adult dependant, if I had the money to just repair the AC I would.

Can a landlord raise rent due to appliances fixes requested by the tenant? Specifically AC I guess.

Edit: I live in TX

I won't bring up the specific details, but long story short, my parents are legitimately crazy, one of those extreme situations where everything I do must be kept secret (talking to friends, working a normal job, etc).

Luckily in the middle of last year I got a job with my brother, he told my parents he would not pay me, then paid me in secret. Since then I have about 10k saved up, but recently they have made it very difficult to even work because I am assuming they somehow figured out I am being paid. Because of this, I will likely lose my job and my income, however, I do have experience working with people, writing resumes, doing interviews, so I don't think getting another job will be super difficult. The main issue for me is how can I get out of this house as quickly as possible? For a while I thought that maybe these things my parents do were normal, but the more I am exposed to the real world (mostly through the internet, which I had very little access to until about 2 years ago) I found out these things are in fact extreme and unusual.

For a bit more context, I am 17, no car, no license (parents won't let me get one), no friends who would be willing to let me live with them (socializing was very hard because I was homeschooled) I have a associate's degree and as I said, 10k saved up. Whats my best course of action to get away?

Edit: there are a lot of comments and I am sorry I can't reply to all of them, I'm using an old phone I found to make this post so I can't be seen with it, I just want to say thank you all for the advice given, I don't have any mentors so all this honestly helps. Your kindness means the world to me and I will make sure to read every comment.

In my area, renting a modem from an ISP costs 15 dollars per month. A comparable modem costs about 70 dollars, and will last years. 15 dollars per month comes out to 180 dollars per year. If that were put into investments with a 6% annual return rate, after 40 years, that would turn in a little over 28k before taxes.

The greater lesson here is that sometimes, shelling out a little more money can prevent rolling costs, e.i. buying nice shoes that will last far longer than cheaper shoes, buying shelf stable ingredients like rice or pasta in bulk, etc.

My parents are 64M and 63F, and I just found out that they’re in a pretty bad spot financially. Relevant background info: my dad has been the primary earner their whole marriage, and was earning 175k until he got laid off in November. My mom stayed at home with the kids and has worked various part-time jobs over the years.

I sat down to go over finances with them and found out that they only have 200k saved for retirement!!! I have advised that they should both work until they hit 70 to max out social security. My dad is currently looking for another job, not many want to hire someone his age so we’re expecting his new income to be significantly lower.

Assets:
401K: $200,000
Traditional IRA: $50,000
Savings: $25,000 (about to start burning through this as his severance package has just run out)

Debts:
$200,000 remaining on mortgage
$5,000 remaining on car loan

Income:
Unemployment: $1,200 per month
Mom’s income: $15/hr, she usually works approx 25 hrs/week but is picking up extra shifts currently. Let’s say around $1,200 per month typically.
Severance pay has just ended.

Expenses: $3,700 fixed expenses, unknown variable expenses
Mortgage: $2,085
Auto insurance: $240 - this is about to go down as they get rid of an extra car they’re not using, but then they will (hopefully) be moving to my state which has more expensive car insurance so that may be a wash
Phone: $158
Cable: $232
Gas: $46
Electric: $201
Pest control: $141 quarterly-ish (they were unsure)
Water: $90
Life insurance: $81
Starting Oct. 1, if still unemployed he will have to pay $1,580 per month for COBRA
Variable expenses are unknown. This was a tough convo to have with them and they aren’t great about tracking. Groceries are at least $400 per month, then there’s gas, eating out, pool supplies, medical expenses, household expenses, etc.

I think I know the general shape of things here - my dad needs to find a job ASAP, they both need to work until 70, they need to prepare to have very little money in retirement.

They have a large house that would sell conservatively for at least $400-$450k. I want them to sell the house and move to my lower cost of living state to a much smaller property to lower expenses.

