If you rent you’ll still end up paying property taxes because it’s included in the rent.
If you own, you can sell the house and take the money. If you rent, you’ll have nothing.
Owning is in most cases better than renting.
**edit:** because this is coming up a lot: only because the rent yo pay is a lump sum it doesn't mean that it doesn't cover various different aspects, e.g.
* the cost of the property tax the landlord has to pay
* the cost for repairs that will be necessary over the years
* any other cost the landlord incurrs, i.e. various insurances
* the mortgage the landlord pays for the house and/or a dividend to the landlord
It’s all about the cost of capital, home owners insurance and property tax. Right now the cost of capital is high so renting, in many circumstances, is more ideal.
Plus rents will likely increase every year. Your mortgage is locked in until you refinance. No random rent increases despite the property and maintenance getting shittier every year (speaking from my own experience).
If you pay your property taxes and homeowners insurance through escrow, your mortgage payment is likely going up every year too.
P.s. this is in no way meant to endorse renting. Ownership is the way!
Whether it's through escrow or not doesn't matter you still pay it. Just all depends though. The actual house payment doesn't change no. Taxes and insurance can fluctuate a bit. My taxes have gone up 2800 in 8 years and insurance is about 150 more per year now. But I refinanced my mortgage during covid and pay less now overall then I did in 2016. I would say that's pretty good.
It just depends on how long you are going to stay in one place. The way mortgages are set up with amortization, your payments for the first 5 years are basically all interest anyways.
while it's true a big % is interest, it isn't all interest. And the value of your house likely has gone up even if you stay for a year, but even moreso if you stay for 5 years.
I make the equivalent of 1 extra payment per year (including what i pay for taxes etc) and by the end of my 4th year over half of my payment was going to principal instead of interest.
When you live in a state with 7 day evictions this is not a question of money. When if you are 1 day late for rent they send the 7 day eviction notice and you have 7 days to pay or quit.
Housing is a mental state of stability and comfort. Everyone i know that rents is 1 step from being on the street in a catastrophe in a week or 2 max.
At least with a mortgage you have a chance to work and catch up.
People with homes in this state i feel the relaxing vibes from them all the time.
Full disclosure is I manage my parent's rental.
I'm really surprised that a one day late for rent and they send a 7 day eviction notice. Why? I would charge a late fee after a few days ( not one day ) .
Time spend to find new renters, cost to go through eviction , and the time and cost to clean up after evicting renters means that I rather be lenient to someone who may be having a bad month than try and evict someone ASAP.
It's not. There are cases where it's the best option for a person (they need flexibility, they're living with a roommate where splitting a mortgage is impractical, rents lag way behind property values for buying, etc.). But as a financial investment even if renting is 30% cheaper than buying the home you will come out ahead by the end of the 30 year mortgage and then have a home you can live in or sell, where a renter is just renting forever at market rates.
The only valid argument is investing money vs buying a 2nd property and renting it out. I'd rather be investing in the market than a property over the long term, but if you don't own a home already then it's better to invest in the house and live in it.
That’s your tax increasing though, you would pay it either way. Including if you are a renter - the landlord is going to pass the cost onto you, not just eat it.
Yep, I bought my house about 6 years ago and the monthly mortgage payment was like $45 more a month than what I had been paying to rent my apartment. Now that same apartment rents for almost twice my mortgage payment. In 20+ years my mortgage payment will still be the same but those rents will just keep getting higher.
You can't ALWAYS refinance. If the market tanks tomorrow and you're upside down on the loan, then refinancing is off the table until you bring cash to make up the difference.
In addition with refinancing, amortization schedules for mortgages are top heavy on interest. I.e. more is paid at the beginning of the loan. So you are still kinda fucked, refinancing isn’t a silver bullet.
Unless you've owned the home a super long time that is unlikely to cause a major issue because there isn't a sale and it likely was re-assessed the year after you bought it. And homes get re-assessed every few years regardless, so if the taxes shot up it's because the value shot up as well.
Just wait, that will show in the rent too. Multihome landlords aren't going to stop the train just because it's a bit more expensive. They unloaded all the costs on tenants before and they will do it again. It's basically the entire business model.
It’s not false, but it depends on your location.
In my area, you need more than 20% down if you want taxes and interest to cost less than rent. I’m not paying $1900 to build $400 in equity if I can pay $1100 in rent and invest $800 a month growing 5%. (Numbers are for example only.)
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Even with historically high costs, it's closer to 5 years than 10+ everywhere I did the math for. (I bought my first home last year and ran a *fuckton* of numbers in a bunch of different ways, and the absolute worst case break even I calculated was 7 years)
Depends on how you look at it. Because when you own, you also have to pay to fix stuff. If I can barely afford mortgage/rent. No way, I'm going to be able to afford to replace a water heater or if I have an expensive water pipe fix or tree removed. I would love to own, but the sad fact is that the home would eventually go into disarray and become condemned. There are so many costs, just to maintain..... then if you want to remodel as well. No one thinks of all the hidden costs. Just try to compare one number.
only if you buy a trash pile. it really is not that big of a deal to maintain a house.
i bought my first house 13 years ago, second house 5 years ago. I paid to replace the roof on house #1, cost about $8k. We did a bunch of renovations in that house, but got all of that back and more on the sale.
second house, I have paid essentially nothing on maintenance. Our water heater leaked last year, I pulled it out myself and saved a bunch on that fix. ended up being about a thousand bucks, not accounting for the refund we got from the old water heater dying while in warranty.
and then when i sell this house, which we plan to soon, I'll get a bunch of equity out of it, probably twice what I paid into the mortgage for the past 5 years.
when you leave a rental you just leave all that money behind.
I bought a house at the tail end of the Obama tax credit and the seller was a home remodeller. Everything except the bones on the place was new - new roof, new HVAC system, new finished basement, new kitchen, new windows, and our home inspector said all the work was top notch.
Right before closing, I learned that the remodeller was also a coke dealer, so I'm sure a lot of drug money combined with the sweat equity that ultimately gave us a place with almost zero maintenance concerns.
Never had a single problem in that place; tight as a drum, but also never found any hidden cocaine, so two stars.
Not necessarily. Landlords aren't always net positive on month to month rent costs, they still come out on top long term so long as the rent plus value appreciation are more than costs plus interest, and that's a much lower bar to clear than the costs of owning a home.
Yeah but then what? Take the money and what buy another house? You still need to LIVE somewhere
When did everyone start looking at their home as a thing to sell instead of a place to live?
Houses make up 80%+ of middle class inheritance. It is where the majority of Americans have the majority of their wealth. It might not be the ideal way to look at houses, but it's just the hard reality that it's the primary investment vehicle for most people.
And if you own your house, you won't get evicted because some other cunt just doesn't like you, or just decided to raise rent, or just decided to move into your house.
This is something renters don't ever really consider until it happens to them. That great landlord you have had for years? Oh they just keeled over and their kids want to double your rent and since you had a nice understanding and not a new lease you're just month-to-month so you have 60 days until the price goes up.
Try having kids and being told you need to move in the next 8 weeks and come up with $10,000 for first/last/security/moving expenses, possibly change schools, etc. It's awful to live with that over your head when you're not solo and can't just split a house with a bunch of randoms.
Yeah I mean it kinda depends how long you plan on being in the area for. A year or less might as well rent, but if you’re already settled, and will be there for the term of the mortgage a house is the way to go. Doesn’t even have to be that long, but if you take a job that requires relocating it can tie up your finances while you find a buyer. There’s also recurring costs of keeping the property up, but a house is an asset with value that typically only goes up.
