Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The real cost of owning a home

ericturner.dev

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

711–720 of 901 posts

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#711

Post by skirmish »

999900000999 wrote: post #599

I had a rental which was great up until the last 2 months where the landlord sent a prospective tenant to view it twice a week. No regard for my personal privacy. At a point a real estate agent just walked into my home without any notice. Even after this the showings continued. I’ve had truly awful landlords and some very good ones. Although unless you own a house in the woods it seems like someone needs to mess with…

> a real estate agent just walked into my home without any notice

Just open the door stark naked, you are in your private home.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#712

Post by AnthonyMouse »

lostapathy wrote: post #701
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #697

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like you misspelled "human" there. A large number of people can't afford contractor rates, so the alternative to the handyman is doing the work themselves. Who is more likely to screw it up, the person who does it once a month but not every day, or the person who does it once in their whole life?

Honestly, I'd debate this. The problem is the "handyperson" may "know" (but not actually) and do what they think they know. When I encounter the same task, I don't know I stop and try to learn the right way first. So there's a good chance the homeowner is actually on a better path. A lot of the handypeople you hire, kinda by nature of being under-the-radar, also end up intentionally cutting corners where "it doesn't…

> The problem is the "handyperson" may "know" (but not actually) and do what they think they know. When I encounter the same task, I don't know I stop and try to learn the right way first. So there's a good chance the homeowner is actually on a better path.

Maybe that's true for diligent technical people, but they're not the majority. The average person is going to watch a YouTube video, run out of free time and wing it.

> A lot of the handypeople you hire, kinda by nature of being under-the-radar, also end up intentionally cutting corners where "it doesn't matter" because savings are a priority for their customers, and it can go too far.

This is just humans again. Plenty of people willing to skimp out on something, even when it's for themselves, when it means saving time or money. Especially the people short on time or money.

> I, on the other hand, at least know I'm not trying to cheap out on my own work just because my last customers were broke and I'm conditioned to working in that mode.

This is the argument for doing it yourself when you have the time and wherewithal to do it yourself. It's not an argument for pressuring people to do it themselves when they don't have the time and wherewithal by making the only other lawful alternative be the one they can't afford.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#713

Post by obloid »

laughing_man wrote: post #629
mc3301 wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plumbing: plumber. Electrics: electrician. Most other things (besides obvious big things like foundation, drainage, roofing, load supporting areas) can be done with a good "fix it all" kinda person, or (with patience) youtube.

Plumbing isn't all that complicated, really. There are things you have to understand, but a little research will take you a long way. I only call the plumber when I don't have the equipment I'd need, like cameras and snakes.

If you're comfortable doing DIY a lot of equipment can be rented at your local Home Depot or similar store. I had a clogged sewer line and rented a drain snake for the afternoon. Much cheaper than calling the plumber.

The thing I won't do is roof work. Too scary.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#714

Post by stevenhuang »

archagon wrote: post #92
Havoc wrote: post #43

The numbers miss a key aspect - risk management Landlords do whatever the hell they like with zero consequences. Thats not a game I’d like to play with a 40 year horizon of unknowns. With a mortgage the risk is interest rates. And on that I’m confident I can carry far more exposure than my peers. So if that blows up in my face then the entire country’s financial system is cooked anyway

And that’s why we have rent control.

Rent control is nice for the select few that get it but results in worse overall conditions for renters by distorting market conditions.

It's a stop gap band-aid feel good measure, not an effective long term solution.

More housing supply and densification is the solution.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#715

Post by jandrewrogers »

what wrote: post #646
jandrewrogers wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Renting gives you a giant pile of additional money you can save and invest so that after 30 years you could buy a house in cash if you wanted to. The person with the house does not have this cash, they have a house instead. After 30 years you either have a house or enough cash to buy that house. In many cases, the rate of return on the cash is sufficiently greater that it is significantly more than the value of that…

Eh, not really? If you have money to invest after rent, you’ll also have money to invest after mortgage payments.

Rent is much cheaper than the total monthly purchase costs in many locales. Literally thousands of dollars per month of net cash per month to investments in the renting scenario. And that cash appreciates at equity rates rather than debt rates. This is on top of being able to invest the down payment instead of spending it on a house.

