How much house did you buy?

**project15** · 03-20-2009, 12:50 PM

1. Salary: $90k - both of us work, no kids
2. Price of home: $178k
3. Amount borrowed: $159k
4. No, we didn't stretch at all. We bought a fixer upper and also budgeted to have enough to fix it up. We've put $20k into it over the past 6 months. The townhouse is big enough to raise two kids, so we can stay in it as long as we want to. I feel very comfortable with our purchase. If one of us loses a job, we can still afford it on one salary (even though it would be very tight for our current standard of living).

**boosami** · 03-20-2009, 01:12 PM

First home:

1. Salary: $65k (single, no kids)
2. Price of Home: $149,900
3. Amount Borrowed: $119,000
4. It was a perfect little starter home in a great location, and is now one of my rental properties. I could easily afford it when I lived there, as I had no other debt and didn't stretch myself. These days I can still easily afford it, even if it is vacant. (Though currently I have tenants in the property.) The only downside is that its value is about the same as when I originally purchased it, due to the recession. I'd like to sell it in future, but now is definitely not the time.

**disneysteve** · 03-20-2009, 01:23 PM

First and only home:

1. Income $85,000
2. Purchase Price $142,000
3. Mortgage $113,600 (20% down)
4. We were comfortable with that amount. We were pre-approved for a fair amount more but I knew what they were saying we could afford and what we actually could do reasonably were two different numbers.

Great question, by the way.

**jIM_Ohio** · 03-20-2009, 01:30 PM

Originally posted by MonkeyMama View Post

First home:

1 - What was your income?
2 - What was the purchase price?
3 - How much did you borrow?
4 - Do you feel, with time, you stretched too much, were quite conservative, or it feels just right? Why?

Same question if you have moved up, or down, since.

First home was a condo

1) Made about 50k
2) purchase price was 152k
3) 145k
4) my wife was my fiance at the time, but was not on the mortgage even though she paid bills (her credit score was not helping qualifying- around 600). Was tight for about a year then wife got a really good job (she had only worked for 2 years at the time we closed, and those were temp jobs).

Second was a single family home 7 years later.

1) made about 100k
2) purchase price was 352k bought at the peak of the bubble (IMO) in Dec 2005.
3) 330k
4) again tight first year (that was advice I was being given) and 20k of raises later we are doing well.

**LivingAlmostLarge** · 03-20-2009, 01:45 PM

First Home Condo 1 bedroom

1. $42k combined gross
2. $165k
3. $132k 1st, 16.k 2nd mortgage
4. Bought with my DH who was my Boyfriend at the time. I thought it extremely tight, but we were only paying $700 mortgage + $200 2nd mortgage+ $150 HOA + $150 property taxes + $20 insurance = $1200 which is what we were renting for.

With the tax deduction we were actually better off and building equity. It was REALLY tight though. We were on graduate student stipends and unfortunately the area was just ridiculously expensive. It was not a good situation. But if we couldn't pay our mortgage, we had been locked into renting at that price as well. So we were used to it.

2nd home townhouse
1. $175k that year, ~$130k since
2. purchase price $575k, with $25k back from the developer
3. $460k mortgage
4. Again tight and tighter still after my DH went back to get an MBA. It's not great still but better. We're managing. The interest rate we got really helped.

We weren't that stressed actually. It was basically all my DH's salary and very little mine so we were buying on one income.

I am hoping we can score a SFH on our next home.

**GREENBACK** · 03-20-2009, 02:28 PM

1. 55k
2. 75k(an absolute steal)
3. 60k
4. I think this was quite conservative. It was very nice at the time to not be attached at the hip to a big mortgage. It gives you so much more breathing room in the rest of your financial life.

**m3racer** · 03-20-2009, 03:17 PM

Originally posted by LivingAlmostLarge View Post

.
2nd home townhouse
1. $175k that year, ~$130k since
2. purchase price $575k, with $25k back from the developer
3. $460k mortgage
4. Again tight and tighter still after my DH went back to get an MBA. It's not great still but better. We're managing. The interest rate we got really helped.

That must be a VERY nice townhouse for $575k.

**jIM_Ohio** · 03-20-2009, 03:36 PM

Originally posted by m3racer View Post

That must be a VERY nice townhouse for $575k.

or LAL lives in DC area, NYC, CA or some other expensive area. I remember seeing townhouses in DC suburbs going for 500k+ in 1996.

**zetta** · 03-20-2009, 04:09 PM

1st home townhouse (1170 sq ft, 2 bdr)
1. income -- around $56k
2. price -- $189k
3. loan -- $140k (25% down, with $20k gift from my parents)
4. I feel I was fairly conservative. I paid 1.5 points to bring the monthly payment down to a comfortable level. My mortgage was actually $200 less than what a roommate and I had been paying for a 2 br apt.

It was the best investment I ever made, as I bought at the very beginning of the bubble, and sold it for $369k during the middle of the bubble (2002).

**myrdale** · 03-20-2009, 05:49 PM

Income = $55k
Price = $108k
Loan = $100k
Overall = I was approved for $180k, I knew that was far outside of my budget. $110k was my ceiling. Homes are not what I would consider cheap around here, but that was the best deal I could find.

I think I did excellent. Ofcourse I wish I could have found something in the $80-90k range, but I love what I got!

**tripods68** · 03-20-2009, 05:55 PM

2003
1. Income - $91K
2. Home Price - $283K (1740 sq ft, 3 bdr NorCAL)
3. Mortgage Balance - $265K (7% down FHA) - My parents help put down $21K which we paid off last year.

We have much higher income now but our home its worth according to zillow $225K

But we are very happy in the community we are living even in the midsts of sub prime mess.

**Phatphoeater** · 03-20-2009, 06:18 PM

Income: 180k combined
Closing price: 570k
Loan value: 512k
Our current housing costs to net income ratio is about 35%, but living in the San Francisco area is costly. We rented prior to buying at about 1/3 the monthly cost. It isn't tight as we are both minimal spenders. I just hope the big earthquake doesn't come along in our lifetime because our poor 90 year old house will surely crumble.

**LivingAlmostLarge** · 03-20-2009, 06:49 PM

Extremely HCOLA. Most 1 bd were $300k. $575k didn't buy that much to be honest, more the location. Very close to city, inner suburb.

Our friends bought in the city $525 2bd/1ba! Soooo...you see it's ridiculously expensive.

By the way we sold our 1st place for almost $300 and scored our downpayment in 3 years. It doubled in 3 years.

**SavingCash** · 03-20-2009, 08:06 PM

1. $32,000 (student loans) as a medical student.
2. $61,900 for a brand new 2 BR 2 BA 1100 square foot townhome. What a deal!
3. $55,900 borrowed.
4. My payment including taxes and insurance was $530 per month, which was easily doable on my student loans. The housing market at the time was booming, so it really felt right. In the end, I ended up making $25,000 on the sale of the house when I started residency. Right place at the right time...

How much house did you buy?