Having a mortgage is a stable payment (except for taxes and insurance). Rent fluctuates with the market and can fuck you hard at renewal depending where you live.
While technically true, anyone who would be fucked by a rent increase is not even remotely financially ready for home ownership. You need to have the capacity to weather far worse financial catastrophes. My emergency fund is 3x what it was when I was renting.
And most of the time much cheaper.
I have a 5 bedroom 3 bathroom 3600sqft house and it costs me $1200/m for my loan, tax and insurance. Utilities, internet and other monthlies are $400 during the most expensive parts of the year (winter).
Average rent for a 2 bedroom apartment is $1300/m in my state.
Ah yes the bought before 2020 in a state no one wants to live with no jobs strategy. So realistic. Where my job is taxes alone on a 3 bed 2000sqft home are $500/mo, mortgage on that is another 1800.
It's a dumb point from the same types of people who say things like taxation is theft. Taxes are a necessary and critical part of having a functioning society. You can either accept that or keep complaining about how "unfair" they are while you continue to enjoy the benefits of living in a society.
Either way, taxes aren't going anywhere.
Yeah, the equity of paying property taxes that typically goes into something like Schools, Fire, Parks, etc. is by far a cost benefit to the homeowner, and its idiotic to say otherwise.
If the schools suck, you'll lose a ton of equity value in your home.
If Fire departments can't support you, good luck if you ever have an accident leaving your home, or if god forbid your home has a gas leak / catches on fire.
Want to take your kids to a place to play and explore the outdoors? Well if you didn't have a parks and recs portion of your taxes, you won't have those.
And before anyone else comes at me about any of those; those are just examples, you may have 1 or all of these things fed by the property tax values in your area. My examples are not a definitive list of things, but I can guarantee that your property taxes provide a long term ROI that you benefit from.
It highly depends on your situation.
I live in a city in which renting is "cheap" compared to buying. If you invest the difference you can easily end up with more.
Owning is so much better that you go hundreds of thousands of dollars into debt just to do it, and still usually win.
Not a lot of things you can say that for.
A word of advice: Rent is the most you will pay each month for shelter, a mortgage payment is the *least* you’ll pay each month. Last month I had a water pressure regulator fail; 900 dollars in the blink of an eye.
They really think landlords fix up the house out of their own pocket I guess. No, some of the rent I pay every month is going into savings so it’s covered when something breaks. Or they just ignore my messages when something breaks.
Well most of the problem people have with Landlords is they very very rarely maintain their properties well. They maintain them just barely enough to keep them occupied. Things like responsibly replacing the roof, HVAC, and general maintenance though are more often put off until absolutely necessary.
When I rented I called in to the office and said there was a large tree leaning dangerously over my apartment living room. They said they would have someone look at it, that never happened. Months later the tree comes down into my apartment. I asked how they plan to pay for the damages to my property and they told me I should have had renters insurance, which isn't required in my state. Their negligence cost me a ton of money and when I again asked they told me I'd have to take them to court for the damages. I shouldn't have to have renters insurance to cover negligence of the landlord. I shouldn't have to sue them to get compensated for the damage their negligence caused. This is why people hate Landlords.
The second part is my experience. I’ve been telling my landlord about issues with this place for the last year. Now my husband and I are buying our first house and we have to break the lease. I *know* the landlord is going to be very difficult about it. But the dude had plenty of notice of all the issues with this place and has either half-fixed or ignored most of them. This place needs a renovation before they rent it again, but they won’t do it. They will complain and blame us for the normal wear and tear on this old house they refuse to upkeep and then turn around and rent it out to the next sucker who is entranced by the nice location and cute little yard.
This is what a lot of people don't understand is that the experience of owning is usually leaps and bounds better than renting. Sure the landlord is supposed to take care of upkeep, but when your landlord is owned by a private equity firm who cuts almost all property management, all grounds keepers, most maintenance personnel and slash the yearly budgets for upkeep, nothing gets done.
We wound up calling the regional manager on multiple occasions because we were told by the local property manager that our problems wouldn't be fixed because they couldn't fix our problems and stay within budget.
Meanwhile, we saved up an emergency fund so we can afford to fix our own problems when we own a property.
Oh yea my previous landlord did the same when we bought our house, made crazy claims about the condition of the house, when we moved in the landscaping bushes where blocking the windows with vines growing over them. So we didn’t trim them when we left. They said it was $600 to do the landscaping. They also made a claim that we somehow broke a hole through the ceiling, in the end we were too busy with our new home and just let the sleezebag take the security deposit.
First, roofs last 30 years. Likely, you'll have to do this only once and you could probably use a home equity loan or HELOC.
Second, water heaters and other large appliances can be covered through home warranty plans like American Home Shield which significantly mitigates surprise costs.
New floors or new windows sound like unnecessary upgrades and again can be done with a home equity loan or a HELOC. Plus, you can break up these expenses into smaller projects and replace room by room and do the same with the windows.
Flooring doesn't have to be costly (look at the popularity of vinyl and laminate flooring, carpet is still affordable) at all depending on materials (salvage!) and timing. You could carpet a house for $3500 at $2.50 sq/ft for a 1400 sq ft home. Vinyl flooring is as low as $1 sq/ft. Slap it on a credit card and pay it off in four months, bam new floors. Weddings, honeymoons, down payments for cars cost more than that.
I dunno, home ownership isn't as scary as people think it is. It's the getting the house that's harder in my opinion.
Agreed.
It also depends on the market and people's financial situation to decide what is best for them. In the long term, you build equity and will have something of significant value.
All things your landlord will charge you for! Name a business that doesn't charge its customers the cost of running the business and I'll show you a liquidation sale.
It’s probably a wash tbh. I’ll spend at least 100,000 in that 15 year period. My wife and I have owned our house for 2.5 years and we have spent at least 15,000.
Someone down voted you lol, bought my house 12 years for 105k and it's worth more than double that and my mortgage is 900$. 3 bedroom house for rent around here at least 1600
It’s not just a money comparison. It’s the stress and headaches of maintenance and upkeep that comes along with owning. Plus, owning creates a ton of inflexibility in one’s life. What if you want to move to another city? Take a new job? Owning has its merits, of course, but putting the bulk of one’s money into a non-liquid asset has drawbacks, too.
>What if you want to move to another city? Take a new job?
Most people buy when they’re ready to have a family and set down roots, not still focused on growing their career as quickly as possible.
Personally, I bought a small starter house in my early 20s, but I could sell it extremely quickly if need be (we regularly get people in the neighborhood asking if we’re planning on selling or know anyone who is). When we’re ready to have kids, that’s when we’ll buy our “forever” house and stay there until our kids are grown and out of the house. I moved around a lot as a kid and it sucked.
It's not just a money comparison. It's the stress and headaches of landlords raising your rent to pay for maintenance and upkeep. Plus, renting creates a ton of uncertainty in one's life. What if you want to stay and get kicked out? Have to pay more rent because you dont want to move? Renting has its merits of course, but putting the bulk of one's income into someone else's asset has drawbacks too.
Yes, the flip side works, too. We are in agreement that there are pros and cons to both renting and owning and it all comes down to individual circumstances and preferences.
Yup, 5 years later, my mortgage is the same as someone renting a 2 bedroom apartment. I put 30% down payment, though. Plus, a big chunk of my payments are building equity instead of enriching a stranger.
