How much house *did* you buy?

[MonkeyMama]

Wow - what a response.

First home:

1 - What was your income? $60k? (2 incomes)
2 - What was the purchase price? $260k condo
3 - How much did you borrow? $210k
4 - Do you feel, with time, you stretched too much, were quite conservative, or it feels just right? Why? You know, it felt just right. We lived in an extremely pricey area. This was the most we could afford with old fashioned lending standards (it was the 90s/we put 20% down). The interest rate was kind of high. We refied to a 15-year loan shortly after that and was fine for 2 years. That being said, our income went up to almost $100k in the course of 2 years. But even so, we knew housing would be a chunk of our income, and all things considered, the home was cheaper than anything we could have rented (including a studio apartment on the wrong side of the tracks. I Don't understand the whole renting is cheaper thing. If that was the case where we live, we'd be HAPPY to rent.). We also had no other debts. Though looking back, I see we took on a lot. But our thinking at the time was honestly something we could afford on one income. We were used to most of our income going to rent, etc. (& yeah - the tax breaks really helped with the cost back then).

[MonkeyMama]

Second home:

1 - What was your income? $100k (2 incomes)
2 - What was the purchase price? $300k (dream home)
3 - How much did you borrow? $230k
4 - Do you feel, with time, you stretched too much, were quite conservative, or it feels just right? Why? We moved to a lower cost area to buy more house. The house feels "dirt cheap" to me. That is certainly relative! But our perspective is very skewed. Though our income, combined, was officially $100k when we bought the house, most of the years we have lived here, our income has been $50k-$70k. Even so, the house payment is only 15% of my income with falling interest rates, income tax breaks, etc. We'll pay off the house in our 40s or early 50s. Most of our friends rent apartments for far more. So I feel this was a very conservative purchase considering the region. (Interestingly, since we moved somewhere cheaper, all our costs are about the same - insurance, property taxes, maintenance, utilities and everything - even though the house is twice as big as our first condo). On the flip side, we expected a much lower income the last 8 years we have lived here. I got more pay than I expected moving here, and more raises than I expected, since dh quit working. We felt we could afford this home quite easily on one low income.

We actually originally intended to only borrow about $150k (expected more equity from condo). But stuff happened, and we still felt this was a good move in the end, even borrowing $100k more than planned. Our alternative was to stay put and pay $500k+ for a starter HOUSE. 8 years later, happy to say we still feel it was a good move.

[supercheap]

Today if you don't already own a house you are lucky. You would have to be nuts to buy one now. Housing will keep going down in price at least for the next 12 months more likely more than that. Rents will keep falling along with prices. Then when we do bottom out don't worry about missing it. When prices hit the bottom they will stay there for a long long time.

[simpleyme]

1. 20K
2.25K single family dwelling Victorian fixer upper on 3 city lots with nice detached garage(we do not live in it any more but still own it tax statement declares it work 200K)
3.borrowed 22,500 land sale contract no fees of any kind except tittle insurance
4. It was a stretch at first but our house payment was the same as our rent had been, the places we rented were old and landlords did no repairs so it was great to move into a fixer that we could repair things on that was ours
there were lots of houses available at the time that cost 150K and that's what most of our friends bought so we were not "lucky" we bought a house that we could afford the payment on even if DH lost his job and could only get a job in fast food
we were dirt ass poor when we bought and very young pretty uneducated but we manged to make these decisions and that is I have very little empathy for highly paid educated professionals who are managing to lose there house,they always put "my kind "down, yet cannot do the most basic thing as spend less than the earn

[thekid]

Purchased first house with fiance a year ago.

1. 150-160K$ (combined);
2. 352K$;
3. 95K$
4. It's pretty easy. Financed over 20 years, so 640$ monthly motgage payments. Making substantial prepayments, so should be done in 5-7 years.

To be fair though, my fiance had a bit of money and paid her half cash. I'm the one paying the mortgage. So, for my half the numbers are:

1. about 100K$;
2. 176K$;
3. 95K$;
4. Same as above. We could have bought more house fairly easily, but there was no point. We really love our house and plan on having a family here and staying long term.

[Ima saver]

We were earning about $6K for the both of us when we bought a house. We bought a new 3 bedroom 2 bath home for $13,000. I do not remember how much we put down, but our payments were $96 a month. We added a family room and pool later and sold the house for about $42K. We built our next house for cash.
The house we are in now is very nice. It is 3200 sq. feet with a 2 car garage and another attached garage (heated) with bathroom and efficen. apartment. We are on 2 acres with a creek.
My husband built the house for about $200,000. We did NOT count his labor in the price but he did all the work completely alone except for the framing and stucco. Then we spent about $30,000 for the 2nd garage and little apt. It is appraised for about $500K.

Buying a house very young (21) and paying it off early was one of the best decisions I ever made.

[wincrasher]

I bought my first house in 1990. Deal fell in my lap - wasn't really looking. It was a VA repossession - so it was a sign and pick up the keys situation.

Income - $42k
Price - $75k
Loan - $75k

Best move I ever made. Had $30k in instant equity. But that first year was really tight! No furniture, no curtains in the front rooms. Mother came to visit and said enough is enough!

I'm one of the crazies buying a new house now. I gave up looking for the bottom and started looking for a good value.

Income now - $280k
Price - $342k
Loan - $275
Tight? Nope!

I'm getting a brand new, 3700 sq ft brick home on a 1 acre lot. Got an appraisal in hand for $372, but who knows how good that is. If it slides a little, so what - I'm not reselling any time soon.

