Buying With Help From The Rental Units
The Times dishes on the New York City real estate market’s dirty little secret — that it’s being fueled in great part by the retirement-age parents of twenty- and thrity-somethings who wouldn’t otherwise have a shot in hell of owning even a studio apartment. When we bought our first apartment — a 950-square-foot prewar one-bedroom…
The Times dishes on the New York City real estate market’s dirty little secret — that it’s being fueled in great part by the retirement-age parents of twenty- and thrity-somethings who wouldn’t otherwise have a shot in hell of owning even a studio apartment. When we bought our first apartment — a 950-square-foot prewar one-bedroom in Manhattan — for $160,000 in 1996, it was still possible for a 27-year-old and his fiancee to buy something on their own. Now, though, the idea of having socked away a downpayment of $150,000 or $200,000 (instead of $30,000 or $40,000) by the age of 30 is realistic only for those in a small handful of professions. Enter Mom and Dad. In Williamsburg (where Natasha Agrawal, bottom right, got hooked up with a $900,000 penthouse by her parents), one Douglas Elliman broker estimates that one quarter of the condos are being bought by parents or the trust funds they have set up. The twist, The Times notes, is that these hand-outs often come with some (creepy) strings attached, such as extorted promises not to let a boyfriend or girlfriend move in.
Buying With Help From Mom and Dad [NY Times]
When I’m dead my kids can pry my brownstone from my stone cold grip. Parents I recommend a reverse mortgage. Drain all the equity out of the sucker for bingo cruise ships vacations.
Couple of points:
1) Working on Wall Street: wisen up, unless you are an investment banker or have a corporate title of Director or Managing Director, you won’t be pulling in more than $180,000 salary. And what kind of NYC housing can that buy after taxes?
2) Parents lending the $$ for a down payment are making trust fund kids…not everyone! Face it, lots of parents bought their brownstone(s) when housing was much more affordable and in healthy relationship to the average salaries. These brownstones, purchased for below TWENTY THOUSAND in the 1970s are now worth on, average upwards of 2 MILLION DOLLARS!! Add good and healthy investment in the stock market and these 70+ folks are net worth in the millions. For them to distribute some of their estate now, while they can to their kids is a good thing.
3) If you can’t afford NYC, move somewhere else you can afford. How snobby and unfeeling. Where can one find the vibrancy, diversity and overwhelming things to do other than NYC. There are many who HAVE TO live in NYC because they simply love the city and all it has to offer. But…how do you afford it when all real estate has SKYROCKETED?? Truly a BIG PROBLEM when the average salary doesn’t even come remotely close. Not everyone is a lawyer or investment banker. Not everyone wants to have kids and hire nanny’s to raise them since both mom and dad have to (or even want to) keep working.
Without my parents financial help, I could not have afforded to the down payment that makes the mortgage payments realistic. My parents did very well…a teacher and a senior clerk for the NYC government. Today, the both of them wouldn’t stand a chance to even dream of buying a place in NYC.
That is what is so sad…real estate prices are unreachable to the overwhelming majority.
I did hear of a recent deal where the owner (lived in here house for over 40 years with her family) rejected the high markup her RE broker and also attorney were pushing and in the end, sold to a family at a deep discount (still high by today’s average income standards) because she wanted a family to live where she did.
That kind of person is rare. how many of us would do something like that – to give someone a chance…
I don’t know where we are going sometimes, but I am grateful for my parents who did instill solid values to me: work hard, save your money, don’t drink or smoke excessively, don’t pass your body around like its a welcome mat, respect your neighbors, don’t be so “plugged in”…
I am also grateful that they believe in helping their kids. It’s a beautiful legacy.
My first mortgage broker literally refused to believe I was not getting ANYTHING from my parents. Had to ask me four times. It’s not just common; NOT getting a handout is the exception, and a rare one at that.
North Crown Heights = Little Central Park West
williamsburg = manhattan wannabe. the real brooklyn = loud and proud.
1:02pm
I was being facetious.
1:02pm
I was being facetious.
how bout calling Williamsburg Large Supercool Trailerpark?
Yeah I kind of see SuperGIrl’s point… but I wouldn’t call Wburg little Manhattan…