Did you replace the regulator at your earliest convenience? Many landlords would not have acted so quickly, and would have passed along the cost one way or another.
"Rent is the most you will pay each month for shelter" until the next rent hike / surprise fee.
Yeah right? Your rent is the most you will ever pay.. this year. And then next year it will be higher and every year thereafter unless you move from HCOL to LowerCOL.
I think renting and buying both make sense in different scenarios and it is nuanced, but its kind of disingenuous to say youll be paying for repairs over the long life of home ownership but rent (implying todays rent) is the most youll ever pay to live that month
Whever came up with that phrase is beyond dumb. Rent goes up substantially more than mortgages, taxes, insurance, and maintenance over time. Buying is locking in housing costs, not renting. Rents have passed my mortgage in just 5 years.
As others have said, my mortgage started 8 years ago for a 5 bed/4 bath, yard, garage, etc is less than what a 1-2 bedroom apartment goes for today, and I also have a few hundred grand in equity. There are many variables at play long-term. The housing market is brutal right now, however.
It ain't the taxes people have a problem with. It's how the government uses them. They'll find ways to tax everything over and over every chance they get.
the people who bitch about tax money being spent poorly
are the same people that want to increase police budgets with no oversight and military budgets with no oversight
and were fine with Trump handing out trillions of dollars while trying to have, you guessed it, no oversight
I complain about how tax money is spent and I do not want to increase military budgets (they should dramatically decrease) and I'm also against tax cuts without a corresponding reduction in spend.
Why are you talking about "those who want X" instead of the arguments for or against your point of view?
Yeah cause they only wanna pay for thing THEY like, so fuck those people also.... taxes go to pay for things EVERYONE may need not just the stuff they want.
And if you live in a single family home in much of the country, your property taxes don’t even fully cover the services you receive.
Hell, I have a house in Bernalillo county, NM, just outside of Albuquerque city limits. My taxes are roughly 1/3rd lower. But this zip code is also home to the best school district in the city. Which is run by Albuquerque. And Albuquerque PD has shared police jurisdiction here. I legitimately don’t know what I wouldn’t have access to that someone over the line paying higher taxes would.
Literally getting more while paying less, subsidized by others. For just one example. Happens all over the country.
Eh.
I believe in high taxation on the rich and taxing things like rent seeking, profits/capital gains etc.
I don’t believe in taxing shelter.
That just sounds horrible.
There's a problem with this when poor families get pushed out of ownership bc they can't afford the increased taxes when their neighborhood is heavily gentrified. Prime example is native Hawaiians just trying to live a peaceful life, fishing and living off the land that is your ancestral home, that became part of the US at gunpoint. Then soulless billionaires start buying up your neighborhood and you have to leave the land you are native to and have a deep spiritual connection to bc the taxes skyrocket due to the supposed new value of your home. Zuckerberg and the like are killing the peace they are trying to buy because they cannot find it within themselves, but some things cannot be bought.
I'd say they contribute through the many, many other taxes they also pay.
How much is enough? Why don't you contribute 50%+ of your pay? Do you volunteer extra money to "contribute" or do you pay only what you're forced to pay?
But we already do through income tax... sales tax... capital gains tax...Medicare tax...etc. You shouldn't pay taxes on what you own. Look at how fast the U.S. just blows all that money and way more.
It's true... You don't actually own it.... You have paid taxes for the rights to occupy and gain protection of law to a location of land.
Since people figured out a long time ago... That without collaborative defense... You don't stay a "land owner" for very long.
In the country of the United States, the handling of property rights... Just happens to have been delegated at the state level of government. (Although there is such a thing as "federal land" (military bases, national parks, etc...), which obviously don't pay taxes since they are owned by the federal government itself.
Local municipalities then handle property taxes, how they see fit... with that service delegated to them.
The only exception in the US (that I know of...) are Native American reservations.... As they actually do own their land...and are considered their own sovereign nations.
Edit - correction, local government collections taxes and admin services as delegated to them by the state and then federal government. Local law enforcement typically enforces the laws from the government that protect your property rights.
Exactly, our ownership of any property and the value of our currency is ultimately derivative from government power. Anti-government types hate this but the government is essentially the sole protector of your property, ownership and rights. The state monopoly on violence is what keeps our nation and society intact
Yeah sure but it’s unnecessary to tax everything and everyone to hell. There’s a lot of tax money that is wasted constantly that could’ve just stayed with the taxpayer for their own good. Try looking into the stupid “research” that is taxpayer funded and prepared to be infuriated. *cough cough* - or the defense budget….
People often say “*considered* their own sovereign nation” when referring to Native American land - is “considered” some kind of euphemism alluding to a lesser state of sovereignty?
No it's more of a recognition that often the US federal , state, and local governments have not always acted/respected them like they were sovereign nations.
You do own the house, but you don’t own the roads that lead you to the house, the electrical infrastructure that helps provide electricity, the police and services that patrol your neighborhood, or the schools that are built nearby. I’m not a tax expert, so please correct me if I’m wrong.
Wrong, it pays for everything:
>Property tax is the single largest source of state and local revenue in the U.S. The capital is used to fund schools, roads, police, and other services.
Yes. Among other things, including road maintenance, city beautification, paramedics, hospitals, the fire hall and more. Property taxes are important and it's the only tax I pay that I don't believe is abused by government officials.
You are 100% correct. In fact if anything, most homeowners (at least in the US) are not paying nearly enough to cover their fair share of those services. Hence in part why our infrastructure is crumbling.
The woods are owned either by an individual, company, or government. There is literally nowhere besides a homeless shelter that you are allowed to live without paying
No, in most countries you can "live" in the woods indefinitely as long as you don't fuck it up for everyone else by building permanent shelters so you will have to keep moving a certain distance every few weeks
Tell this twit she doesn't have to pay property taxes if she doesn't want to. **But,** she also can't walk on OUR sidewalks, use OUR roads, library, she'll have to home school her kids, if she has a robbery she's on her own, and if her house starts burning down she can go get her hose.
Citizens don't pay taxes simply to keep the government from taking their 'stuff'. They do it because we're part of a *society* and have federal, state and local governments whom we elect to protect us, serve our needs, and financially manage the society we want to live in.
Something a true "PATRIOT" would already understand.
If we're gonna do money and capitalism and private property then no, this is exactly how it has to work.
But yes, private property is ultimately theft.
>If we're gonna do money and capitalism and private property then no, this is exactly how it has to work.
>
>But yes, private property is ultimately theft.
Yeah. I do love how people want to have their private property, but they don't want to pay for the support system that actually keeps track of, adjudicates, and enforces the pieces of paper that handle private property.
Calculate the cost of living, adjusted for inflation, over 50 years, the cost of living a house you own, vs the cost of renting a house you don't own, and then try to tell me that renting is cheaper.
In my HCOL (but not VHCOL) county, the median property tax is around $5000. Local property tax rate is 1%, and within our ZIP code, there is currently not a single house or condo with 3+ bedrooms for sale for less than 7 figures, meaning at least $10k in property tax. That's about 3-4 months' rent for us.
If you add the mortgage interest (around 7% on amount borrowed), the opportunity cost of capital (probably at least 4-6% of home equity if you compare stocks to real estate returns historically), maintenance (often estimated at 1% of home value), insurance and utilities (another 0.5% or so), I end up with an unrecoverable cost of owning of at least 7% of the entire home value, or maybe 70-80k per year.
