I saved for a loooong time and was able to pay cash for my home. No debt of any kind either. I realize this is not the norm.
But I don't think 20% down is unrealistic even in a HCOL area. If you can avoid PMI I think less than 20% down can be ok. But home ownership is expensive and being house poor is not a fun place to be.
The only reason I was willing to only put down 10% was because our loan didn't have PMI. If it did I would have sucked it up and scraped together the 20% or built a less expensive house.
share.memebox.com/x/uKhKaZmemebox referal code for 20% off! DD1 "J" born 3/2003 DD2 "G" born 4/2011 DS is here! "H" born 2/2014 m/c#3 1-13-13 @ 9 weeks m/c#2 11-11-12 @ 5w2d I am an extended breastfeeding, cloth diapering, baby wearing, pro marriage equality, birth control lovin', Catholic mama.
I saved for a loooong time and was able to pay cash for my home. No debt of any kind either. I realize this is not the norm.
But I don't think 20% down is unrealistic even in a HCOL area. If you can avoid PMI I think less than 20% down can be ok. But home ownership is expensive and being house poor is not a fun place to be.
The only reason I was willing to only put down 10% was because our loan didn't have PMI. If it did I would have sucked it up and scraped together the 20% or built a less expensive house.
The only reason I was willing to only put down 10% was because our loan didn't have PMI. If it did I would have sucked it up and scraped together the 20% or built a less expensive house.
share.memebox.com/x/uKhKaZmemebox referal code for 20% off! DD1 "J" born 3/2003 DD2 "G" born 4/2011 DS is here! "H" born 2/2014 m/c#3 1-13-13 @ 9 weeks m/c#2 11-11-12 @ 5w2d I am an extended breastfeeding, cloth diapering, baby wearing, pro marriage equality, birth control lovin', Catholic mama.
We're planning on buying at the end of the year / early 2014. We won't have CC debt, but not sure that we'll put the full 20% down. Probably 15% or so. If we sacrificed location or size/amenities, we'd be able to do the full 20 or more, but location is really important to us.
Post by brickhouse on Aug 27, 2013 16:35:30 GMT -5
We had a little more than 20% down and no credit card debt. We did have a car payment. Some of the 20% we put down came from the sale of our previous house since we had some equity. We saved for a few years before we were able to do it.
For us, we could only afford a home with a big down payment. We have a conforming 15 year mortgage at a rate under 3%. If we had to go with a jumbo mortgage instead, we'd be stuck with a 30 year at about 5%. So for our same house, we'd pay the same mortgage for 5% down as we did for 25% down, but spend 30 years paying it rather than 15. (In a magical world where you can get a jumbo for 5% down and without PMI). The extra 20% up front bought us a ton of freedom down the line and frees up $ now we'd otherwise have to throw into the kids' college funds now.