Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups • Hacker News Board

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#101

Post by dingaling » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 7:56 AM UTC

chrisco255 wrote: post #26

Renting an apartment vs owning a house is not necessarily a bad financial move. Depends on a number of factors. For instance, if you anticipate moving within a certain time frame, between closing costs, mortgage fees, commission, etc...it can cost more to own in the first 3-5 years, especially if prices are stagnant. Also, there are hidden costs of home ownership not necessarily factored in for, like repairs, mainten…

> Finally, one can use the savings from paying rent

What savings?

Rent as you stated already includes anticipated maintenance costs, property taxes, the landlord's mortgage costs, often an agency fee, plus a margin for the landlord.

I don't think I've seen rental rates ever cheaper than a personal mortgage. The main advantage of renting is avoiding long-term commitment but you'll pay a premium for that flexibility. Otherwise there wouldn't be an incentive for landlords.

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#102

Post by Bombthecat » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 7:57 AM UTC

jaabe wrote: post #82

chrisco255 wrote: post #26

Renting an apartment vs owning a house is not necessarily a bad financial move. Depends on a number of factors. For instance, if you anticipate moving within a certain time frame, between closing costs, mortgage fees, commission, etc...it can cost more to own in the first 3-5 years, especially if prices are stagnant. Also, there are hidden costs of home ownership not necessarily factored in for, like repairs, mainten…

In Denmark where I live you can loan 1 million Danish kroner at around 5k each month. A decent downtown apartment in a bigger city or a house in the suburbs is 2-4 million. Renting the equivalent is 10-15k, and with renting you obviously skip a lot of the maintenance cost and taxes. On the flip side loans are tax-deductible, meaning you actually don’t pay 20k to borrow 4 million, you pay 12k. It can still be cheaper…

I doubt that the house would be 4 million. Thanks to reducing population, increased building and housing. Plus who knows how the weather will be, I'm not sure that owning a house is the right thing in 20 years.

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#103

Post by methodover » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 8:02 AM UTC

baroffoos wrote: post #33

This is just another move from mega corps to tricking us in to paying a subscription for everything and never owning anything. Owning pretty much always ends up cheaper if you will have the item for a long time. Renting only makes sense for short term needs. I don't need to buy expensive equipment I only use once a year so renting that makes sense but for a couch it makes far more sense to buy it outright and use it…

What if I don’t know what couch I want?

I spent like 2 months going couch shopping every other weekend. I couldn’t decide. Whatever I bought I’d own, and be tied to forever, it feels like. Selling shit is time consuming and annoying. Moving it later or donating it is annoying and maybe been expensive. And the damn couch itself was expensive too. It felt like this big decision that I had to get right.

I didn’t end up buying anything.

I’d have much rather just picked out something interesting to rent for a while, see if I like it. If I do do, great. If not, it’s easy to change it.

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#104

Post by durnygbur » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 8:03 AM UTC

Barrin92 wrote: post #48

chrisco255 wrote: post #26

Renting an apartment vs owning a house is not necessarily a bad financial move. Depends on a number of factors. For instance, if you anticipate moving within a certain time frame, between closing costs, mortgage fees, commission, etc...it can cost more to own in the first 3-5 years, especially if prices are stagnant. Also, there are hidden costs of home ownership not necessarily factored in for, like repairs, mainten…

Renting anything really isn't a bad move. There's not much upside to owning something that depreciates in value. Instead of buying a sofa for 2000$ renting one for 50 and putting the rest of your money into some productive financial asset is actually perfectly reasonable.

After 4 years you paid for the sofa 2400$, "rest of your money" is -400$, sofa doesn't belong to you, and in case of scummy renter you own money for damage repairs and cleaning. Ready for legal litigation?

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#105

Post by Bombthecat » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 8:09 AM UTC

foepys wrote: post #94

ccozan wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Germany and I never heard of this "need". Nobody forces you. Yes, you may want to change your old heating (that's what I do), but you get a lot of subvention from the state. You do this, then you also get some good terms on taxing etc. Same with electricity. You get a better insurance policy if you have it new.

Actually, you have to replace your heating every 30 years. Unless you are exempt, which is becoming more and more unlikely. See EnEV §10.

A ton people don't hear about stuff like that,until they need a new credit for all those things...