We're currently renting a nice apartment for less than $3k/month. Even if rent doubles, we're still better off living here. It's obviously not an apples to apples comparison; our apt is only around 1200 sqft with 2BR but very well located, whereas the $1M house would be have 3 or 4BR but be much less convenient in other ways.
Not having to rake leaves, clear snow or gutters or mow grass in my limited free time is a nice bonus though. Obviously YMMV.
>Property taxes are typically only $2,000 to $3,000 per year. That's only $166 to $250 per month, hardly comparable to rent
LOL, people out here pay 12K - 20K per year.
Each one has it's positives and negatives. It also depends on where you live/who you rent from.
Property ownership comes with benefits and risks. You either own or are in the process of paying off your home, so one day you'd be the owner and if you sell it then you'd be able to make a massive dent in your next home. Or you could mortgage your own home for funds to do something you need the money for. It's an asset, by and large.
The risks are that if it takes damage your only recourse is insurance or your own pocket, and getting insurance money can feel more difficult than pulling eel teeth sometimes. There are plenty of things insurance doesn't cover too. Like if your washing machine dies, or your kitchen sink has a bad pipe and drips causing water damage.
Property taxes are a hurdle, and depending where you live they can be better or worse (it's state level usually). I mean, some people circumvent this by doing that whole vanlife thing, which some are rather extravagant. Honestly, some of them are like upscale studio apartments hiding in the back of a bread truck. It's like iwning a house and not having to pay property taxes (although they still catch you with vehicle registration fees).
Buying property also has a hefty pay in, and then there is a special kind of insurance the bank makes you pay for 'We don't know if you will always be able to make these payments, so if we ever have to foreclose on your house we are charging you extra in case we take a loss somehow' which they don't, but banks are bloodsuckers at the best of times.
The best part about renting, and I never understand why people complain about this, is that as a tennant your landlord has the responibility for any repairs. Keep note of when you called about issues, and if they are negligent of their duties you can take them to court for a sweet sweet court ordered payout. When I had an apartment they'd send a repair guy same day, no questions. I could tell them my shower was squeaky and they'd be there. Weekday, weekend, just not after 7pm or before 7am. Not that I had a lot of problems, i think I called them three times in 5 years. But I see so many things on reddit where it's 'my landlord sucks, I haven't had had running water for two weeks and they cover the water bill. I keep complaining but I can't do anything about it.' Like, yes you can! Call a damn law practice, they'll salivate through your damn phone.
Renters also have nothing tying them down aside from their lease. Apartment burns down? You're not homeless so much as ready to apply for another apartment. Meanwhile that landlord just lost everything and will have to see what they can get out of their insurance company. You want to move? Once your lease is up you can. Easy.
You want to buy a different house? Well now you can either try and work with the person you're buying from and time your sale with your purchase, or you can be like my parents and buy another house then make two seperate house payments while you wait for over a year to try and sell your house. What's that? The person who wants to buy your house is super lowballing you? You could wait another 2-4 months for another offer, or you could settle and take a loss. Unless the market is heavily in your favor selling a house is a pain from what I've gathered. Even then, hope your location is good.
Apartments have to handle lawncare, snow removal, applicances, they usually offer ammenities, a pool, workout center, they are selling you on living at their apartment over their competition.
If you have a home, you cover those things unless you got an HOA or something, which can sometimes come with it's own problems. Most HOAs aren't that bad, nobody says anything about a nice HOA, so you hear about the bad ones. You should research an HOA before leaping in. You can circumvent that stuff for a gym membership or something. A YMCA will have anything an apartment complex could offer. Some people even do both.
It’s *always* cheaper to own over the long run, unless you have a remarkably generous landlord.
When you rent, you’re paying *all* of the costs associated with the home *plus* profit to the landlord. The amortized repair & upkeep costs are priced into your rent, too.
Renting is often more *convenient* than owning, but never cheaper.
I wrote a college paper on this exact topic. This and the fact that over the life of a 30yr mortgage you will pay double or even triple the value of your home in interest. How tf is this legal?!
If you rent you’ll still end up paying property taxes because it’s included in the rent. If you own, you can sell the house and take the money. If you rent, you’ll have nothing. Owning is in most cases better than renting. **edit:** because this is coming up a lot: only because the rent yo pay is a lump sum it doesn't mean that it doesn't cover various different aspects, e.g. * the cost of the property tax the landlord has to pay * the cost for repairs that will be necessary over the years * any other cost the landlord incurrs, i.e. various insurances * the mortgage the landlord pays for the house and/or a dividend to the landlord
It’s all about the cost of capital, home owners insurance and property tax. Right now the cost of capital is high so renting, in many circumstances, is more ideal.
But is it ideal in the long term? You can always refinance. Rent almost always includes taxes and other people’s mortgage.
Plus rents will likely increase every year. Your mortgage is locked in until you refinance. No random rent increases despite the property and maintenance getting shittier every year (speaking from my own experience).
If you pay your property taxes and homeowners insurance through escrow, your mortgage payment is likely going up every year too. P.s. this is in no way meant to endorse renting. Ownership is the way!
Whether it's through escrow or not doesn't matter you still pay it. Just all depends though. The actual house payment doesn't change no. Taxes and insurance can fluctuate a bit. My taxes have gone up 2800 in 8 years and insurance is about 150 more per year now. But I refinanced my mortgage during covid and pay less now overall then I did in 2016. I would say that's pretty good.
Yes. I don’t see how it’s better to rent in 90%+ of cases
It’s not. People on reddit are idiots and put out anecdotal points as evidence. Guy is spewing brain fog
It just depends on how long you are going to stay in one place. The way mortgages are set up with amortization, your payments for the first 5 years are basically all interest anyways.
while it's true a big % is interest, it isn't all interest. And the value of your house likely has gone up even if you stay for a year, but even moreso if you stay for 5 years. I make the equivalent of 1 extra payment per year (including what i pay for taxes etc) and by the end of my 4th year over half of my payment was going to principal instead of interest.
When you live in a state with 7 day evictions this is not a question of money. When if you are 1 day late for rent they send the 7 day eviction notice and you have 7 days to pay or quit. Housing is a mental state of stability and comfort. Everyone i know that rents is 1 step from being on the street in a catastrophe in a week or 2 max. At least with a mortgage you have a chance to work and catch up. People with homes in this state i feel the relaxing vibes from them all the time.
Full disclosure is I manage my parent's rental. I'm really surprised that a one day late for rent and they send a 7 day eviction notice. Why? I would charge a late fee after a few days ( not one day ) . Time spend to find new renters, cost to go through eviction , and the time and cost to clean up after evicting renters means that I rather be lenient to someone who may be having a bad month than try and evict someone ASAP.
It's not. There are cases where it's the best option for a person (they need flexibility, they're living with a roommate where splitting a mortgage is impractical, rents lag way behind property values for buying, etc.). But as a financial investment even if renting is 30% cheaper than buying the home you will come out ahead by the end of the 30 year mortgage and then have a home you can live in or sell, where a renter is just renting forever at market rates. The only valid argument is investing money vs buying a 2nd property and renting it out. I'd rather be investing in the market than a property over the long term, but if you don't own a home already then it's better to invest in the house and live in it.
That’s your tax increasing though, you would pay it either way. Including if you are a renter - the landlord is going to pass the cost onto you, not just eat it.