I have decades of data on this in a few locales (including Bay Area and Seattle) based on my own experience and despite buying and (still) owning homes several times. It never pays out better than renting and investing. The math doesn't math. I still buy places occasionally but I am honest about this reality.

For the kinds of places I rent the finance math is so heavily tilted toward renting that it is a no-brainer. I'm not alone in this; I know many people of means that choose to rent even though they could buy any house they wanted.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#716

Post by [deleted] »

y1n0 wrote: post #274
huhkerrf wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but it's also one of the downsides. "Care about the plan of their surroundings" can just as easily turn into the HOA drama that many prefer to avoid.

HOA drama sucks for sure, but just outside of my HOA controlled neighborhood, I see also the houses with junk cars in their yards and grass gone to seed. As much as I hate many stupid rules and seemingly unfair application of them, I do like that it mitigates against people that just don't give a shit about their property or the impact of their life choices on others.

[deleted]

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#717

Post by cperciva »

EdgeExplorer wrote: post #319
relium wrote: post #15

I think 1% per year is insufficient for repairs. Even a paint job will cost more than that these days. There's also a potential HOA fee, even in many neighborhoods with freestanding homes. But there are tax benefits of home ownership too. The interest deduction used to very significant, although less now since they raised the standard deduction. There's also a $250K/500K non-taxable capital gains benefit when you sel…

Seriously. My experience with 15 years of home ownership is probably more like 3% per year. I don't think I've ever had even a single year where 1% was accurate.

I've heard a guideline of 3% of the value of the structure plus 0.5% of the value of the land.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#718

Post by stevenhuang »

rogerrogerr wrote: post #634

Been thinking about this a lot. Curious what the rational folks of HN would suggest for me. Fact pattern: - I'm in the 25-30yo range, single male - Living with parents because I can; there's no friction and I mostly enjoy it. And I'm saving a ton of money. - Remote senior SWE for a non-FAANG, but still doing around $200k/yr between my W2 and a few other things - NW somewhere around 400-500k. I could easily go buy a h…

If you rent and remain invested in the market, it's a wash. So yes there's nothing wrong with renting. It just tends to not be effective for most people since they lack the self control and discipline to invest in stock equities, since lifestyle creep means they tend to overspend. A mortgage for most people is then a form of forced savings which helps them build equity through rising land values.

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#719

Post by bombcar »

verbify wrote: post #569
ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #119

>"renting is just throwing your money away" Unless you think landlords are running a charity, some part of your mortgage is going to them as profit (over a large enough sample of renters anyways), and some percentage of your rent is covering 'bad tenants' (which you're not, right?). Their entire improvement section is also something renters tend to not think about. It's a weird situation when renting that you aren't…

> With home ownership though, things like a modern kitchen, a shed, new laundry machines not only better your life today but also (likely) have some value add. Just beware that it's usually much less than you put in though. We bought our house for £25k more than the next door neighbours even though they're cookie cutter houses sold within 4 months of each other. Our house was thoroughly modernised, new kitchen, all o…

You also basically have to assume any and all repairs and upgrades were done crappy, the absolute opposite of what you’d want, and probably didn’t fix anything, either.

Which means that good deals are out there, if you’re willing to search and adapt

Re: The real cost of owning a home

#720

Post by skeptic_ai »

laughing_man wrote: post #641
skew-aberration wrote: post #635

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you were renting, you would still be paying for the fence, utilities, roof, etc (quoted prices for fence/hvac are very high btw). If every renter on the street had significant free money to invest, why wouldn't the landlords increase rent? The only thing stopping them is the availability of other land / houses to buy, which acts as leverage for the renters. As land gets bought up over time, zoning becomes more res…

Usually when you're renting you're not in a detached dwelling, which is more expensive. On a per-unit basis, it's a lot cheaper for the landlord to maintain your unit than it is for you to maintain a separate house. Renting a house just makes no sense, IMO, unless you have a family and you know you're going to be moving soon. Also, rents don't increase just because you have extra money. People take the cost of living…

You can’t compare buy house with rent a flat. You need to compare same property style/type. Otherwise you just lying you yourself.

My friend said: I can rent this 3 bed room for 6k. But if I buy a 1 bed I need to pay 2k. So it’s 3 times cheaper to buy.

Post reply on HN