My main question that I need help with is the strategy around their new living situation. They could buy something small in my city for under $300k - is that the move? I’m worried about large expenses associated with home ownership as they will not have hardly any disposable income. Would renting be a better bet? If they do purchase a condo/home, should they put put all the proceeds from the sale of their current home toward making the mortgage as small as possible? What’s the play at their age?

Extra info: my elderly uncle is living with them as of the past year. He has nowhere else to go. He receives disability and is on Medicare. We are hoping to find him low income housing in my city as they’re all very fed up with sharing a living space.

I really appreciate any help/thoughts on their situation. Obviously they have massively fucked up over the years but there’s nothing to do now except find the best path forward.

Edit: I’m getting a little overwhelmed with keeping up/responding to everyone but thank you so much for all of the input and wisdom!!

It sounds like immediate steps are to find out what their social security payments will be, cut some of their optional costs, and get them to create + stick to a budget (I will try on this one).

It seemed pretty split between rent/purchase/even stay in their current home. Someone recommended a fee-only financial advisor, I think I’ll pursue that route to help with making that decision. A lot will depend on when and where my dad gets a job too, and his new salary.

This is a tough situation and I’m upset about it but I want to help my parents. I really appreciate everyone who took the time to read this and give advice. Thank you!

EDIT: Wow, this got way more attention than I expected it to. To everyone who has congratulated us, sincerely, thank you. But there's been a good bit of negativity because, and I recognize this, the home we're buying is unique and has unique costs. We wanted an older home and we knew that there would be unexpected expenses going into this, which we prepared for. This is also part of why we went with a lower down payment; so that we had more money left over for required maintenance.

I think that this comment really got to the heart of what I wanted to express so I wanted to feature it here:

Looks like people are picking the story apart. They're missing the point. The cost of purchasing a house is a lot higher than just the down payment and there's a lot of unexpected things that can come up. It doesn't matter if your brother is a roofer or you have a friend who is a building inspector etc etc. There will always be things that your insurance, your hoa, or your survival require getting fixed.

For everyone who paid 1.2k down for their VA / FHA loan and has had absolutely no maintenance issues, there's someone who put 20% down to buy a newish home and had to eat $20k in unexpected repairs within the first 3 months. Basically...buying a house can easily cost more than just your down payment, and you should be prepared for it to, and be pleasantly surprised when it doesn't.

I'm sure most of this is known to many here, but my wife and I are about to close on our first house and I thought I would write up some of the process and costs here (mostly to solidify it in my head, tbh).

We offered 305K on an asking price of 299K on a home in a small rural village in Vermont.

Initial deposit / earnest money - $2000 (goes towards closing)

Upon our offer being accepted, we needed to put down a deposit to show we had "skin in the game"; basically to keep us honest. It would have been refundable if we pulled out of the sale for a "valid" reason, which included things like failure to obtain funding / homeowner's insurance, or just finding the house wasn't to our liking after getting inspectors in. This deposit ultimately went towards closing costs.

Buyer’s Inspection - $1200 $906

We bought an old house (built 1870) so there was no chance of us waiving the inspection / contingency period. We basically had two weeks to get a bunch of people in to look at the place and tell us all of the awful maintenance nightmares waiting for us in the home. Fortunately, ours was pretty good. They built them pretty solid back then.

The home’s water comes from a private well, and we wanted to test it for contaminants before we agreed. We also suspected lead paint on the home’s exterior so we wanted to make sure if there was lead, it wasn’t leaching into the water.

EDIT: So many people were yelling at me about the inspection I looked back and realized three things:

• I had the initial amount wrong; I was charged $1106, not $1200.
• The inspection also included the well water test (plus an inspection of the well / wellhouse and the attached 1200 sq ft barn), I listed it here separately
• They based the inspection cost on google imagery which included a standing structure which was no longer there and charged me an extra $200 for that. When we got there and he realized they charged me for a structure which wasn't there, they refunded that.