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#106

Post by dagw » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 8:10 AM UTC

rietta wrote: post #35

Its hard to wrap my head around renting furniture and cloths. Most of the pieces in my house are gifts from family, many are antiques and very functional. Getting married and buying a house was all the excuse our families needed to set us up. I know not everyone has this but many do. Saved a ton of money vs buying new or renting.

When my wife and I bought a house we had to almost barricade the driveway to prevent our families from dumping all their old 'junk' on us. While we do have a bunch of stuff from our families, for us buying our furniture for our place to make it like we wanted was an important part of making the house ours.

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#107

Post by Barrin92 » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 8:15 AM UTC

durnygbur wrote: post #104

Barrin92 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Renting anything really isn't a bad move. There's not much upside to owning something that depreciates in value. Instead of buying a sofa for 2000$ renting one for 50 and putting the rest of your money into some productive financial asset is actually perfectly reasonable.

After 4 years you paid for the sofa 2400$, "rest of your money" is -400$, sofa doesn't belong to you, and in case of scummy renter you own money for damage repairs and cleaning. Ready for legal litigation?

The point of the exercise is to invest the money you didn't pay into something that earns you money. If you put the 1950 bucks you didn't spend into stock, you're making money.

And in case of damages and repairs, if you own the sofa, you're always sitting on the damages. Homeowners for example routinely spend thousands of dollars per year on their houses, whereas renters (generally), have repairs covered by the landlord.

this is a basic situation of opportunity cost. You can't just tally up the renting costs while ignoring the freed up capital, this is the exact mistake people make when they prematurely buy.

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#108

Post by xivzgrev » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 8:17 AM UTC

dingaling wrote: post #101

chrisco255 wrote: post #26

Renting an apartment vs owning a house is not necessarily a bad financial move. Depends on a number of factors. For instance, if you anticipate moving within a certain time frame, between closing costs, mortgage fees, commission, etc...it can cost more to own in the first 3-5 years, especially if prices are stagnant. Also, there are hidden costs of home ownership not necessarily factored in for, like repairs, mainten…

> Finally, one can use the savings from paying rent What savings? Rent as you stated already includes anticipated maintenance costs, property taxes, the landlord's mortgage costs, often an agency fee, plus a margin for the landlord. I don't think I've seen rental rates ever cheaper than a personal mortgage. The main advantage of renting is avoiding long-term commitment but you'll pay a premium for that flexibility. O…

No? In San Francisco median rent is much lower than equivalent monthly cost would be on median home.

You are correct that rent includes all the costs plus markup. But a big factor is that housing costs (esp in california) remain pretty steady once you buy. So that rent does include the housing cost...from 10, 20, x years ago.

Alternatively a developer builds a building and rents out the unit instead of marking up and selling units. So the cost isn’t as high as market price. An example: I recently rented a 1 bedroom in a desirable neighborhood for $3500 per month. Equivalent condos are over $1m dollars in that area. But it certainly didn’t cost the developer of my building $1m to build my unit.

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#109

Post by TeMPOraL » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 8:20 AM UTC

Barrin92 wrote: post #107

durnygbur wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After 4 years you paid for the sofa 2400$, "rest of your money" is -400$, sofa doesn't belong to you, and in case of scummy renter you own money for damage repairs and cleaning. Ready for legal litigation?

The point of the exercise is to invest the money you didn't pay into something that earns you money. If you put the 1950 bucks you didn't spend into stock, you're making money. And in case of damages and repairs, if you own the sofa, you're always sitting on the damages. Homeowners for example routinely spend thousands of dollars per year on their houses, whereas renters (generally), have repairs covered by the landl…

As a regular middle-class person, how do you put $1950 in stock to make more than $400 in 5 years risk-free and time/effort-free?

Re: Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups

#110

Post by scirocco » Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 8:25 AM UTC

Bombthecat wrote: post #102

jaabe wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Denmark where I live you can loan 1 million Danish kroner at around 5k each month. A decent downtown apartment in a bigger city or a house in the suburbs is 2-4 million. Renting the equivalent is 10-15k, and with renting you obviously skip a lot of the maintenance cost and taxes. On the flip side loans are tax-deductible, meaning you actually don’t pay 20k to borrow 4 million, you pay 12k. It can still be cheaper…

I doubt that the house would be 4 million. Thanks to reducing population, increased building and housing. Plus who knows how the weather will be, I'm not sure that owning a house is the right thing in 20 years.

"Buy land, they're not making it anymore"

- Mark Twain