Priorities - Affordable Housing

There is a great deal of discussion on the issue of 'Affordable Housing'.  People (Politicians, Bankers, Realtors etc.) are looking at solutions from down payment assistance, tax credits, seller concesions, builder incentives - all of which help - but the area we might be overlooking at is ourselves!

My comments are based on my observations from my 25+ years experience in Real Estate and training in the business world of Credit & Finance.  I invite you to observe your own experiences and tell me if I am wrong or off target.  I speak from too much experience unfortunatly.

 

Many people buy their lifestyle first, then think about wealth second.  They get big car payments.  We rent - but we don't want to rent a small starter place - we want to rent to the lifestyle we are accustom too (our parents).  We want a place with a pool, a 2 car garage, with a yard. Then we need to fill that place with furniture - not second hand, but new stuff.  We tend to finance the sofa and bed at high interest rates.  Then kids come and we need a bigger place to rent and new mini van to drive them in.  All of a suddent - 5 or 10 years later we want to buy a house.  But with our debt levels and no savings we can't buy a dream house.  We don't want to buy a starter home now - we want to keep the lifestyle. We have no desire to leave our 3 or 4 bedroom rental that we can barely afford to buy a starter home because the kids need their own bedrooms, we need a garage for 'stuff'.  We want someone to come in and solve our 'affordability' problem.  

 

I KNOW everyone has a different story - but like a hallmark movie I think only the names of the characters change but the life-plot is often the same.  

 

THEN GOOD NEWS is that anyone can buy a home if they are willing to (1) be intentional with the planning and (2) set realistic expectations for themselves.  MORE GOOD NEWS.  Anyone can start today and in short order make enough changes that they can become homeowners.  As a Ramsey Trusted Pro I'd love to show you how and work with you.  IF you're ready to make a change - lets talk.