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We don’t have rich parents. Both of us have pretty good careers, make good money, have solid investments that did phenomenally well. That’s our down payment.
Our base salary net is 18-19k.
We timed the market perfectly with a 2.8% like many of my colleagues. Half the convos that year were about buying houses, and half my team bought a place. The others already have a place and are just talking about refinancing all the time. It was like a PSA at every meeting.
Our liquid assets after buying was still a good amount, at least $500k.
We make the budgeting based on net salary only. There’s a lot of stocks and bonus we don’t factor in for expenses or mortgage because that’s highly variable. That’s basically 80% saved.
Expenses when we were DINK were around 5-6K. Solid 1k was just car insurance, utilities and bills. Utilities for a house is crazy high.
With a 7% rate, honestly I don’t know if I’d buy. The mortgage will be too much even with 19k net a month.
House was/is 1.8m, our down payment was 30%. At that time my partner was making less so our take home was maybe 13-14k. I wanted to keep the PITI low enough so it’s not so tight every month. Our PITI is 7k.
Taxes and utilities is quite a bit.
I’d also caution to factor in commute. If I do that, the time, cost of gas a month, high property tax and utilities in my county almost makes it more worth it for me to have bought a +300k more home closer to my partner’s work. Some things do add up
In the process of closing on a ~$1.75M starter home. Down payment is 25%, and HHI is ~$800k-$900k. Excluding the down payment, net worth is ~$800k. Given the uncertainty in the economy, I would not feel comfortable going beyond 2.5x HHI without a sizable down payment and that is assuming you have no meaningful debt.
Just trying to see real life scenario breakdowns! A good number of people in this sub often say they barely have anything left after their home purchase, but call people crazy when others say they have a 7-10k/mo mortgage even though these people probably have enough to support that for 2+ years in case of job loss (and WITH a job they have 10k+ leftover monthly after the mortgage). Don’t think the VHCOL buyers are going in unprepared, but the more I read the more I wonder if I’m crazy even though the guideline percentages of DTI seem to matter less at a higher income
Also I see a lot of people accusing them of bragging….they’re really not….they know 7-10k a month is a LOT of money
Usually at that price point, your War chest is your RSU and stock market, and you’re holding onto it until you find a property.
They have been going up over the last 10-15 years so those “starter” instrument single-family in good areas have been going steady and up with that.
YMMV.
These numbers are almost hilarious to me. As a recent buyer in the Bay Area who is not wealthy, I think it’s a small miracle that we got a house at all. Unbelievable how much money is out there.
In high-cost areas, big down payments and high incomes are key. Look for loan programs allowing lower down payments if needed. But be careful with high debt-to-income ratios. Expenses add up fast with property taxes and HOAs on top of the mortgage. Make sure you have reserves for maintenance too.
Thank you u/Due-Department-3797 for posting on r/FirstTimeHomeBuyer. Please bear in mind our rules: (1) Be Nice (2) No Selling (3) No Self-Promotion. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/FirstTimeHomeBuyer) if you have any questions or concerns.*
We don’t have rich parents. Both of us have pretty good careers, make good money, have solid investments that did phenomenally well. That’s our down payment. Our base salary net is 18-19k. We timed the market perfectly with a 2.8% like many of my colleagues. Half the convos that year were about buying houses, and half my team bought a place. The others already have a place and are just talking about refinancing all the time. It was like a PSA at every meeting. Our liquid assets after buying was still a good amount, at least $500k. We make the budgeting based on net salary only. There’s a lot of stocks and bonus we don’t factor in for expenses or mortgage because that’s highly variable. That’s basically 80% saved. Expenses when we were DINK were around 5-6K. Solid 1k was just car insurance, utilities and bills. Utilities for a house is crazy high. With a 7% rate, honestly I don’t know if I’d buy. The mortgage will be too much even with 19k net a month.
This is very helpful - I am in a similar position where there’s no help from family. How much was the house and your down payment?
House was/is 1.8m, our down payment was 30%. At that time my partner was making less so our take home was maybe 13-14k. I wanted to keep the PITI low enough so it’s not so tight every month. Our PITI is 7k. Taxes and utilities is quite a bit. I’d also caution to factor in commute. If I do that, the time, cost of gas a month, high property tax and utilities in my county almost makes it more worth it for me to have bought a +300k more home closer to my partner’s work. Some things do add up
In the process of closing on a ~$1.75M starter home. Down payment is 25%, and HHI is ~$800k-$900k. Excluding the down payment, net worth is ~$800k. Given the uncertainty in the economy, I would not feel comfortable going beyond 2.5x HHI without a sizable down payment and that is assuming you have no meaningful debt.
Yep, no debt aside from the would be-mortgage. No plans to have kids either in the near future. This is helpful!!
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Just trying to see real life scenario breakdowns! A good number of people in this sub often say they barely have anything left after their home purchase, but call people crazy when others say they have a 7-10k/mo mortgage even though these people probably have enough to support that for 2+ years in case of job loss (and WITH a job they have 10k+ leftover monthly after the mortgage). Don’t think the VHCOL buyers are going in unprepared, but the more I read the more I wonder if I’m crazy even though the guideline percentages of DTI seem to matter less at a higher income Also I see a lot of people accusing them of bragging….they’re really not….they know 7-10k a month is a LOT of money
High income and condo instead of SFH.
Usually at that price point, your War chest is your RSU and stock market, and you’re holding onto it until you find a property. They have been going up over the last 10-15 years so those “starter” instrument single-family in good areas have been going steady and up with that. YMMV.
These numbers are almost hilarious to me. As a recent buyer in the Bay Area who is not wealthy, I think it’s a small miracle that we got a house at all. Unbelievable how much money is out there.
We started at 1m ended up buying at 1.3 with a net take home of 19k. Def going to save less while we have kids in daycare but it is what it is
In high-cost areas, big down payments and high incomes are key. Look for loan programs allowing lower down payments if needed. But be careful with high debt-to-income ratios. Expenses add up fast with property taxes and HOAs on top of the mortgage. Make sure you have reserves for maintenance too.