[thekid]

We were earning about $6K for the both of us when we bought a house. We bought a new 3 bedroom 2 bath home for $13,000. I do not remember how much we put down, but our payments were $96 a month. We added a family room and pool later and sold the house for about $42K. We built our next house for cash.
The house we are in now is very nice. It is 3200 sq. feet with a 2 car garage and another attached garage (heated) with bathroom and efficen. apartment. We are on 2 acres with a creek.
My husband built the house for about $200,000. We did NOT count his labor in the price but he did all the work completely alone except for the framing and stucco. Then we spent about $30,000 for the 2nd garage and little apt. It is appraised for about $500K.

Buying a house very young (21) and paying it off early was one of the best decisions I ever made.

This is outstanding. Congratulations. When did you buy your first house, if I may ask?

[TBH]

2004
Income: around $60,000 (both of us working, 1 kid)
Price: $70,000
Financed: $54,000
Currently owe: $44,000
Payments: $585 per month
Tight? Not really. We had to put a lot of money into the house right off the bat, or we would have put down more than 20%. The good thing about doing the work right away was that many of the immediate improvements were energy-saving (new windows, new appliances, new furnace) so our utilities were low from day one. Our daycare costs were always much higher than our mortgage. The house has always felt affordable.

Now we're one of those families trying to get into $250,000 house, give or take. We thought we could afford it but now we are second-guessing ourselves. Current income is about $80-85K, both of us still work, and our childcare expenses are about to drop a lot because our son is starting public school in Sept. We'd put 20% down, using equity in this house. Current house now worth around $130,000, altho who really knows until the money is in hand.

[irmanator]

First home:

1 - What was your income? 20,000
2 - What was the purchase price? 35,000
3 - How much did you borrow? 35,000
4 - Do you feel, with time, you stretched too much, were quite conservative, or it feels just right? Why? just right bc it was way cheaper than the rent i used to pay, there is more space, I have my own yard, neighbors are better.

[sheridan15926]

Let's see:

I also want to add that DH and I both have credit scores right around 800. We are uber-conservative spenders, and we have no debt beyond our mortgage. We just bought a house in Colorado (the sixth home we have owned since we got married 22 years ago).

Income: $115,000 (single income)
Purchase price: $430,000
Amount Borrowed: $344,000 (we put 20% down out of our savings)
We feel comfortable with this amount. Our montly mortgage is around $2,300, which is about 1/3 of what DH brings home every month.

[PrincessPerky]

We bought this house in 2001
1. income: 30K (just his)
2. House price: 110K (1100 sqft)
3. Loan amount:108K
4. It was tight, got worse before it got better, now it is better. Apartments with more than one bedroom were about the same price, so with a kid on the way we decided to go for the house and make it work.

House was worth 160K at one point, prolly down to the 120 now.

Still here, I should have remembered the 110K I do recall talking how we paid 1000 per sq ft..

[Snowgirl]

In 2001:

1. income: 80k $ (combined, DBF and I)
2. paid: 115k $
3. mortgage: 100k $ (but my father loaned us 10k $, which we paid back in 2 years)
4. it was very conservative, but we wanted to make sure we could pay everything on s single income if need be, as we were both at the very start of our career (less than 1 year out of school). However, we have no regret and feel it is just right for us. We have a lot of disposable income for vacations, nice renovations, and are paying on a 20 years schedule. It was a large 2 bedrooms in the close suburbs, so we thought it'd be OK for a few years if we had kids, but since we haven't be able to have any yet, it should do for many more years.

[Zunow]

> 1 - What was your income?

2004: $345k/yr (with bonus). 2008: $150k/yr.

> 2 - What was the purchase price?

Bought first condo in September 2004 - Downtown San Diego, 1 bd/1 ba, $690k.

> 3 - How much did you borrow?

$552k (put 20% down).

> 4 - Do you feel, with time, you stretched too much, were quite conservative, or it feels just right? Why?

I paid too much, sold condo in September 2008 for $530k (now worth probably high $400s). I did stretch too much, because 2004 also turned out to be my highest earning year (due to decline in business).

So I stretched too much, but I knew I could afford it in a worse case scenario, which, unfortunately, did happen. Somewhat frustrating for me because so many people in the building walked away (foreclosures), but I just ended up eating my down payment (and a little more). Oh well, live and learn.

[Seeker]

We were earning about $6K for the both of us when we bought a house. We bought a new 3 bedroom 2 bath home for $13,000. I do not remember how much we put down, but our payments were $96 a month. We added a family room and pool later and sold the house for about $42K. We built our next house for cash.
The house we are in now is very nice. It is 3200 sq. feet with a 2 car garage and another attached garage (heated) with bathroom and efficen. apartment. We are on 2 acres with a creek.
My husband built the house for about $200,000. We did NOT count his labor in the price but he did all the work completely alone except for the framing and stucco. Then we spent about $30,000 for the 2nd garage and little apt. It is appraised for about $500K.

Buying a house very young (21) and paying it off early was one of the best decisions I ever made.

Wow -- very nice. To get that kind of pricing for houses here in Southern Calif, you'd have to go back to the 1950's though.

My folks purchased their first new home in '69 and the price then was 38k. But no idea of the details.

Early 90's I bought a two-bedroom condo. (Single)
1) probably making 50k at that point.
2) price = 160k
3) loan amount was 60k // 9% fixed interest / renegotiable after 7 years. Paid off in 6.

Too much for me alone? not at that time. But as time moved forward that the corresponding changes in Prop 13 and tax ramifications, I did find it difficult to pay for rising property taxes because of outsourcing and the number of times I've had to change jobs (and making less $'s than the original 50k... it would have been a problem today if I had not found better paying jobs and DH