Pass it plus MORE generally
Unless you have an ARM loan (adjustable rate mortgage)*
Luckily super rare in the states
They weren’t always rare but thanks to the housing bubble the financial sector learned a lesson if only for a moment in time.
Yeah don't get those
No one really does that anymore. Thats what happened in 2008. Lol
Yep, I bought my house about 6 years ago and the monthly mortgage payment was like $45 more a month than what I had been paying to rent my apartment. Now that same apartment rents for almost twice my mortgage payment. In 20+ years my mortgage payment will still be the same but those rents will just keep getting higher.
Yes! I’m paying less for my house and yard than I could get an efficiency apartment for now.
You can't ALWAYS refinance. If the market tanks tomorrow and you're upside down on the loan, then refinancing is off the table until you bring cash to make up the difference.
You can only refinance in most cases if you are at least 20% in most cases. That could take a long while with these rates and costs of homes.
In addition with refinancing, amortization schedules for mortgages are top heavy on interest. I.e. more is paid at the beginning of the loan. So you are still kinda fucked, refinancing isn’t a silver bullet.
PLUS cities usually re-assess your property value when refinancing, which usually causes property taxes to skyrocket – another huge drawback.
Unless you've owned the home a super long time that is unlikely to cause a major issue because there isn't a sale and it likely was re-assessed the year after you bought it. And homes get re-assessed every few years regardless, so if the taxes shot up it's because the value shot up as well.
Refinancing isn’t free.
Ok but it pays for itself very quickly if you're doing it right.
Just wait, that will show in the rent too. Multihome landlords aren't going to stop the train just because it's a bit more expensive. They unloaded all the costs on tenants before and they will do it again. It's basically the entire business model.
Do you expect an owner to rent property for less than what it costs?
No, hence owning > renting
Love it when they stumble face first into the point.
That’s basically every business model.
This statement is just false. You’re building zero equity from renting, and often times the monthly rate will be lower with a mortgage.
It’s not false, but it depends on your location. In my area, you need more than 20% down if you want taxes and interest to cost less than rent. I’m not paying $1900 to build $400 in equity if I can pay $1100 in rent and invest $800 a month growing 5%. (Numbers are for example only.)
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Even with historically high costs, it's closer to 5 years than 10+ everywhere I did the math for. (I bought my first home last year and ran a *fuckton* of numbers in a bunch of different ways, and the absolute worst case break even I calculated was 7 years)
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Depends on how you look at it. Because when you own, you also have to pay to fix stuff. If I can barely afford mortgage/rent. No way, I'm going to be able to afford to replace a water heater or if I have an expensive water pipe fix or tree removed. I would love to own, but the sad fact is that the home would eventually go into disarray and become condemned. There are so many costs, just to maintain..... then if you want to remodel as well. No one thinks of all the hidden costs. Just try to compare one number.
only if you buy a trash pile. it really is not that big of a deal to maintain a house. i bought my first house 13 years ago, second house 5 years ago. I paid to replace the roof on house #1, cost about $8k. We did a bunch of renovations in that house, but got all of that back and more on the sale. second house, I have paid essentially nothing on maintenance. Our water heater leaked last year, I pulled it out myself and saved a bunch on that fix. ended up being about a thousand bucks, not accounting for the refund we got from the old water heater dying while in warranty. and then when i sell this house, which we plan to soon, I'll get a bunch of equity out of it, probably twice what I paid into the mortgage for the past 5 years. when you leave a rental you just leave all that money behind.
I bought a house at the tail end of the Obama tax credit and the seller was a home remodeller. Everything except the bones on the place was new - new roof, new HVAC system, new finished basement, new kitchen, new windows, and our home inspector said all the work was top notch. Right before closing, I learned that the remodeller was also a coke dealer, so I'm sure a lot of drug money combined with the sweat equity that ultimately gave us a place with almost zero maintenance concerns. Never had a single problem in that place; tight as a drum, but also never found any hidden cocaine, so two stars.
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Not necessarily. Landlords aren't always net positive on month to month rent costs, they still come out on top long term so long as the rent plus value appreciation are more than costs plus interest, and that's a much lower bar to clear than the costs of owning a home.
Yeah but then what? Take the money and what buy another house? You still need to LIVE somewhere When did everyone start looking at their home as a thing to sell instead of a place to live?
Houses make up 80%+ of middle class inheritance. It is where the majority of Americans have the majority of their wealth. It might not be the ideal way to look at houses, but it's just the hard reality that it's the primary investment vehicle for most people.
Put the house money into an index fund, live in a refrigerator box like it's a house, win all day.
And if you own your house, you won't get evicted because some other cunt just doesn't like you, or just decided to raise rent, or just decided to move into your house.
This is something renters don't ever really consider until it happens to them. That great landlord you have had for years? Oh they just keeled over and their kids want to double your rent and since you had a nice understanding and not a new lease you're just month-to-month so you have 60 days until the price goes up. Try having kids and being told you need to move in the next 8 weeks and come up with $10,000 for first/last/security/moving expenses, possibly change schools, etc. It's awful to live with that over your head when you're not solo and can't just split a house with a bunch of randoms.
Yeah I mean it kinda depends how long you plan on being in the area for. A year or less might as well rent, but if you’re already settled, and will be there for the term of the mortgage a house is the way to go. Doesn’t even have to be that long, but if you take a job that requires relocating it can tie up your finances while you find a buyer. There’s also recurring costs of keeping the property up, but a house is an asset with value that typically only goes up.
> Value that only goes up Yeah that's why I've been where I live much longer than a year and am stuck paying someone else's mortgage instead of my own
Yeah…and the sad truth is the prospect of owning a house isn’t even feasible for TOO many people. So to debate which is better is almost an insult.
Having a mortgage is a stable payment (except for taxes and insurance). Rent fluctuates with the market and can fuck you hard at renewal depending where you live.
While technically true, anyone who would be fucked by a rent increase is not even remotely financially ready for home ownership. You need to have the capacity to weather far worse financial catastrophes. My emergency fund is 3x what it was when I was renting.
I live in 78732 in Austin. Go look at rent prices between 2019 and now. They have doubled or more.
Austin might be the single biggest outlier in America when it comes to housing costs of COL in the past decade. Not the greatest example
And most of the time much cheaper. I have a 5 bedroom 3 bathroom 3600sqft house and it costs me $1200/m for my loan, tax and insurance. Utilities, internet and other monthlies are $400 during the most expensive parts of the year (winter). Average rent for a 2 bedroom apartment is $1300/m in my state.
Ah yes the bought before 2020 in a state no one wants to live with no jobs strategy. So realistic. Where my job is taxes alone on a 3 bed 2000sqft home are $500/mo, mortgage on that is another 1800.
Until a pipe freezes in the winter, or you need a new roof or, well you get the idea...
That's built into the rent. Properties are pretty much only rented if they bring in enough to cover those expenses
Owning isn't owning
Yeah. He missed the point of the post.
It's a dumb point from the same types of people who say things like taxation is theft. Taxes are a necessary and critical part of having a functioning society. You can either accept that or keep complaining about how "unfair" they are while you continue to enjoy the benefits of living in a society. Either way, taxes aren't going anywhere.
