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The real cost of owning a home

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Re: The real cost of owning a home

#471

Post by em-bee »

vel0city wrote: post #440
em-bee wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

that's the nice thing about renting in germany. there this would not work, the owner can sell the house but they can't kick out the tenant. so whoever is buying is taking over the tenant. and while you can ask a tenant to move out if you need the house for yourself, that too has to consider the needs of the tenant. if they have kids in school it is almost impossible to remove them unless you go out of your way to hel…

Is the landlord obligated to renew the lease at the end in perpetuity? Or does the landlord just need to wait for the lease to expire and then choose to not renew?

in germany by law every lease for private homes is always in perpetuity. the concept of renewal does not even exist. it is always month to month until the tenant decides to move out. you can't not renew a lease. you can raise the rent, but only in small steps. exceptions are if the tenant fails to pay for a few months, damages the property or misbehaves in other ways.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#472

Post by rmwaite »

dividefuel wrote: post #315

Beyond financial costs, I was caught off guard at how much time home ownership took up. House maintenance and projects have taken up most of every single weekend of mine for the past few years. Part of it is simply that I bought a house with more space than the places I usually rented. More to clean, more to maintain, more things that can go wrong, etc. But the biggest thing is that I'm the only one in charge of main…

Agree completely about the time thing. Indeed, every time I’ve fallen into the trap of somehow believing I’ve moved “past” the time sink it inevitably has bitten me down the road when something breaks or I learn about some maintenance task I should have been doing but didn’t even know existed.

More than anything, I’ve come to admire those who learn how to do this stuff consistently because it is hard.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#473

Post by asdff »

m463 wrote: post #467
dividefuel wrote: post #315

Beyond financial costs, I was caught off guard at how much time home ownership took up. House maintenance and projects have taken up most of every single weekend of mine for the past few years. Part of it is simply that I bought a house with more space than the places I usually rented. More to clean, more to maintain, more things that can go wrong, etc. But the biggest thing is that I'm the only one in charge of main…

I don't think home ownership is an "every single weekend" thing unless you bought a fixer-upper. Honestly, it sounds like you enjoy it. If you are doing it with that frequency I think you just are "into" your house.

Depends where you live. In the midwest you might legitimately need to mow 3x a week and you might have a huge lot. If you say screw it and let it go to knee high weeds, city might show up and cut your grass and fine you for it.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#475

Post by asdff »

pc86 wrote: post #362
colordrops wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not gp, but I bought a fixer-upper and it was at least weekends for the first two years, then slowed down quite a bit after that. Now it comes in fits and starts similar to you.

This is the answer - there are plenty of move-in ready, turn-key homes that require basically zero maintenance unless you want to remodel or change something, but those cost more (sometimes a lot more) than the ones that need more TLC or true fixer-uppers.

Even with fixer uppers the house is usually functional and fine. Just people think the bathroom is too ugly to poop in, so they have to spend five figures and rip out the walls, floor, ceiling, and everything else, to replace it with new walls, floor, ceiling, and everything else.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#476

Post by QuiEgo »

amw-zero wrote: post #273
anthonypasq wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

very weird how so many people are using apartments vs single family homes as a variable in discussing renting vs buying

It's not weird, since 99% of rentals are apartments, right?

Source? In my neighborhood on the outskirts of downtown (about a 10 minute drive out) at least 25% of the houses are rentals, maybe more like 33%. Lots of investment properties people scooped up when mortgages were 2%.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#477

Post by bombcar »

asdff wrote: post #473
m463 wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think home ownership is an "every single weekend" thing unless you bought a fixer-upper. Honestly, it sounds like you enjoy it. If you are doing it with that frequency I think you just are "into" your house.

Depends where you live. In the midwest you might legitimately need to mow 3x a week and you might have a huge lot. If you say screw it and let it go to knee high weeds, city might show up and cut your grass and fine you for it.

“Mow & snow” will eat most of your life, if you let it.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#478

Post by paul7986 »

dividefuel wrote: post #315

Beyond financial costs, I was caught off guard at how much time home ownership took up. House maintenance and projects have taken up most of every single weekend of mine for the past few years. Part of it is simply that I bought a house with more space than the places I usually rented. More to clean, more to maintain, more things that can go wrong, etc. But the biggest thing is that I'm the only one in charge of main…

I owned two single family houses both built in 2002. I am not handy at all and only will do remodeling when im going to sell a house. I was fortunate with both houses needing very little maintenance over the 7 years i lived in them. If i did need a maintanence guy my realtor has a good number of great reliable contractors in her back pocket. Realtors who have been selling houses in your area for MANY years usually have a great rolodex of solid, reliable contractors at their disposal vs. going online and rolling the dice.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#479

Post by hawaiianbrah »

abalashov wrote: post #450
hawaiianbrah wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course that’s a benefit of renting. How does that relate to the OP _homeowner_ saying one downside of ownership is they don’t have a single number to call for any maintenance issues?

I guess on the face of it, it's not related. I didn't read his comment as literally lamenting the lack of a number, or even someone to orchestrate, but rather to imply that there's nobody on the hook for it in all facets. With a landlord, you just call the number and magic happens and it's free to you (in theory, not always in practice).

Heh, gotcha. Yes, as a homeowner, the buck stops with you since you own it.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#480

Post by whaleofatw2022 »

asdff wrote: post #473
m463 wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think home ownership is an "every single weekend" thing unless you bought a fixer-upper. Honestly, it sounds like you enjoy it. If you are doing it with that frequency I think you just are "into" your house.

Depends where you live. In the midwest you might legitimately need to mow 3x a week and you might have a huge lot. If you say screw it and let it go to knee high weeds, city might show up and cut your grass and fine you for it.

The weeds are the hard part.

But as far as when I owned my own home, cutting the grass was just part of my routine and at least guaranteed some physical activity instead of working all day during covid.

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