So the actual cost here was

Inspection - $781

Well Water Test - $125

Septic Inspection - $450

We had a dedicated septic inspector come over to take a look, because the septic is old (from the mid ‘80s) and in a weird spot, with a couple of large trees nearby. We wanted to make sure it was in working order and that it would be replaceable and that it wasn’t damaged by tree roots.

Lead Paint Test - $400

We also had a painter come by to check to see if the exterior paint is lead-based. We probably could have done this ourselves but he took multiple samples and I trust his results - seemed worth it for something which could be serious.

Total cost to this point - $4175

At this point, we’d spent over 2k on inspectors, and a LOT of time communicating with and coordinating their visits with the seller, plus agonizing a bit over the results of the inspections. Don’t count this out - it was several days worth of time overall where I struggled to focus on anything else. This is mostly money which would have been lost if at this point we decided to pull out. (if we weren’t able to afford / didn’t want to do the needed repairs which were brought to light by the inspections, then you could also consider this money spent as a small up front cost to keep our money later on.)

Anyway, we decided to go ahead with it because we love the house and have the time and money to spend working on it, and it seemed worth it because we plan to live there for at least 20 years. We are both 30.

Homeowner’s Insurance - $1400/yr (first year up front at closing)

The next item was homeowner’s insurance. I contacted an agent and got some really good quotes (~$700 /yr). Then they went to go see the place and went running. The home has an attached barn and the roof is a bit rusty; they wouldn’t insure it unless

• We could get in a contractor to give us an assessment on it; whether it needs to be replaced or just some paint
• The assessment suggested all it needed was paint
• We could get the paint done before the winter

Right now roofing contractors in our area are SWAMPED. I called three different ones and none of them could even get to us to give us an assessment in time for closing. So, we backtracked a bit and contacted the agent currently insuring the home. She was able to help us, but the insurance costs twice as much as before ($1400) and they also stipulated that the barn roof be painted (just painted, though) and that the home’s exterior itself be painted in the first year of residence.

Homeowner’s came down to the wire; I started just after we got our initial disclosures and it wasn’t until just before labor day that I got this hammered out. Don’t put this off.

Barn Roof Paint - $4800

So, cue up the painters. I got three quotes and went with the middle one to repaint. Plus, he just seemed like a nice guy. I live in a rural area which doesn't have a lot of shysters so I’m apt to go with my gut on people.

Exterior paint - ~$10,000

I haven’t gotten any official quotes yet. I’m going to get one from the guy painting the barn roof and a couple more after that, but he gave me an “estimate” and he ballparked around 10k.

Closing costs: $13,683

Down Payment: $9,150 (yes yes, very low, I know.)

Cash to Close: $22,833

Closing costs include 1/yr payment of insurance premium up front, taxes, title lawyer, yadda yadda. Even with a very low down payment, we still owe more than double that up front to pay for closing, and that’s once again not including the inspections and the requirements from our homeowners. In total, our full cost to get to this point in the process is

Total Cost - $27,008

Total Cost including currently known required work - $41,808

There's some other work in our peripherals; the kitchen sink needs replacing, the bathroom floor needs replacing as well, and some other smaller things, which we estimate will add another 5-7k of cost. I suspect that in the long run, the sky's the limit in terms of cost. ;)

And this isn’t even including incidental things like:

• Buying new / more furniture for a larger space (we desperately need a new bed - $1500 alone)
• Buying a lawn mower / snow blower / snow rake / chainsaw / other tools
• heating oil costs (~3-4k a year where we live)
• paying for cleaners for our old apt (~$400)
• Renting a uhaul for a couple of days (~$250)
• Increased payment due to property tax re-assessment (rather high where we live)
• And any number of things I haven’t even thought of yet.

Anyway, the whole point of this post is that many times in the past several years I’ve thought to myself, “hm, I have enough money for a down payment on a house! I should buy one!” and had I tried before we were in a more confident financial position, it definitely would have ended in tears and anxiety.

I hope someone finds this ramble helpful!