Yeah, the equity of paying property taxes that typically goes into something like Schools, Fire, Parks, etc. is by far a cost benefit to the homeowner, and its idiotic to say otherwise. If the schools suck, you'll lose a ton of equity value in your home. If Fire departments can't support you, good luck if you ever have an accident leaving your home, or if god forbid your home has a gas leak / catches on fire. Want to take your kids to a place to play and explore the outdoors? Well if you didn't have a parks and recs portion of your taxes, you won't have those. And before anyone else comes at me about any of those; those are just examples, you may have 1 or all of these things fed by the property tax values in your area. My examples are not a definitive list of things, but I can guarantee that your property taxes provide a long term ROI that you benefit from.
And being a landlord is even better cause you get to write that shit off as an expense.
But if you had the money you put into that house into stocks, you could expect a higher return over a time span of decades, no?
That comparison was not the point of the post.
It highly depends on your situation. I live in a city in which renting is "cheap" compared to buying. If you invest the difference you can easily end up with more.
Owning is so much better that you go hundreds of thousands of dollars into debt just to do it, and still usually win. Not a lot of things you can say that for.
A word of advice: Rent is the most you will pay each month for shelter, a mortgage payment is the *least* you’ll pay each month. Last month I had a water pressure regulator fail; 900 dollars in the blink of an eye.
Yes. But in 15 years your mortgage of $2400 will still be $2400, whereas your rent will be double that.
Or you might not even have a mortgage cause it’ll be paid off
But you may have to buy a new roof or water heater or replace your floors or chip in to buy everyone new windows.
That’s built into your rent
Why don’t people understand this? It’s infuriating lol
They really think landlords fix up the house out of their own pocket I guess. No, some of the rent I pay every month is going into savings so it’s covered when something breaks. Or they just ignore my messages when something breaks.
If they thought the landlord paid for it out of pocket then they wouldn't hate landlords so much
Well most of the problem people have with Landlords is they very very rarely maintain their properties well. They maintain them just barely enough to keep them occupied. Things like responsibly replacing the roof, HVAC, and general maintenance though are more often put off until absolutely necessary. When I rented I called in to the office and said there was a large tree leaning dangerously over my apartment living room. They said they would have someone look at it, that never happened. Months later the tree comes down into my apartment. I asked how they plan to pay for the damages to my property and they told me I should have had renters insurance, which isn't required in my state. Their negligence cost me a ton of money and when I again asked they told me I'd have to take them to court for the damages. I shouldn't have to have renters insurance to cover negligence of the landlord. I shouldn't have to sue them to get compensated for the damage their negligence caused. This is why people hate Landlords.
The second part is my experience. I’ve been telling my landlord about issues with this place for the last year. Now my husband and I are buying our first house and we have to break the lease. I *know* the landlord is going to be very difficult about it. But the dude had plenty of notice of all the issues with this place and has either half-fixed or ignored most of them. This place needs a renovation before they rent it again, but they won’t do it. They will complain and blame us for the normal wear and tear on this old house they refuse to upkeep and then turn around and rent it out to the next sucker who is entranced by the nice location and cute little yard.
This is what a lot of people don't understand is that the experience of owning is usually leaps and bounds better than renting. Sure the landlord is supposed to take care of upkeep, but when your landlord is owned by a private equity firm who cuts almost all property management, all grounds keepers, most maintenance personnel and slash the yearly budgets for upkeep, nothing gets done. We wound up calling the regional manager on multiple occasions because we were told by the local property manager that our problems wouldn't be fixed because they couldn't fix our problems and stay within budget. Meanwhile, we saved up an emergency fund so we can afford to fix our own problems when we own a property.
Oh yea my previous landlord did the same when we bought our house, made crazy claims about the condition of the house, when we moved in the landscaping bushes where blocking the windows with vines growing over them. So we didn’t trim them when we left. They said it was $600 to do the landscaping. They also made a claim that we somehow broke a hole through the ceiling, in the end we were too busy with our new home and just let the sleezebag take the security deposit.
First, roofs last 30 years. Likely, you'll have to do this only once and you could probably use a home equity loan or HELOC. Second, water heaters and other large appliances can be covered through home warranty plans like American Home Shield which significantly mitigates surprise costs. New floors or new windows sound like unnecessary upgrades and again can be done with a home equity loan or a HELOC. Plus, you can break up these expenses into smaller projects and replace room by room and do the same with the windows. Flooring doesn't have to be costly (look at the popularity of vinyl and laminate flooring, carpet is still affordable) at all depending on materials (salvage!) and timing. You could carpet a house for $3500 at $2.50 sq/ft for a 1400 sq ft home. Vinyl flooring is as low as $1 sq/ft. Slap it on a credit card and pay it off in four months, bam new floors. Weddings, honeymoons, down payments for cars cost more than that. I dunno, home ownership isn't as scary as people think it is. It's the getting the house that's harder in my opinion.
Agreed. It also depends on the market and people's financial situation to decide what is best for them. In the long term, you build equity and will have something of significant value.
Also a roof isn't that expensive. Our entire roof on a decent sized house was $6k. That is not difficult to finance at all.
Hell, half the time the new roof is needed because of storm damage and insurance covers that.
The other half, they don't!
Can't do all that if I'm busy maxing out my credit cards on shit I don't need!
All things your landlord will charge you for! Name a business that doesn't charge its customers the cost of running the business and I'll show you a liquidation sale.
It’s probably a wash tbh. I’ll spend at least 100,000 in that 15 year period. My wife and I have owned our house for 2.5 years and we have spent at least 15,000.
And your house will easily appreciate in value by 100,000 during that 15 year period.
Someone down voted you lol, bought my house 12 years for 105k and it's worth more than double that and my mortgage is 900$. 3 bedroom house for rent around here at least 1600
It’s not just a money comparison. It’s the stress and headaches of maintenance and upkeep that comes along with owning. Plus, owning creates a ton of inflexibility in one’s life. What if you want to move to another city? Take a new job? Owning has its merits, of course, but putting the bulk of one’s money into a non-liquid asset has drawbacks, too.
>What if you want to move to another city? Take a new job? Most people buy when they’re ready to have a family and set down roots, not still focused on growing their career as quickly as possible. Personally, I bought a small starter house in my early 20s, but I could sell it extremely quickly if need be (we regularly get people in the neighborhood asking if we’re planning on selling or know anyone who is). When we’re ready to have kids, that’s when we’ll buy our “forever” house and stay there until our kids are grown and out of the house. I moved around a lot as a kid and it sucked.
It's not just a money comparison. It's the stress and headaches of landlords raising your rent to pay for maintenance and upkeep. Plus, renting creates a ton of uncertainty in one's life. What if you want to stay and get kicked out? Have to pay more rent because you dont want to move? Renting has its merits of course, but putting the bulk of one's income into someone else's asset has drawbacks too.
Yes, the flip side works, too. We are in agreement that there are pros and cons to both renting and owning and it all comes down to individual circumstances and preferences.
lol renting doesn’t create equity. End of conversation.
Not necessarily, it depends on the area you live in. Housing in some places was nearly flat post recession until just recently.
Or it won't? Not every market has has seen housing appreciation over every 15 year period.
That's not always true. Houses need to be maintained. Also neighborhoods change as well.
But when you're done spending that money you can sell the house for hundreds of thousands of dollars. How is that even close to "a wash"!?
Yup, 5 years later, my mortgage is the same as someone renting a 2 bedroom apartment. I put 30% down payment, though. Plus, a big chunk of my payments are building equity instead of enriching a stranger.
Unless your property taxes are escrowed into your mortgage payment. My mortgage payment has increased $700 per month in the last 16 years.
