[jbb555]

The money is certainly important. But buying is better than renting in many ways. Want to rip out your kitchen and have a new one? Want to pave part of the garden? Want to move a wall? Want to paint it all, or fit blinds?

If you own it you can do all that. If you rent you have to ask permission which you might not get. Plus why spend money on somewhere you don't own?

[batou]

It's a trade off.

I live in London, UK in a flat I rent for £950 pcm. This would cost me £379,000 to buy, at the very least as it's a relatively nice area.

I could scrape the deposit and get a £379,000 mortgage but the insurance, maintenance and other costs on top would result in zero disposable income.

Currently I have £1750 left over every month which is nothing but bags of freedom to do whatever I want.

If I was to drop dead on Monday, the last great event wouldn't be getting Magnet in to do my kitchen, painting the living room ceiling and sitting in all weekend eating Tesco Value food. It would be chilling next to Lake Geneva in Lausanne with my other half which is exactly what I'm doing.

Live life now before it's over.

Edit: This is based on the advice of my wife's grandparents who are just about hanging on at the age of 84 and 86 respectively. They had to cancel their cruise this year due to poor health and openly admit that they worked way too hard for a house. They have a nice £1m house in London and a pile of savings but it's worth nothing to them now because their health is gone. It's empty as the children have left and they realised the memories were more important than the bricks.

So, sod buying a house. I'll live an irresponsible yet fulfilling life now.

[erichmond]

Phenomenal comment. Hopefully people read this and contemplate it. I've gone through an intense period of my life with respect to life and death, and a couple of years ago I only thought about "doing the right thing", now I ensure I enjoy each day I have, because nothing is promised and possessions are ultimately useless.

[saiya-jin]

you know, some of us DO hangout around lake geneva (or any other pretty place), have most of weekends done like there's no tomorrow (mountains, adventures, traveling etc. practically every weekend) and still manage to invest into whatever they prefer (right now selling flat in Prague, and considering one in Chamonix). That's my sweet spot in life right now. We'll see how long life will keep me in it, before throwing into something wild, as usual :)

It's not irresponsible to spend money on traveling and adventures. You get back much more than nice time there and couple of photos and souvenirs - you are exposed to new environment, people, culture etc. and you'll grow inside in a subtle, yet steady way. On the other hand, usual "buying stuff you don't need to impress people you don't care about" is useless, and won't even bring any long term happiness.

[giulianob]

Not sure if it's a difference in location but where I live it would cost me more per month to rent a similar property than what I own. If I wanted to save, I'd have to rent a smaller place instead.

[batou]

You're probably right but will it in 5 years is the question you need to ask?

You always pay over the odds to rent initially but due to inflation and relative property prices it becomes good value rather quickly.

[giulianob]

It wasn't before the market crashed but it's been much cheaper to buy than to rent where I live at least.

[knodi123]

it's definitely a balancing act, where the balance point depends on your own personality and proclivities. However, I think we can all agree that a formula involving London home prices is not going to be very representative of the rest of the world! ;-)

[batou]

Actually in the tech sector the price vs salary ratio is pretty consistent all over the UK. The prices are high in London but you earn a pile of cash. The inverse is also true elsewhere.

London is one of those crazy places where a job jump can actually get a salary boost larger than the national average salary in its entirety which is where the short term advantage is if you know how to play the market.

[rm999]

Renting is the best option for flexibility. Want to add a bedroom? Want to change neighborhoods? Just lost your job and want to downgrade? Want to move closer to your new job, or an entirely new state? These are all good, common use-cases for renting. BTW, a lot of landlords will let you modify your place - some will even chip in for the costs or pay it all.

>Plus why spend money on somewhere you don't own?

People have this mentality that renting is throwing out money. It's not - it turns your housing into another explicit cost like food and travel. I like this, I think too many people make the biggest investment decision of their lives (often by orders of magnitude) so lightly. And anyway, when you own, the costs that would go to renting are priced in, like: taxes, upkeep, opportunity costs, and interest payments. There is no free lunch - even the home ownership tax benefits get priced into housing costs.

