Pinching Pennies To Save Up for a Down Payment
This week’s cover story in the New York Times real estate section is about people who’ve scrimped and sacrificed— sometimes for years— to save up enough money for the down payment on their first home. One guy survived for an entire year on a daily diet of a $2.95 chicken special and a 99-cent coke;…
This week’s cover story in the New York Times real estate section is about people who’ve scrimped and sacrificed— sometimes for years— to save up enough money for the down payment on their first home. One guy survived for an entire year on a daily diet of a $2.95 chicken special and a 99-cent coke; another woman started drinking only at happy hours. It’s notoriously hard to save from paycheck to paycheck in New York City; we were lucky that a real estate deal we worked on back in 1999 paid off well enough a few years later to enable us to come up with the downpayment on our house. (That, and we had the good fortune to flip a couple of one-bedrooms in Manhattan between 1997 and 2000, when we cashed out thinking the market had peaked! Got that one wrong, huh?) There must be lots of tales of self-deprivation in the name of nest-egg building. Anyone care to share?
Every Penny Counts [NY Times]
Slopehead – the entire article was centered around the fact that virtually everyone aged 25-35 are likely to be in the “buying stage” of their life – whether they are married, single, rich, poor or middle class. The point is affordable housing is virutally non-existant in this region. I don’t think people want to time markets; rather they don’t want to botch the biggest financial transaction they’re likely to ever make.
I agree marlets are based on the supply demand equation but what do you do when the supply of reasonably priced housng dries up and wages don’t rise? Sounds like an accidental housing crash, to me.
that wasn’t me, but good to know, 1:13.
slopehead, thanks for the info on the submarine rental, but they built a bridge to get down there three years ago – i just drove it the other day with the family; it’s a delightful little bridge with a taco stand and a scenic vista at the midway point.
that’s interesting, 12:51. i just yesterday heard a report from the head of the leading homebuilding conglomerate…i forget the name…but they are responsible for 80% of all housing built in the u.s.
he said while prices may and are sagging through the end of this year and part of 2008 that all demographics point to an uptick beginning in late 2008 or early 2009 and then a move upwards for the next few years after that.
housing is based on supply and demand and apparently there are a lot of people entering the house buying stage of their lives in about 2 years.
he said the best piece of advice he can offer is that you should never try to time the market.
Just wait for the crash, it has already started.
“or do we have to move to the ends of the earth in order to find something approaching our current situation?”
and it’s been said before on here many times, but it is not your god given right to own a brownstone in brooklyn, so yes…you might need to go a little farther out. there are PLENTY of places within 30 minutes of manhattan that are neither prohibitively expensive nor at the ends of the earth, as you say.
you just need to open your mind a little bit.
Chime, if you want to “drive down to Puerto Rico”, you’ll have to rent a submarine, not a car, and those are considerably more expensive.
you’re frustrated by hearing about people saving money to buy a home???
lordy.
doens’t take much, does it…
if buying isn’t right for you, so be it. but sounds like envy more than it does frustration.
Maxed out my student loans. Best financial decision I will have ever made.