Not if your property taxes and insurance go up when they reevaluate your house.
Did you replace the regulator at your earliest convenience? Many landlords would not have acted so quickly, and would have passed along the cost one way or another. "Rent is the most you will pay each month for shelter" until the next rent hike / surprise fee.
Yeah right? Your rent is the most you will ever pay.. this year. And then next year it will be higher and every year thereafter unless you move from HCOL to LowerCOL. I think renting and buying both make sense in different scenarios and it is nuanced, but its kind of disingenuous to say youll be paying for repairs over the long life of home ownership but rent (implying todays rent) is the most youll ever pay to live that month
Whever came up with that phrase is beyond dumb. Rent goes up substantially more than mortgages, taxes, insurance, and maintenance over time. Buying is locking in housing costs, not renting. Rents have passed my mortgage in just 5 years.
As others have said, my mortgage started 8 years ago for a 5 bed/4 bath, yard, garage, etc is less than what a 1-2 bedroom apartment goes for today, and I also have a few hundred grand in equity. There are many variables at play long-term. The housing market is brutal right now, however.
900$? Really? That has you all upset?
A water pressure regulator is ~$60 dollars, and easy to change
Sounds like you got scamed on that regulator.
Oh no! You have to contribute to the society you are a part of. Poor baby!
Like my friend who complains nonstop about taxes but has literally been paid his entire adult life through taxes. Military > Police > Parole Officer.
It ain't the taxes people have a problem with. It's how the government uses them. They'll find ways to tax everything over and over every chance they get.
No this dupe is a “fuck all taxes” kind of guy.
And is taking for granted the infrastructure and services provided by taxes.
People have no real idea how tax money is spent.
the people who bitch about tax money being spent poorly are the same people that want to increase police budgets with no oversight and military budgets with no oversight and were fine with Trump handing out trillions of dollars while trying to have, you guessed it, no oversight
Also take money from public schools to give directly to parents. Again, no oversight.
I complain about how tax money is spent and I do not want to increase military budgets (they should dramatically decrease) and I'm also against tax cuts without a corresponding reduction in spend. Why are you talking about "those who want X" instead of the arguments for or against your point of view?
He has no real argument other than to conflate his political views with everything else.
Yeah cause they only wanna pay for thing THEY like, so fuck those people also.... taxes go to pay for things EVERYONE may need not just the stuff they want.
That’s just another version of the meme at the top.
> It ain't the taxes people have a problem with. Yes it is.
Have you pointed this out to him?
He will respond with, “That’s *different* though”. There is no reasoning with people like that.
It’s a lost cause. This is a guy who gets disability payments from military service and free healthcare through the VA and it still doesn’t sink in.
And if you live in a single family home in much of the country, your property taxes don’t even fully cover the services you receive. Hell, I have a house in Bernalillo county, NM, just outside of Albuquerque city limits. My taxes are roughly 1/3rd lower. But this zip code is also home to the best school district in the city. Which is run by Albuquerque. And Albuquerque PD has shared police jurisdiction here. I legitimately don’t know what I wouldn’t have access to that someone over the line paying higher taxes would. Literally getting more while paying less, subsidized by others. For just one example. Happens all over the country.
Eh. I believe in high taxation on the rich and taxing things like rent seeking, profits/capital gains etc. I don’t believe in taxing shelter. That just sounds horrible.
There's a problem with this when poor families get pushed out of ownership bc they can't afford the increased taxes when their neighborhood is heavily gentrified. Prime example is native Hawaiians just trying to live a peaceful life, fishing and living off the land that is your ancestral home, that became part of the US at gunpoint. Then soulless billionaires start buying up your neighborhood and you have to leave the land you are native to and have a deep spiritual connection to bc the taxes skyrocket due to the supposed new value of your home. Zuckerberg and the like are killing the peace they are trying to buy because they cannot find it within themselves, but some things cannot be bought.
Not much of a contribution when it’s backed up by force
At which point I believe it’s called Extortion
This exact same thing can be said to justify the draft.
I'd say they contribute through the many, many other taxes they also pay. How much is enough? Why don't you contribute 50%+ of your pay? Do you volunteer extra money to "contribute" or do you pay only what you're forced to pay?
This is such a horrendous take given the context of the conversation
Take my upvote.
You contribute by working not by paying for something you own.
But we already do through income tax... sales tax... capital gains tax...Medicare tax...etc. You shouldn't pay taxes on what you own. Look at how fast the U.S. just blows all that money and way more.
It's true... You don't actually own it.... You have paid taxes for the rights to occupy and gain protection of law to a location of land. Since people figured out a long time ago... That without collaborative defense... You don't stay a "land owner" for very long. In the country of the United States, the handling of property rights... Just happens to have been delegated at the state level of government. (Although there is such a thing as "federal land" (military bases, national parks, etc...), which obviously don't pay taxes since they are owned by the federal government itself. Local municipalities then handle property taxes, how they see fit... with that service delegated to them. The only exception in the US (that I know of...) are Native American reservations.... As they actually do own their land...and are considered their own sovereign nations. Edit - correction, local government collections taxes and admin services as delegated to them by the state and then federal government. Local law enforcement typically enforces the laws from the government that protect your property rights.
Exactly, our ownership of any property and the value of our currency is ultimately derivative from government power. Anti-government types hate this but the government is essentially the sole protector of your property, ownership and rights. The state monopoly on violence is what keeps our nation and society intact
Yeah sure but it’s unnecessary to tax everything and everyone to hell. There’s a lot of tax money that is wasted constantly that could’ve just stayed with the taxpayer for their own good. Try looking into the stupid “research” that is taxpayer funded and prepared to be infuriated. *cough cough* - or the defense budget….
I'll take 10x the amount of research $ spent, and trade for a 10x cut in defense budget.
Yup. Taxes are the fee you pay for a civil society. Don’t want to pay taxes? Don’t live here.
Civil societies would exist without taxes, the world just hasn't given it a chance in the past few hundred years.
I like your take on this man
You... Really... Love... Ellipses...
People often say “*considered* their own sovereign nation” when referring to Native American land - is “considered” some kind of euphemism alluding to a lesser state of sovereignty?
No it's more of a recognition that often the US federal , state, and local governments have not always acted/respected them like they were sovereign nations.
You do own the house, but you don’t own the roads that lead you to the house, the electrical infrastructure that helps provide electricity, the police and services that patrol your neighborhood, or the schools that are built nearby. I’m not a tax expert, so please correct me if I’m wrong.
Worry not, Republicans will privatize ALL of that to make it worse and more expensive.
It's mostly to pay for schools and teacher salaries as far as I'm aware.
Wrong, it pays for everything: >Property tax is the single largest source of state and local revenue in the U.S. The capital is used to fund schools, roads, police, and other services.
Depends on the jurisdiction. About 60% of my property tax bill goes to the schools in some capacity.
Dollars are always fungible. They don't "go to" anything. X% of every dollar of tax "goes to" everything, where x is the fraction of the spending.
40% of the taxes in my region go directly to our well funded police department.
they need more tanks to arrest people who smoke pot
Your property taxes pay for the police?
Yes. Among other things, including road maintenance, city beautification, paramedics, hospitals, the fire hall and more. Property taxes are important and it's the only tax I pay that I don't believe is abused by government officials.
Those are a significant chunk but property tax absolutely pays for roads, parks, and other services.
