Thinking about buying a house...input needed

[jeffie7]

my taxes are 5200 a year.

we have land, you don't.

Again I push to look in different counties, we don't have an extra school tax but different counties have better/worse school systems, Howard County has a big resale that is pushed by Howard County schools, look at listings and you'll see, your kids can go to howard county schools!!!!

And as far as your taxes. 5200 with land.... wow.... welp I pay 2800ish and 1 county over for the same yard if not smaller (another town home) taxes are in the 4000-4500 range. both PG county and Howard county have taxes out the ass.

It's something worth looking into when buying a house. Different county could make a big difference both in resale and in monthly payments.

 

[Briansol]

basically the way it works here is that the 'poorer' towns have a higher mill rate (the mill rate is basically a figure in milis (thousandths) that they tax based on 75% of assessed value).
But, the richer towns have houses i can't afford.
Where i am is right in the middle. moderate houses, moderate mill rate.

they can use a 20 mill rate in the rich towns, because average home value is 300+ and earn enough income to drive the city. On the other hand, the poorer towns, they have a 40+ mill rate because the average house value is 130k. (as an example)

 

[Speedracer228]

Damn houses in texas are cheap....... Definately take your time like they are saying... I just closed on my new house last friday... Its a 3br 2.5ba 2100sq ft end unit town home that was built just about 2 years ago now.... I bought it from someone who bought 8-10 units in the development as investments and I paid 80k less than they did for it brand new and they had 1 tenant in there for 6 months... So basically I got a brand new house that has had nothing even touched in it (walls etc everything is still white and how the builder left it)....

The market is in your favor and will stay that way for a while, if I wasnt getting married in 3 months I wouldnt have bought right now, probably would have tried to wait a few more months..

I did an FHA loan and it required 3.5 down and has some great features for resale and refinancing at a later date (ask ur mtg guy). I was lucky enough to have my future father in law as my realtor so that was a huge help and continuing beating the dead horse, get a GOOD realtor and take some time... Good Luck!

 

[civicious]

my taxes are 5200 a year.

we have land, you don't.

we also don't have a 'school tax' nor a single toll road in the entire state. it all evens out in the end...



I honestly totally agree.

Let them build it first.

It will sit. you still have to wait 5 months anyway.

you'll get a better price.
you might find something else that's better in the mean time.
etc etc.



werd.


If you don't have 10k in the bank for the house right now, you can't afford it.
half will be used for closing, and since the place doesn't come with appliances, the other 5 is already gone so you can cook and not have spoiled milk.

On top of that 10k, if you don't have 6 months of living expenses (call it 8-10 grand? probably more with the mortgage) in cash in the bank right now, you can't afford it.

If you lose your job, or get hurt, or whatever and can't work, you don't want to lose your house over it. It's not like renting where you can just move anywhere. if you default on a house, you won't own another one until you're 45. no one will lend to you again. ESPECIALLY now.


If you have 18k in your bank sitting and 0 credit card debt, then i would say you're ready.

If you don't, you need to slow your roll before you become a statistic on the forclosure graph.

I've got the 'money in the bank' part covered, as well as the closing costs. The price of the house without appliances is $75k, the total price is going to include all my appliances and accessories, and will all be included in the loan.

As far as the housing market falling more over the next few months, I've got that covered as well. Part of the deal I'm signing with the housing company is that if the price of the house falls after I've signed the contract and before the house is built, I'll only have to pay the lower price, BUT if the market comes back up my price will stay the same.

With the county thing, I live in the neighborhood that's furthest north in the county that I live in. The next county up has OUTRAGEOUS taxes, as most (if not all) of the neighborhoods in it are 'high class' type. If I were to move to any other county in the area, I'd be over an hour from where I am now, and not only would I have to wake up a LOT earlier to get to work on time, I'd be spending a LOT more in gas.

I've rented in this same neighborhood for a year and a half, and it's a 'cookie-cutter' type neighborhood, so all the houses are built by the same company, and there are only 6 or 7 different models. I know firsthand that it's a good neighborhood, the houses don't fall apart (at least not in the first few years), and I already know about most of the downsides/inconveniences (in the particular house that I'm currently living in, the a/c doesn't cool in the spare bedrooms worth a fuck, for instance).

I'm not jumping into this over the course of a few days, I've been looking into it and considering it for a while - that's part of the reason I started renting in this neighborhood.

 

[jeffie7]

As far as the housing market falling more over the next few months, I've got that covered as well. Part of the deal I'm signing with the housing company is that if the price of the house falls after I've signed the contract and before the house is built, I'll only have to pay the lower price, BUT if the market comes back up my price will stay the same.

That wasn't my point. I bought a house 3 months? ago and for all I know prices fell and will fall some more, either way I need a place to live and over time it will go back up.

The whole market maybe falling more or even leveling out means there is and will be 293804932804 options and chances are the house you're looking at will sit around for awhile as with the other x many that haven't been built in that same neighborhood.

Just get an agent and look around.

Option A is buy the house now and never have the chance to go else where and maybe get stuck in it since you wont beable to resale it any time soon with out losing a good deal of money.

Option B is look around take your time 1-2-3 months and when you're ready if you can't find shit, buy the house. it will still be there and if not another house around it will be there and for some reason if not there will still be 293809324 other houses in that area that are sitting.

I for one like the idea of having more then 1 option.