[saiya-jin]

There are locations, and I live on one of them, where finding an accomodation, even with stable long term 150k USD/year single pet-less guy is a few month effort of chasing 100s of appartments, until one will work out. You are nto in position to actually pick anything.

On this thread it's visible that people try to promote their own decisions in this topic (and we all have been into it deep down). Let me put mine - I took loan 8 years ago, in a different country, on a small appartment that when looking back, wasn't the best idea (but neither really bad). Mind you, it was in 2007 :) Surprisingly the price didn't drop below the one I paid, but the pressure to bring every month enough cash to make it through was... not nice. THe perspective to have similar setup for next 20 years was a bit sould-crushing though (it was 50m appartment, so nothing to raise your family in).

But, this pressure forced me off my lazy but, I temporarily moved to another country to earn more and pay it off asap, realized that this country is SO much better than previous one (which wasn't my home anyway), so I decided to stay. 5 years forward, probably the best decision of my life (and there were heaps of people saying I should settle where I am instead of move).

[vonmoltke]

> BTW, a lot of landlords will let you modify your place - some will even chip in for the costs or pay it all.

Where are all these landlords, because the ones I have experience with in Florida, Texas, and Virginia get pissed if you so much as nail a picture to the wall.

[edj]

Providence, RI: interior paint.

Fairfield, IA: all maintenance as well as on-going renovations at $25/hr plus materials.

San Francisco, CA: interior paint, garden, chicken coop, converted garage into bedroom.

Portland, OR: extensive tear out and renovation, removed walls, renovated kitchen, new wiring and lighting, converted attic into bedroom, finished basement and added bedroom -- all on the owner's dime. Also, we built a kiln and a giant skate ramp in the backyard.

So it is possible. Although admittedly, I do have a knack for finding laid back landlords.

[bhayden]

The Portland example is dangerous territory, because now they have a home they can rent for much more per month and might kick you out. Then you just lived in a construction zone doing free labor for a year for nothing.

[aroch]

Hanging paintings with nails is typically considered part of legally defined normal wear-and-tear. If your landlord is getting angry at you using the place you're renting in a reasonable manner, than perhaps you're renting from the wrong people.

[vonmoltke]

So, that seems to be an open question in Texas. The Texas law leaves a lot up to interpretation, so reversing charges for nail holes would require suing your landlord. I'm not sure, but I think the situations in Florida and Virginia are similar.

[saturdaysaint]

Want to live somewhere else without making a life-altering financial transaction that could lower your net worth tens of thousands of dollars?

[eueueu]

Property will always increase over the long term. Unless you're moving every 6 months this isn't a good reason.

Of course selling your house and buying a new one will take a few months, so it does restrict your mobility in that way.

[refurb]

Property will always increase over the long term.

I'm not picking on you, but it's amazing how quickly Americans (not saying you're from the US) forget economic events that happened only a few years back.

There are many places in the US where housing prices haven't come close to the peak in 2007. I knew several folks who lost a ton of money ($100K+) on real estate back then. It seems like all of those concerns have evaporated in the last 8 years.

[atwebb]

Maybe on the whole but your personal investment is highly centralized and is in no way guaranteed to go up over any period of time.

[akgerber]

My parents bought a 2-family in Milwaukee in 1980 for around $30,000. They sold it in 1988 for around $30,000. It's still worth around $30,000, if it's still standing and maintained.

And Milwaukee is not, by a long shot, Detroit— it's still barely below its peak population. Wages have declined, however— an average young person when my parents were young would make the same amount of money as in San Francisco: http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/02/for-grea...

(All of these numbers are nominal dollars— the house has significantly declined in real value.)

[eueueu]

8 years isn't the long term. Sorry if this wasn't obvious.

[pitt1980]

"Property will always increase over the long term"

what makes you think this is the case?

for all the singularity and robot economy talk on here, if give those things have even a small chance of occurring, over 30 years that adds significant risk to real estate values across the United States

that's essentially like the factory in town going out of business across most of the country

----------------------------

[wazoox]

And when the factory employing most of the people in the town closes down, you're stuck with a virtually worthless property forever. Buying may have real downsides when you need to work for a living...