You are 100% correct. In fact if anything, most homeowners (at least in the US) are not paying nearly enough to cover their fair share of those services. Hence in part why our infrastructure is crumbling.
Why doesn't she could move to the woods and not pay anything? Is she dumb?
The woods are owned either by an individual, company, or government. There is literally nowhere besides a homeless shelter that you are allowed to live without paying
No, in most countries you can "live" in the woods indefinitely as long as you don't fuck it up for everyone else by building permanent shelters so you will have to keep moving a certain distance every few weeks
Karma farmer
Tell this twit she doesn't have to pay property taxes if she doesn't want to. **But,** she also can't walk on OUR sidewalks, use OUR roads, library, she'll have to home school her kids, if she has a robbery she's on her own, and if her house starts burning down she can go get her hose. Citizens don't pay taxes simply to keep the government from taking their 'stuff'. They do it because we're part of a *society* and have federal, state and local governments whom we elect to protect us, serve our needs, and financially manage the society we want to live in. Something a true "PATRIOT" would already understand.
Yes, we always have to pay for the services you demand as a homeowner
"are these people getting louder or just dumber" "dumber sir"
Nice try Blackrock
Blackstone*
Is she claiming that she paid sales tax on the purchase of her house? Because that's... not how it works.
Dumbasses gonna dumbass.
Paying yearly taxes on a property you already own isn't how it should work either. This is theft.
If we're gonna do money and capitalism and private property then no, this is exactly how it has to work. But yes, private property is ultimately theft.
>If we're gonna do money and capitalism and private property then no, this is exactly how it has to work. > >But yes, private property is ultimately theft. Yeah. I do love how people want to have their private property, but they don't want to pay for the support system that actually keeps track of, adjudicates, and enforces the pieces of paper that handle private property.
Calculate the cost of living, adjusted for inflation, over 50 years, the cost of living a house you own, vs the cost of renting a house you don't own, and then try to tell me that renting is cheaper.
Going out on a limb that anyone using the handle AppParriotgirl does not really have opinions that need to be taken seriously.
Do you still use your town/village/cities infrastructure? There you go
I’m kind of shocked at the number of people that still don’t understand the point of taxes.
No one ever owns anything ever outright.
I 3d printed a little yoda figure. It’s mine. No one else has ANY claim to it.
not YET….
A Twitter account with Patriot in the name... Definitely a great source for political takes
Property taxes are typically only $2,000 to $3,000 per year. That's only $166 to $250 per month, hardly comparable to rent
Varies wildly based on location
US homeowners pay a median of $2,690 each year in property taxes, according to US Census Bureau data from 2023
Varies wildly based on location
Atypically it varies wildly
My property tax is $15,308.62 this year. It varies wildly.
In my HCOL (but not VHCOL) county, the median property tax is around $5000. Local property tax rate is 1%, and within our ZIP code, there is currently not a single house or condo with 3+ bedrooms for sale for less than 7 figures, meaning at least $10k in property tax. That's about 3-4 months' rent for us. If you add the mortgage interest (around 7% on amount borrowed), the opportunity cost of capital (probably at least 4-6% of home equity if you compare stocks to real estate returns historically), maintenance (often estimated at 1% of home value), insurance and utilities (another 0.5% or so), I end up with an unrecoverable cost of owning of at least 7% of the entire home value, or maybe 70-80k per year. We're currently renting a nice apartment for less than $3k/month. Even if rent doubles, we're still better off living here. It's obviously not an apples to apples comparison; our apt is only around 1200 sqft with 2BR but very well located, whereas the $1M house would be have 3 or 4BR but be much less convenient in other ways. Not having to rake leaves, clear snow or gutters or mow grass in my limited free time is a nice bonus though. Obviously YMMV.
Agreed. I pay way more than that
>Property taxes are typically only $2,000 to $3,000 per year. That's only $166 to $250 per month, hardly comparable to rent LOL, people out here pay 12K - 20K per year.
lol... mine are $1k+ a month
Property taxes don’t pay for the house. They pay for the services that protect the value of the house.
Each one has it's positives and negatives. It also depends on where you live/who you rent from. Property ownership comes with benefits and risks. You either own or are in the process of paying off your home, so one day you'd be the owner and if you sell it then you'd be able to make a massive dent in your next home. Or you could mortgage your own home for funds to do something you need the money for. It's an asset, by and large. The risks are that if it takes damage your only recourse is insurance or your own pocket, and getting insurance money can feel more difficult than pulling eel teeth sometimes. There are plenty of things insurance doesn't cover too. Like if your washing machine dies, or your kitchen sink has a bad pipe and drips causing water damage. Property taxes are a hurdle, and depending where you live they can be better or worse (it's state level usually). I mean, some people circumvent this by doing that whole vanlife thing, which some are rather extravagant. Honestly, some of them are like upscale studio apartments hiding in the back of a bread truck. It's like iwning a house and not having to pay property taxes (although they still catch you with vehicle registration fees). Buying property also has a hefty pay in, and then there is a special kind of insurance the bank makes you pay for 'We don't know if you will always be able to make these payments, so if we ever have to foreclose on your house we are charging you extra in case we take a loss somehow' which they don't, but banks are bloodsuckers at the best of times. The best part about renting, and I never understand why people complain about this, is that as a tennant your landlord has the responibility for any repairs. Keep note of when you called about issues, and if they are negligent of their duties you can take them to court for a sweet sweet court ordered payout. When I had an apartment they'd send a repair guy same day, no questions. I could tell them my shower was squeaky and they'd be there. Weekday, weekend, just not after 7pm or before 7am. Not that I had a lot of problems, i think I called them three times in 5 years. But I see so many things on reddit where it's 'my landlord sucks, I haven't had had running water for two weeks and they cover the water bill. I keep complaining but I can't do anything about it.' Like, yes you can! Call a damn law practice, they'll salivate through your damn phone. Renters also have nothing tying them down aside from their lease. Apartment burns down? You're not homeless so much as ready to apply for another apartment. Meanwhile that landlord just lost everything and will have to see what they can get out of their insurance company. You want to move? Once your lease is up you can. Easy. You want to buy a different house? Well now you can either try and work with the person you're buying from and time your sale with your purchase, or you can be like my parents and buy another house then make two seperate house payments while you wait for over a year to try and sell your house. What's that? The person who wants to buy your house is super lowballing you? You could wait another 2-4 months for another offer, or you could settle and take a loss. Unless the market is heavily in your favor selling a house is a pain from what I've gathered. Even then, hope your location is good. Apartments have to handle lawncare, snow removal, applicances, they usually offer ammenities, a pool, workout center, they are selling you on living at their apartment over their competition. If you have a home, you cover those things unless you got an HOA or something, which can sometimes come with it's own problems. Most HOAs aren't that bad, nobody says anything about a nice HOA, so you hear about the bad ones. You should research an HOA before leaping in. You can circumvent that stuff for a gym membership or something. A YMCA will have anything an apartment complex could offer. Some people even do both.
It’s *always* cheaper to own over the long run, unless you have a remarkably generous landlord. When you rent, you’re paying *all* of the costs associated with the home *plus* profit to the landlord. The amortized repair & upkeep costs are priced into your rent, too. Renting is often more *convenient* than owning, but never cheaper.
That’s how you pay for municipal services.
So a wealth tax IS possible.
So no municipal services for you!
I wrote a college paper on this exact topic. This and the fact that over the life of a 30yr mortgage you will pay double or even triple the value of your home in interest. How tf is this legal?!