A lot of us look at a home as a place to live and as an investment.
From the investment perspective, it's not the best time to buy a home. If the home does not appreciate at least 4% each year, you are better off renting in most cases. Additionally, you have to be sure that you will live in that home for at least 5 years to make monetary sense. Use a good rent vs. buy calculator to guesstimate which is better for your circumstances. One piece of advice that a real-estate professional gave me is to avoid homes that were built during the "housing-boom times" (esp betweeen 2002 & 2006) -- since builders were optimizing on quantity of homes rather than quality, during this time period.
For those who really want to live in a home, consider renting a home for a year or two (you can get some reasonably good deals on rentals, since homes are not selling). In the Seattle area, rents of high-end apartments & that of good homes are more or less the same (currently). Renting a home from a private owner (as opposed to a company that manages an apartment community) is not all that hard, though you have to watch out for a few gotchas.
From the investment perspective, it's not the best time to buy a home. If the home does not appreciate at least 4% each year, you are better off renting in most cases. Additionally, you have to be sure that you will live in that home for at least 5 years to make monetary sense. Use a good rent vs. buy calculator to guesstimate which is better for your circumstances. One piece of advice that a real-estate professional gave me is to avoid homes that were built during the "housing-boom times" (esp betweeen 2002 & 2006) -- since builders were optimizing on quantity of homes rather than quality, during this time period.
For those who really want to live in a home, consider renting a home for a year or two (you can get some reasonably good deals on rentals, since homes are not selling). In the Seattle area, rents of high-end apartments & that of good homes are more or less the same (currently). Renting a home from a private owner (as opposed to a company that manages an apartment community) is not all that hard, though you have to watch out for a few gotchas.
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